Track: Operations Management

Abstract

The purpose of this research is to assess the current state of outsourcing practices in Nigerian oil and gas industry and examine the impacts of technology on firm's geographical scope of outsourcing operations. The study is a mixed method approach invloving a combination of questionnaire and semi-structure interview. The data collected provides a cross-sectional study of 200 oil and gas companies with senior level managers and supply chain experts as the respondents. We have asked the respondents to provide their own perception on how technological capabilities have impacted their organisational outsourcing practices and performance. The research revealed that there are many beneficiary roles of technology in outsourcing practices in terms of driving new business concepts and performance, such as business process re-engineering, organisational restructuring, benchmarking, alliance and lean management. This paper is different from other previous studies in outsourcing industries that focused on discrete manufacturing whereas the oil and gas sector is process oriented and offer a different operational environment for outsurcing practices. There is also limited literature that explained the impacts of technology on the outsourcing practices in a developing economy. The results could be used by outsourcing organisations as  a decision support  enabler in processing the value of their intellectual assets in making strategic and tactical decision and sharing problems effectively. The outcome could also support organisation's general knowledge from both internal and external source, uncover relationships between the tangible and intangible, the tacit and explicit.