the european institute for advanced studies in management 21 st workshop on strategic human resource aston uk march 30 31 2006 hr outsourcing and boundary design determinants of decision martina gianecchini paolo gubitta giovanni costa department economics university padova via del santo 33 35123 italy corresponding author unipd it m p g 2 introduction recent years firms have outsourced an expanding variety activities traditional rationale is stated economic terms improving service product quality reducing production cycle times cutting costs increasing organizational flexibility despite clear trend toward there are still a lot ambiguity one hand evidences its performance effects conflicting gilley greer rasheed 2004 other surveys decisions concerning revealed wide range choices adler 2003 recently alternative explanation come out literature about focusing complementarities or cospecialization resources with regard to best practice perspective assumes that practices naturally clustered into groups which more
