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Collaborations between public administrations and private sector represent a specific challenge to manage contractual and organizational relationships among partners with different goals, working cultures, norms, rules and processes. Therefore, the main research question of this paper is: What are the antecedents of effective collaboration in public-private IT outsourcing relations? Thus, the purpose of this paper is to identify the determinants of collaborative interface characteristics as scaffolding structures to manage public-private IT outsourcing relations effectively.

Two cases of public-private IT outsourcing relationships in Mexico were used to compare and contrast the main antecedents of collaborative interface characteristics. Case selection was based on the success in each case, as perceived by the collaborating members involved. A successful case and a less successful case of application development for the provision of public services from two state administrations in Mexico were chosen. Data gathering took place via face-to-face interviews.

The quality of the organizational interface depends on the interactions between exchange of knowledge and mutual trust, along with the commitment between partners. Trust, commitment and knowledge sharing interacted to enhance interface characteristics that have an impact on public and political values.

This paper used and extended an outsourcing technology enactment model to emphasize the quality of organizational interfaces as a main antecedent for the success of public-private IT outsourcing relations.

Effectively designing work practices and contracts implies the development of flexible contracts, objects and routines to adjust project requirements to fulfill better public-private goals. Such flexible contracts and practices are only possible in a trusting environment where participants shape their mutual understanding of the project.

The paper contributes to the literature on public-private IT outsourcing relationships by offering a theoretical framework on key antecedents and processes of success of these relationships.

The authors propose a conceptual model that explains how interorganizational relations in public-private IT outsourcing (ITO) may enhance public value in public administrations through process improvement.

The research design is based on the development of a theoretical framework based on the integration of transaction cost theory (TCT) and the resource-based view (RBV), and empirical interview data from IT managers in state and local governments in Mexico.

First, public-private ITO does produce specific process improvements in Mexico's public administration given its specific institutional context. Second, public value depends on the alignment between the characteristics of IT project activities and the attributes of outsourcing as a mode of governance. Third, process improvements moderate this relation. Fourth, relevant process improvements are identified on an empirical basis, showing the importance of institutional conditions in the determination of public value through interorganizational relationships in the public sector.

The authors suggest new roles for public managers as orchestrators of interorganizational relations, and specify the orientation relevant process improvements could take in a specific institutional context.

Through this study, it is possible to gain both theoretical and practical understanding of process improvements in public administrations to enhance public value.

This article analyzes the impact of the national culture, the dependence of the sector of activity on human capital, and the multinational character of the firm involved, on the degree of implementation of high performance work practices (HPWPs) in Ibero-American companies.

This quantitative study results from a survey of 614 Ibero-American firms, in 6 different countries. Multiple regressions were performed to test the hypothesis proposed.

HPWPs for employee recruitment and selection have been frequently implemented in Ibero-American countries. Three factors, i.e. national culture, degree of multinationality, and degree of dependence of the sector of activity on human capital, have a strong influence on the degree of implementation of HPWPs in general, at different degrees. For example, recruitment and selection practices are conditioned by the degree of multinationality, individualism, uncertainty avoidance, and power distance, while they are not influenced by masculinity and by the sector of activity.

HR managers must align the design and execution of HPWPs with the national culture, and with the characteristics of the sector of activity, they belong to. Domestic companies should also aspire to achieve the higher standards of multinational companies for specific HPWPs.

This study, to the authors’ best knowledge, is the first to provide insights into the influence of the three factors mentioned above on the degree of implementation of HPWPs in Ibero-American firms, using multiple regression analysis. The authors examine in this article a larger set of HPWPs than does most of the existing empirical literature.

The purpose of this paper is to study the status of the individual self in the emergence of change initiatives in organizations.

This theoretical paper examines the emergence of change initiatives through the building of agents’ capacity to act, based on a theory of action inspired by Paul Ricœur.

This paper identifies the “course of recognition” to favor the emergence of change initiatives and the building of the capacity to act of agents, respecting the autonomy at the individual level, a sense of care at the group level and justice at the institutional level.

The theoretical research can be extended with empirical studies dealing with the role of agents’ capacities in conflict management, the role of the “narrative self´” in change processes in organizations and the conjoint operationalization of autonomy care and justice to determine the agents’ capacity to act for initiatives to emerge.

