An Integrative Model of Trust on IT Outsourcing: From the Service Receiver's Perspective

As the investment in outsourcing continues to grow, both service provider and receiver face an increasing pressure to exhibit the value of outsourcing. Improving the quality of a relationship between service provider and receiver has frequently been suggested as the best way to meet this challenge. Recent studies stress that the most critical time for a successful interorganizational relationship is at the beginning of their relationships. Trust has been considered as a central aspect of a successful outsourcing from the beginning of outsourcing relationship to the end. A great deal of interest in trust has been described, but there has been little in the way of strong theoretical models to aid in understanding the role of trust, the antecedents of trust, and the consequences of trust in outsourcing relationship. This study suggests an integrative model of trust in the context of outsourcing by adopting Mayer and Davis’s organizational trust model and then attempts to empirically explore the role of initial trust, initial distrust, and trust with knowledge sharing as mechanisms for a successful outsourcing project from the service receiver’s perspective. The results show that mutual trust is very important for knowledge sharing and outsourcing success, and affected by initial perception to each other’s partner at the beginning of outsourcing process. The results help extend our understanding of critical success factors in outsourcing.