IN THE SHADOW OF OFFSHORING: AN EXPLORATORY STUDY OF THE EXPECTATIONS OF PROVIDERS

Offshoring strategies are an emerging trend in the context of global business. Although the literature on this subject is vast, very scarce research has been made to understand the providers' perspective of an offshoring relationship. The goal of our study is to fill this gap in the literature through an exploratory research based on grounded theory, enabling us to understand the expectations of providers when they started working with foreign firms and compare those expectations with their perceptions of reality. A purposive theoretical sampling technique was used to select 7 Portuguese offshoring providers, from different sectors, sizes and ages. Data collected was then coded and analysed using and three broad categories of expectations and perceptions of reality emerged: business-related, firm-related and client-related. Creation of business and acquisition of skills were the most referred categories, both as expectations and as perceptions of reality. However, several expectations don't match the providers' perceptions of reality, as well as some perceptions weren't part of the providers' initial expectations.