Managing external relationships in IS

Managing external relationships with a wide variety of suppliers and partners has become critical to an IS organization´s effectiveness in recent years. The theoretical literature in this area has looked extensively at sourcing relationships and suggests that there are a variety of different types of relationships currently in use. However, while it explains a great deal about how and when to outsource, there has been little study of the actual management of external relationships within IS. The authors seek to address this situation by bringing an experimental and practitioner-oriented focus to bear on these relationships. Using a focus group of practitioners from a variety of industries, the authors sought to tap into the group´s insights to balance the theoretical perspective. Using these two perspectives, they describe the nature of external relationships in IS, group them into categories, and present a number of strategies for dealing with them effectively.