Toward an understanding of the nature and conceptualization of outsourcing success

Despite the pervasiveness of outsourcing, many outsourcing ventures have been unable to achieve success. I posit that one explanation for the elusiveness of the achievement of success relates to a lack of consensus regarding what constitutes "success." This study provides a more complete, multidimensional definition of outsourcing success, which will enable a better understanding of success with a more effective and consistent measure of outsourcing success. The results indicate that practitioners and academics agree on the top criteria used to define success. A quantitative study confirms the conceptualization of outsourcing success as a first-order construct with eight dimensions. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.