Lately I’ve been thinking and writing about the economic theorists and thought leaders who set the stage for modern outsourcing to really take off. For me, the obvious choice to begin this mini-series of posts is with Ronald Coase, who was a pioneer in the area of transaction costs and the nature of the firm.
Coase’s groundbreaking [...]

If it seems like I’m a little stuck lately on Oliver Williamson’s Nobel Prize-winning research on Transaction Cost Economics (TCE), and specifically how he has tied outsourcing contracts and supply chain dynamics to his TCE research, it’s because I am.
Stuck may not be the right word actually, it’s more like really impressed and fascinated with [...]

If there’s one thing that the economic woes of 2008 and 2009 taught us, it’s that collaboration – that oft-used (and often over-used) word in supply chain and outsourcing circles – must be more than lip service and feel-good fodder for slick annual reports.
It’s fair to say that collaboration is an essential key to survival [...]