Review of the IS Offshoring Literature: The Role of Cross-Cultural Differences and Management Practices

There is a world-wide trend towards global cross-cultural networks of outsourcing relationships that are enabled by the extensive use of informationand communication technology (ICT). While ICT reduces national boundaries of global collaboration, cultural differences between outsourcers and vendor firms in offshore locations pose unique management challenges. This literature review analyzes the role of cultural differences between client and vendor companies and management practices in the information systems (IS) offshore outsourcing context. The analysis of the existing IS literature reveals limitations concerning prior conceptualizations of culture and cultural differences and provides ideas for future research on the effect of cultural differences as well as cultural, relationship, knowledge, and project management techniques. In particular, the existing literature can be grouped into formal and informal mechanisms as well as learning issues. Future research could adopt a more integrated and balanced perspective, taking into account formal and informal mechanisms and analyzing the interplay with learning issues.