It is important to develop a sense of shared leadership to nurture the capacity to act of agents to make change initiatives emerge in organizations, increasing organizational members’ feelings of being recognized.

So far, research has not provided satisfactory answers to the question about how to best initiate organizational change. The use of Ricœur’s theory of action adds value to the existing approaches as it addresses the source of the emergence of initiatives from agents’ feelings of their capacity to act, and integrates individual, group and institutional levels, which are rarely contemplated together.

The purpose of this paper is to explore how business organizations design and implement sustainability practices to foster competitive advantage.

This qualitative study is based on an exploratory multiple case study involving 11 Mexican hotels recognized as “champions” in sustainability. Data gathering took place via in-depth interviews with hotel managers.

The key internal resources and capabilities must be supported by integrated microfoundations. The interaction between attributes of key resources and microfoundations reveals four transversal dimensions, namely, leadership orientation, organizational culture, team-based organizational structures and human resources and control management systems to build a sustainability-based competitive advantage in the hospitality industry.

The implementation of sustainability processes in the hospitality industry depends on the ability of leaders to craft systems, build commitment and align interests and goals consistent with sustainability. Business managers may find some guidance for implementing sustainability-related initiatives from the results of this paper.

This work presents both theoretical and practical contributions, integrating and operationalizing a set of key resources (using the VRIO framework) and microfoundations approach to create and maintain a sustainability-based competitive advantage, in contrast to existing studies where those resources and conditions are examined in a piecemeal fashion.

Information technology (IT) constitutes an important driver for innovation in the public sector. However, taking advantage of IT to innovate requires the existence of other organizational and institutional capabilities within the public organization. Using absorptive capability theory, the purpose of this study is to explore the relationship between principles for IT governance and dynamic capabilities across semi-urban (between 10,000 and 149,000 inhabitants), urban (between 150,000 and 600,000 inhabitants) and metropolitan (more than 600,000 inhabitants ) municipal governments in Mexico.

This study reports on three workshops involving 34 chief information officers (CIOs) from semi-urban, urban and metropolitan municipalities. The workshop agenda included a series of brainstorming exercises to discuss – among other topics – the capabilities required for digital government innovation. The capabilities collected during the workshops were codified by the authors based on their relationship to the six IT governance standardized principles and the four dynamic capabilities identified in the literature. The authors used descriptive and correlation analyses to show the importance of governance principles and dynamic capabilities for innovation, as well as the relationships between those two dimensions, in each type of municipality.

This study shows that specific IT governance principles may enhance innovation capabilities linked with knowledge acquisition, assimilation, transformation and exploitation. Moreover, the ways in which IT governance principles support innovation are linked to size, resources and complexity of the local government. In conclusion, this study discusses the primary IT policy implications to improve possibilities to innovate in the public sector.

Although researchers and practitioners agree that following principles of good governance may enhance performance and innovation in the provision of public services, the link between the principles of IT governance and capabilities to spur innovation has not yet been fully established in the literature. Thus, in this study, empirical evidence of this linkage is provided.

This paper aims to propose a conceptual framework showing factors favoring the adoption of information systems (IS)-based service innovations in the public sector at the organizational level.

The research design is based on the development of a theoretical framework from the technology–organization–environment framework and from a case study of an outsourced IS-based electronic document management system from six different ministries in the same state in Mexico.

Strong contrasts in the degree of adoption of the service innovation appeared among various ministries involved in state government, revealing differences in the presence or absence of key variables, integrated into theoretical framework, including perception of external pressure; perception of benefits and risks and organizational readiness; and political, sociotechnical and economical inertia in given institutional conditions, leading to different public value outcomes associated with intraorganizational efficiencies and to the relationship between public administration and politicians.

Public managers must consider process mapping and sources of political, sociotechnical and economical inertia in given institutional conditions, to ensure a satisfactory adoption of service innovations in public administration and create public value. The promotion of a more structured and enduring professional career system in such context is another key to the adoption of innovations.

