Capability,Quality, and Performance of Offshore IS Vendors: A Theoretical Framework and Empirical Investigation

Information systems (IS) offshoring has become a widespread practice and a strategic sourcing choice for many firms. While much has been written by researchers about the factors that lead to successful offshoring arrangements from the client's viewpoint, the vendor's perspective has been largely scarce. The vendor perspective is equally important as offshore IS vendors need to make important decisions in terms of delivering operational and strategic performance and aligning their resources and processes in order to meet or exceed targeted outcomes. In this article, we propose and test a three‐level capability–quality–performance (CQP) theoretical framework to understand vendor outcomes and their antecedents. The first level of the framework represents three vendor capabilities: relationship management, contract management, and information technology management. The second level has three mediating variables representing process quality: partnership, service, and deliverable quality. The third level has three dependent variables representing vendor outcomes: operational performance, strategic performance, and satisfaction. The model was tested with 188 vendor firms from India and China, the two most popular destinations for IS offshoring. Results support the CQP framework; vendor capabilities are significant predictors of intermediate quality measures, which in turn affect vendor outcomes. Implications of the study findings to both theory development and IS offshore vendor strategic decision making are discussed.     

Transnational ties and ethnic identities in the parental homeland: second-generation Indian Americans in India

ABSTRACT

This article explores the ‘return’ migration of high-skilled, second-generation Indian-Americans from the United States to India. Based on interviews with fifty-six respondents, it asks: What transnational ties do second-generation Indian Americans maintain with India prior to return? Upon return, what are their ‘reverse’ transnational linkages to the United States? How do these linkages shape their ethnic identities, if at all? Findings suggest that respondents’ transnational ties to India prior to return reinforce their identities as Indian Americans. Once in India, they maintain affective and civic ties to the United States, the country where they were born or raised. Further, American-inflected social ideas and norms shape returnees’ interactions with domestic workers in India. As they grapple with the disparities between Western and Indian norms on the treatment of domestic help, respondents privilege ‘American’ identities. These findings highlight the transnational ties and identity construction and negotiation of second-generation returnees.     

Infant and child mortality in India: trends in inequalities across economic groups

This paper examines the trends in economic inequalities with respect to infant and child mortality in India using three rounds of the Indian National Family Health Survey conducted in 1992–1993, 1998–1999, and 2005–2006. The paper uses concentration index, and pooled discrete-time survival regression model to examine the aforementioned trends and regional patterns. The findings suggest a decreasing trend in economic inequality in infant mortality but an upward trend in economic inequality in child mortality in India. Economic inequalities in infant mortality have narrowed in the southern region, whereas they have widened in the western region and risen in the northern region. However, mixed trends in concentration indices were found in the different regions of India in the case of child mortality.     

Determinants of Regional Variations in Infant Mortality in Rural India

An analytical framework is specified for understanding the determinants of infant mortality. It distinguishes between factors at three levels – village, household and individual – and arranges them in ascending order with respect to their proximity to infant mortality. Village and household-level factors are assumed to influence infant mortality indirectly by influencing at least one of the six individual-level factors. The present analysis of the data aggregated at the state level clearly demonstrates the importance of both medical and non-medical factors for explaining the observed regional differences in infant mortality in rural India. The percentage of births attended by trained medical personnel and poverty, are the two important determinants of regional variations in neo-natal mortality; and the village-level availability of medical facilities and the extent of triple vaccination are the two important determinants of post-neo-natal mortality. The influence of adult women's literacy on infant mortality is explained by better medical care at birth, and preventive and curative medical care during the post-neo-natal period. Medical factors have been shown to be slightly more important than non-medical factors. This suggests that it might be possible to reduce the high level of infant mortality currently prevalent in many states in India by simple preventive medical interventions.     

