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Advances in information technology coupled with the need to build resilience against disruptions by pandemics like COVID-19 continue to emphasize offshoring services in the software industry. Service-level agreements (SLAs) have served as a key mechanism for safeguarding against risk in offshore service arrangements. Yet, variations in service cost and quality persist. This study aims to open up the blackbox linking SLAs to offshore project outcomes by examining (1) how the provisions in these contracts affect the ability of project teams – the work unit primarily in charge of producing the offshored service – to achieve their objectives and fulfill client requirements and (2) how differences in contextual factors shape the effects of these provisions.

The authors incorporate the role of organizational work practice differences to understand the challenges that 270 offshore project teams faced in coordinating and integrating technical and business domain knowledge across organizational boundaries in offshore arrangements. The examined offshore IT projects were managed by a leading software vendor in India and several of its US-based clients over a three-year period.

The authors demonstrate that organizational work practice differences represent a barrier to offshore project success, and that project team transition processes are an important mechanism for overcoming these barriers. Moreover, the authors find that transition processes represent key mediating mechanisms through which SLA provisions affect offshore project outcomes.

The study findings shed light on how SLAs shape software project teams' balance between activities aimed at meeting client needs and those aimed at containing costs.

Third-party arrangements where a university offers its degrees in collaboration with another institution are not a new phenomenon, particularly when the third-party arrangements occur in the form of a cross-border education (or widely known as transnational education). Drawing on a critical review of the literature available on quality assurance of domestic third-party arrangements and through the use of interviews with the sessional teaching staff, the paper offers theoretical as well as practical views on the domestic third-party arrangement and seeks to inform key stakeholders in the academic management of such collaboration.

The study was undertaken with 40 sessional academics who are involved in teaching postgraduate courses at several third-party education providers and universities with metropolitan campuses in Australia. Focus group interviews were conducted with 8–10 participants in each group. The qualitative study included seven open-ended questions. Each focus group interview was between 45–60 minutes.

The study found 11 universities in Australia offering courses in third-party arrangement with a focus on international students. Online third-party arrangement is also gaining momentum. The study found the following areas that require attention: induction and professional development, quality assurance arrangements, maintenance of standards, adequacy of resources and infrastructure and risk related to academic quality.

Limited study has been conducted on third-party arrangements where a university, usually located far from the city vicinity, works in a collaborative mode with another institution, primarily a private institution, to offer degrees at metropolitan city areas in the same country. Further research is needed with a large number of participants.

The study is undertaken for the first time in Australia. No research has been undertaken on the growth and quality assurance of a third-party arrangement in Australia and other developed countries. The study involves the engagement of the sessional academic staff.

The purpose of this paper is to focus on the motivations for offshore outsourcing encountered by manufacturing small and medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs) and their suppliers in China. The paper explores the motivations and challenges encountered by SMEs choosing to outsource their manufacturing activities and why their suppliers engage with them.

A qualitative case study method was utilized. The authors obtained perspectives of SME managers as well as the suppliers for each of the cases, conducting in‐depth interviews in order to obtain comprehensive information about their outsourcing activities. Then, cross‐case analysis was carried out using content analysis techniques to identify key themes for the motivations to undertake offshore outsourcing.

The results showed that the first rationale for offshore outsourcing relates to increasing efficiency and labor cost reduction while holding quality constant. The second rationale is to maintain flexibility in resource allocation providing both manufacturing SMEs and their suppliers with an opportunity to enter new markets. For both manufacturing firms and their suppliers building a relationship through networks and alliances was the key to the success (learning orientation) of the partnership.

The managerial implications of the findings are that first, from the perspective of client firms, the most important factor for success in manufacturing offshore outsourcing was maintaining good relationships with suppliers. The benefits of having close relationships with suppliers for outsourcing firms helped them to secure the quality of their products. The second managerial implication is from the perspective of the supplier firms. Supplier firms which were also aware of the transaction cost implications of their delivery while improving their own international image by supplying international clients. The evidence supplied suggests that supplier firms can benefit from using networks to assist them to gain international exposure.

While there are numerous studies on offshore outsourcing by multinational enterprises (MNEs) and large enterprises, there are relatively fewer studies on manufacturing offshore outsourcing by SMEs. Using the three theoretical lenses of the transaction cost approach, the core competences and the alliances, networks and internationalization approach, the paper offers insights on the reasons for and outcomes of a group of SMEs decision to undertake offshoring‐manufacturing activities in China. Also, the paper examines the manufacturing offshore outsourcing issues from the perspective of the suppliers to these SMEs.

The purpose of this paper is to review the use and application of shell entities, as they facilitate crime and terrorism, impede investigations and harm societies.