Based on theoretical and empirical grounds, the main contribution of this paper is to emphasize, through an integrated theoretical framework, the relatively unexplored roles of process mapping in organizational readiness and of political, sociotechnical and economic sources of inertia in relation to specific agents in the adoption of public sector service innovations at the organizational level in the context of the public administration in Mexico to produce public value.

The purpose of this article is to propose a theoretical model explaining information technology outsourcing performance in the public sector as well as a set of empirically testable propositions to improve the understanding of key determinants of success.

Based on Fountain ' s technology enactment framework, the authors integrated inter-organizational factors, such as trust, knowledge sharing, and quality of outsourcing interfaces, in the model and added organizational culture alignment between service providers and public administration to enhance Fountain ' s original framework.

The authors proposed 17 empirically testable propositions to establish the relationships between key variables in IT outsourcing projects in the public sector.

The proposed model provides guidance for future research aimed at advancing knowledge of IT outsourcing.

The contribution lies in the development of specific variables, such as trust, knowledge, and organizational culture, which are related to building an outsourcing relationship and are used as determinants of the quality of organizational interfaces between public bureaucracies and IT outsourcing providers.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how the type of logistics services required by firms is related to the freight characteristics, and to the cost and other dimensions of the services in Mexico.

The authors conducted an exploratory study using Anova analysis and correlations, on the basis of a sample of 266 freight movements in Mexico, in order to test two main hypotheses.

The authors found an association between some logistics services, according to their level of customization, with the freight characteristics, and a positive relation of those customized services with security and reliability, on the one hand, and a negative relation with cost of the services, on the other hand.

Size of the sample and some subjective measures of logistics services performance.

For shipping companies to be aware of existing limitations of Mexican logistics service providers in relation to customizing their services and the attributes associated with these services. This knowledge will contribute to firms' better planning of their freight movements.

Authors extend the supply chain analysis considering logistics variables variables such as freight characteristics, logistics services requirements, and the firms’ priorities for contracting these services, such as cost and other attributes.

examinar cómo se relaciona el tipo de servicios logísticos requeridos por las empresas con las características de la carga, y con el costo y otros atributos de estos servicios.

estudio exploratorio que utiliza análisis Anova y correlación Pearson de 266 casos de transporte de cargas para probar dos hipótesis asociadas al propósito.

se encontró una conexión entre algunos servicios logísticos – de acuerdo con su nivel de customización– y las características de la carga, y una relación positiva entre los servicios logísticos customizados y las prioridades de seguridad y confiabilidad. Además, se halló un vínculo negativo con los costos.

tamaño de la muestra y uso de algunas mediciones subjetivas del desempeño de los servicios logísticos.

para las empresas embarcadoras tener en cuenta las limitaciones que tienen los proveedores de servicios logísticos en México, en cuanto a la customización de los servicios logísticos y los atributos favorecidos en la provisión de estos servicios. Esto contribuirá a una mejor planeación de las áreas logísticas de las empresas en el manejo de sus cargas.

extender el análisis de las cadenas de suministro para considerar variables logísticas como son las características de la carga, los servicios logísticos requeridos y las prioridades que las empresas consideran en la obtención de servicios en términos de costos u otros atributos.

The purpose of this paper is to devise recommendations for firms to formulate modes of value capture for their product innovations, ex ante. More specifically, the research question is: how can innovators try to maximize, ex ante, the appropriation of the rent they can derive from their innovating projects?

A theoretical framework is developed and proposed to assess modes of value capture of product innovations and two illustrations are provided to show how the framework can work in practice for innovation projects.

This paper presents a practitioner's view based on the development of an original concept of rent configuration and appropriable rent.

In terms of research limitations, the possible endogeneity of intellectual property protection and the timing of were not considered.

The framework allows a set of predictions regarding modes of value capture for product innovators.

The paper's contribution lies in the proposal of an integrative framework based on the concept of rent configuration, separating analytically three dimensions of innovation value, namely volume, profit and duration. This concept allows the authors to present a richer set of recommendations in comparison to previous frameworks, in order to avoid adopting the form of a yes/no decision tree that tends to over simplify the issues at stake. The authors also contemplate not only erosion effects, but also amplification effects on the rent, which constitutes another contribution of this paper.