Examining how organizational continuities and discontinuities affect the job satisfaction of global contractors

Jennifer L. Gibbs, Julia Eisenberg, Chengyu Fang and J. Nan Wilkenfeld

Journal of International Management, 2023, vol. 29, issue 5

Abstract: Global offshoring has become a key strategy for international staffing, especially in the software industry. Global software teams engage in boundary spanning activities that may help MNEs achieve international connectivity and cope with external disruptions through their use of virtual work. However, offshoring IT professionals who bridge these boundaries in offshoring MNEs must contend with discontinuities, or perceived disruptions in expected communication flows, which impact their job satisfaction. Drawing on survey data from 193 professional consultants from an IT services offshoring MNE located primarily in Eastern Europe and working for a U.S. client, we test a model grounded in Organizational Discontinuity Theory. We find that potential discontinuities arising from the virtual work environment have no impact on the job satisfaction of offshoring IT professionals, but that those who experience team-level continuities of identification and shared vision are more satisfied with their jobs. Our findings suggest that virtual work may have become normalized such that it is not problematic in and of itself, and that fostering connectivity in boundary spanning global teams may be beneficial for MNEs. Our findings have important implications for MNEs managing disruptions created by global work arrangements as well as exogenous disruptions.

Keywords: Global offshoring; Identification; Job satisfaction; Organizational Discontinuity Theory; Virtual work (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1075425323000431
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:intman:v:29:y:2023:i:5:s1075425323000431

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/601266/bibliographic
http://www.elsevier. ... 601266/bibliographic

DOI: 10.1016/j.intman.2023.101046

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of International Management is currently edited by M. Kotabe

More articles in Journal of International Management from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().