The study details the types and characteristics of shell entities, reviews actual cases to exhibit how shells are abused, outlines reasons shells disguise beneficial ownership and analyzes steps taken by countries and organizations to thwart the abuse of shell entities.

Many types of shell entities are used by white-collar criminals and are often layered in an intricate network which conceals the identity of beneficial owners. Nominees and bearer shares are used in tandem with shell entities to optimize concealment. Accountants, lawyers and trust and company service providers facilitate and promote the use and abuse of shell entities by lawbreakers. The G-8, Financial Action Task Force and G-20 have begun steps to improve ownership transparency, but the effort is moving at a modest pace.

The analysis makes clear the reasons for and means by which the wealthy and powerful, along with criminals, conceal trillions of dollars of income and wealth that remain untaxed and may be used for nefarious purposes. The paper is limited by the paucity of data on concealed assets and their beneficial owners.

The findings clearly show the need for more concerted action by national governments, organizations, the United Nations and law enforcement and to improve ownership transparency and information exchange regarding shell entities.

The findings demonstrate that shell entities used to conceal wealth prevent untold trillions in taxes from being collected by governments worldwide. This lack of revenue facilitates income inequality and skews national economic and fiscal policies. Also, more white-collar criminals and terrorist financiers could be brought to justice if ownership transparency is improved.

This study adds to the limited literature on shell entities, their characteristics and uses and abuses.

The purpose of this paper is to address two questions: first, what contracts, instruments and accounting activities constitute Australia’s offshore asylum seeker processing policy in practice? Second, how are notions of legitimacy and accountability mediated through the network constituted by this policy?

The paper is located in the critical interpretivist approach to accounting research. It is based on an exhaustive documentary analysis. Policy documents, contract documents, records of parliamentary inquiries (Hansard) and legislation were analysed drawing on a network policy perspective.

The paper finds that the Australian Government has sought to escape its accountability obligations by employing a range of approaches. The first of these approaches is the construction of a network involving foreign states, private corporations and non-government organizations. The second is through a watered down accountability regime and refusal to be accountable for the day-to-day life of asylum seekers in offshore processing centres through a play with the meaning of “effective control”. Yet while the policy network seems designed to create accountability gaps, the requirement within the network to remain financially accountable undermines the governments claims not to be responsible for the conditions in the detention camps.

The paper focuses largely on the period starting from when Kevin Rudd became Prime Minister to the death in Papua New Guinea of asylum seeker Reza Barati on 17 February 2014. Earlier periods are beyond the scope of this paper.

The paper will result in the identification of deficiencies inhuman rights accountability for extra-territorialized and privatised immigration detention and may contribute towards the formulation of effective policy recommendations to overcome such deficiencies. The paper also provides empirical data on, and academic understanding of, immigration detention outsourcing and offshoring.

The paper will inform debate regarding treatment of unauthorized maritime arrivals and asylum seekers generally.

The paper provides the first detailed and full understanding of the way Australia’s offshore asylum seeker processing policy is practiced. The paper also provides an empirical analysis of the way national policy and its associated accountability mechanisms emerge in response to the competing legitimacy claims of the international community and national electorate.

Offshore outsourcing of non‐core business process has rapidly evolved as a ubiquitous organisational phenomenon. However, failure to follow a clear, systematic and effective outsourcing strategy to evaluate threats, uncertainties and numerous imponderables can cause global enterprise businesses major setbacks. The reasons for such setback could be largely due to lack of core competency, careful legal planning and due diligence to operating models associated with an outsourcing initiative. This paper attempts to collate and exemplify the distinct qualifying processes accommodating contractual and intellectual property rights and provide a worthwhile debate on intricate legal considerations when structuring multi‐jurisdictional outsourcing deals.

The paper presents a comparative analysis of strategic legal and management framework by weighing the risks and evaluating the threats which would assist the decision making process of firms when selecting an appropriate offshore partner to carry out their IT‐development work.

Importance of legal intervention and due diligence to service agreements is further elevated as, at every phase of an outsourcing arrangement, compliance issues and contractual obligations can affect the success of an enterprise customer and its relationship with their outsourcing service provider.

The authors suggest that an exhaustive qualitative and quantitative industry specific research analysis be conducted in order to better define the principles and standards governing sub‐contracting arrangements.

A broader exposure to the strategic management and regulatory framework might provide firms with vantage points from which they could assess and identify new opportunities, evaluate threats and adopt effective risk mitigation strategies. Compliance to security standards and safeguard of information acquisition, analysis and usage should emerge as the mainstream strategy for outsourcing.

The paper offers insights and an overview of management and legal issues in the context of offshore technology outsourcing.

