Coordinating Expertise Across Knowledge Boundaries in Offshore-Outsourcing Projects: The Role of Codification1
Authors: Kotlarsky, Julia; Scarbrough, Harry; Oshri, Ilan
Journal: MIS Quarterly (2014)
DOI: 10.25300/misq/2014/38.2.13
<jats:p>The coordination of effort within and among different expert groups is a central feature of contemporary organizations. Within the existing literature, however, a dichotomy has emerged in our understanding of the role played by codification in coordinating expert groups. One strand of literature emphasizes codification as a process that supports coordination by enabling the storage and ready transfer of knowledge. In contrast, another strand highlights the persistent differences between expert groups that create boundaries to the transfer of knowledge, seeing coordination as dependent on the quality of the reciprocal interactions between groups and individuals. Our research helps to resolve such contested understandings of the coordinative role played by codification. By focusing on the offshore-outsourcing of knowledge-intensive services, we examine the role played by codification when expertise was coordinated between client staff and onsite and offshore vendor personnel in a large-scale outsourcing contract between TATA Consultancy Services (TCS) and ABN AMRO bank. A number of theoretical contributions flow from our analysis of the case study, helping to move our unders…