Mortality in Ghana: Evidence from the cape coast project data

This paper deals with the estimation of mortality for a rural community of about 20,000 persons in the rain-forest area of south-west Ghana. Specifically, infant, child and adult mortality estimates have been obtained by the application of a wide range of direct and indirect methods of measuring mortality from the different statistics collected by a longitudinal mortality and fertility project conducted during 1974–7. It was noted that infant and childhood mortality rates obtained from death registrations were consistent with those rates yielded by pregnancy histories and child survival statistics. However, the adult mortality estimates derived from orphanhood statistics tended to be lower than those suggested by death registrations. The analysis revealed an infant mortality rate of 100 for boys and 84 for girls, equal childhood mortality rates for boys and girls (85–6), a lower expectation of life at birth for men (45.8 years) than for women (52.8), and a much more severe incidence of mortality among men aged over 40 than for women at the corresponding ages.     

A new product growth model with a dynamic market potential

Traditional new product diffusion models have assumed a constant market potential over the planning horizon for forecasting product adoptions. This assumption is conceptually unsound and is likely to yield either theoretically unacceptable parameter estimates of the model or poor demand forecasts. This paper presents a dynamic growth model which relaxes this assumption. Model illustrations, limitations and further extensions are included.     

Pregnancy outcome and the time required for next conception

Abstract Variations in the time required for next conception by outcome ofthe preceding pregnancy, and the age of woman, are studied for Taiwanese women. Pregnancy interval, defined as the period between the end of one pregnancy and the beginning of the next, is taken as a measure of the time required for the next conception. The averages and variances of pregnancy intervals are estimated from reports of pregnancies occurring in a probability sample of 2,443 married women, aged 20-39, living in Taichung (Taiwan) in 1962. The effects of 'truncation bias' and 'memory bias' on the two moments of pregnancy intervals are estimated indirectly by cross-classifying women according to their ages at interview and their ages at the beginning (or end) of each pregnancy interval. The moments of post-partum amenorrhoea are, then, estimated indirectly from the moments of pregnancy intervals. The effects of truncation bias and memory bias are compensatory in this sample. In the absence of contraception, women, on an average, took longer to conceive following a live birth than following a foetal death. The time taken for next conception increases as women become older irrespective of the outcome of the preceding pregnancy.     

Morbidity and multi-morbidity in Australia: Evidence from the national health surveys

This paper examines the prevalence of reported morbidity in Australia during the two time periods 1977–78 and 1989–90. It utilizes data from the National Health Surveys conducted by the Australian Bureau of Statistics in the respective years. Prevalence of reported multi-morbidity is also examined for persons who reported one or more of ten specific long-term conditions in the 1989–90 survey. The study found that the prevalence of morbidity increased in Australia between the survey years, which occurred, as in some other low-mortality countries, along with mortality reduction over this period. Females reported higher morbidity than males but the sex differential narrowed over time. The Aboriginal population had lower morbidity than the total population of Australia but the difference was not statistically significant. For some specific conditions, prevalence of morbidity was higher for the Aboriginal population. Capital city dwellers in the states had higher prevalence of morbidity than non-capital city dwellers. The Australian Capital Territory had the highest and the Northern Territory the lowest prevalence of morbidity among all states and territories of Australia.     

The propagation of lean thinking in SMEs

Abstract

Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) play a pivotal role in economic growth, industrial output, and employment creation. However, SMEs are often ignored by researchers as far as the adoption of lean is concerned in comparison to Large Enterprises (LEs). Therefore, the literature regarding lean implementation in SMEs is not conspicuous, and many SMEs have only a limited understanding and awareness of lean. This paper offers a comprehensive literature review with a focus on the implementation of lean in SMEs and explores the applicability of lean thinking in such environments. An attempt is made to provide an analysis of lean practices that have been applied in SMEs and critical success factors for lean transformation in SMEs. It also contributes to the field of lean implementation research by proposing a framework for lean in SMEs and identifies the scope of future research.     

Relative efficiency of a parameter for a M/G/1 queueing system based on reduced and full likelihood functions

The present paper derives the relative efficiency of a parameter for the M/G/1 queueing system based on reduced and full likelihood functions. Monte Carlo simulations were carried out to study the finite sample properties for estimating the parameters of a M/G/1 queueing system. The simulation runs were conducted using various traftic intensities with increaseing sample sizes. The simulation results indicate that the loss in efficiency is quite small due to the use of a reduced likelihood function approach for estimating the parameter instead of the full likelihood, even for a moderate sample size of 50