Offshoring is a common practice to operationalize global business strategies. Data protection and privacy assurance are major concerns in such international arrangements. This paper aims to examine the strategy adopted to ensure privacy assurance in offshoring arrangements.

This is a literature review to understand privacy assurance strategies adopted in offshoring arrangements and an exploratory case study of captive offshoring arrangement with onshore location in Canada and offshoring locations in India and Philippines. A comparative analysis of the privacy laws and privacy principles of Canada, Philippines and India has been done.

It was found that at the time of migration of process or work to the offshore location, organizations follow a conformist privacy strategy; however, once in business as usual mode, they follow entrepreneur privacy strategy. Privacy impact assessment (PIA) was found to be an important element in resolving the “administrative problem” of an offshoring organization’s privacy assurance strategy.

The core privacy principles are outlined in the PIA templates; however, the current templates are designed to meet the conformist strategy and may need to be revised to include the cultural aspects, training, audit and information security requirements to plan and deliver on the entrepreneur strategy.

Offshoring organizations can benefit by planning for entrepreneur privacy assurance strategy at the inception stage. Enhancements to PIA templates to facilitate the same have been suggested.

Privacy assurance strategy followed by organizations while offshoring has been examined. This paper suggests extending the PIA process so that it covers privacy assurance requirements in offshoring arrangements. The learnings can be used in managing privacy assurance requirements in similar multi-country offshore arrangements.

This is a preliminary study that explores the nature of decision making in the implementation process through an examination of environmental scanning and interpretation activities of project managers tasked with implementing offshore outsourcing activities.

The model utilized for this study suggests that individual scanning is filtered through distinct organizational types and control that will influence implementation efforts to find solutions to major issues associated with offshore outsourcing. The methodology uses a semi‐structured detailed set of interviews to gather data.

The preliminary findings suggest that project managers entrusted with implementing complex offshoring arrangements to achieve strategic short term cost reduction goals receive relatively little scanning information from senior management to guide them, must learn by doing, and are confronted with multiple external challenges centering on culture and communication with individuals performing work offshore that they were not initially prepared for.

Suggestions for future research include expanding the study to complete comparative interviews with senior management scanning, comparisons between industries, comparisons between client and provider organizations and comparisons between organizational countries of origin.

Practical implications include a more accurate definition of decision‐making and implementation of offshore outsourcing by individuals and how this impacts organizations.

The study fulfills a void in organizational literature by examining scanning and interpretation as performed by mid‐level managers.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a framework that incorporates both firm- and process-level factors for understanding location distance choice in the business process outsourcing (BPO) decision.

The research involved undertaking in-depth case study analysis of a number of BPO decisions in six German companies, and employing transaction cost economics (TCE) and the resource-based view (RBV) as a theoretical basis.

The findings have shown that existing literature in the operations management (OM) literature does not provide a complete understanding of the complexities of location distance choice in the BPO decision. This decision requires an understanding of a range of factors at both the firm- and process-level. The findings here enhance the understanding of how these factors interact to influence the potential distance options.

The findings have shown how organisations can influence the factors that affect the location distance choice including modularising business processes, developing outsourcing capabilities, and supplementing internal skills in areas such as cultural management and performance monitoring.

This is one of the first studies in the OM field to analyse how organisations make the decision in relation to local, nearshore, and offshore location distance options. The paper has highlighted the importance of OM concepts such as performance management and continuous improvement to this phenomenon, and the paper has offered a number of important areas for further research.

The paper aims to capture the nuances of two client–supplier relationships to offer new insights on the influences of transactional, knowledge and social elements in outsourcing partnerships.

The study has used descriptive case studies with narrative storylines. Interviews were conducted with three relationship managers (boundary gatekeepers) to understand preferred governance practices between clients and suppliers in diverse economic markets.

Experiences of three real-life cases engaged in offshore outsourcing have helped to identify the market, operational knowledge and social influences in a relational exchange. Findings reveal that offshore partnerships are first constituted with service-level agreements, which set control measures and layout business expectations from both partners. Boundary gatekeepers bring further accountability across firms by designing social networks for capturing and sharing of knowledge, thereby reducing each partner’s perception of risk. As firms evaluate transactional, knowledge and social elements for building a futuristic relational exchange, more disaggregated and dispersed enterprises evolve as new opportunities are explored in foreign markets.

The retrospective nature of the client–supplier partnership is a limitation in this research study. However, retrospection adds to experience, and to practice perspectives made in hindsight, and therefore has a positive influence in this study.

This paper shares real-world experiences that can be used by scholars and practitioners to better understand how relational governance practices operate in a global socio-economic setting.