Towards better understanding of the relationship between formal controls and trust in IS outsourcing

It is interesting to discover that there is a reasonably small but growing literature on the issue and role of trust in IS outsourcing in the past few years. Built on the premise that over-reliance on outsourcing contract and/or other form of formal controls do not necessarily deliver a successful outsourcing partnership and/or outcomes, we have explored another dimension of outsourcing relationship – ‘trust’. This paper is written to further explore the role of trust and its relationship with formal controls within the context of IS outsourcing. The paper advocates that ‘trust’ is a powerful factor that is intricately linked to the success of outsourcing activities and that those engaged in an outsourcing relationship needs to find a balance between trust and formal controls.

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