Abstract:
This paper describes an empirical study on the outsourcing of the staff catering
function in a sample of Australian businesses. It surveys 112 companies with steff
catering facilities, and uses Tichy's (1982) TPC model to explore the reasons for
the provision of the facility in the first place and the factors that influenced the
decision either to outsource or not to outsouree the facility. We hypothesise that
the provision of a catering facility in the first place would primarily be influenced
by cultural and political factors rather than technical ones; and that although the
decision to out source or not will be influenced primarily by technical factors, these
decisions (particularly the decision not to outsource) will reflect a balance of
technical, political and cultural factors. Lastly, we hypothesise that the shaping of
the outsourcing decision will be located at middle to senior management levels
(without a great deal of employee participation), with the decision made at senior
levels and generally involving the CEO. The findings generally support these
hypotheses.
