stuck in the conflicted middle: a role-theoretic perspective on b2b

RESEARCH ARTICLE

STUCK IN THE CONFLICTED MIDDLE: A ROLE-THEORETIC PERSPECTIVE ON B2B E-MARKETPLACES1

Hope KochHankamer School of Business, Baylor University, Waco, TX 76798 U.S.A. {[email protected]}

Ulrike SchultzeSouthern Methodist University, PO Box 750333, Dallas, TX 75275-0333 U.S.A. {[email protected]}

Over the years, research on the implications of information technology on network governance structures hasexplored the “move to the market” and the “move to the middle” hypotheses. The middle is a space in whichthe logic and modalities of markets and hierarchies are intermingled. There is increasing evidence that mostnetwork relations reflect mixed-mode or hybrid logic. Despite the apparent advantages that make the middleso populous or “swollen” (Hennart 1993, p. 472), Kambil et al. (1999) highlight that it is riddled with uncer-tainty and high transaction costs. They label it “the conflicted middle” and propose that online marketplaces,specifically all-in-one markets, are capable of resolving this conflict. Unfortunately, however, Kambil et al. provide limited insight into both the nature of the conflict that plagues the middle and the ability of all-in-onemarkets to resolve it.

To address these questions, this paper applies a role-theoretic perspective to the study of an e-marketplace thatserved the energy industry and evolved into an all-in-one market. Relying on an interpretive case study, thispaper addresses the following research questions: (1) What is the nature of the conflict that characterizes theconflicted middle? (2) How do e-marketplaces, specifically all-in-one markets, help resolve this conflict? Ourresearch highlights that brokers, trading partners, and agents who operate in the middle (where the contra-dictory logic of markets and hierarchies are mixed) experience goal, behavior, and identity conflict. All-in-onemarkets can help resolve these conflicts by supporting role integration at the group level and role segmentationat the individual level.

Keywords: B2B e-marketplace, all-in-one markets, network governance structures, market, hierarchy, moveto the middle, role theory, role conflict

Introduction1

Over the years, there has been considerable research on theimplications of information technology on governance struc-tures in industry networks, that is, the relationships betweenorganizations in a value chain (e.g., Robey et al. 2008).

Initially, the “electronic markets” or “move to the market”hypothesis dominated the information systems literature. Theprediction was that, thanks to interorganizational tech-nologies, markets with arm’s-length modes of transactingwould become the preferred governance structure since ITreduces the unit cost of communication and, consequently,coordination costs (e.g., Malone et al. 1987). However, thishypothesis was later criticized for failing to consider thatsupply-side firms are made worse off by price transparency.

1Varun Grover was the accepting senior editor for this paper. SuprateekSarker served as the associate editor.

MIS Quarterly Vol. 35 No. 1, pp. 123-146/March 2011 123

Koch & Schultze/A Role-Theoretic Perspective on B2B 3-Marketplaces

They need compensating benefits, such as limits on size of thesupplier network, in order to participate (Soh et al. 2006). Furthermore, the electronic markets hypothesis overlookedthat buy-side firms tend to favor hierarchical relationshipswith a handful of suppliers to ensure that the right productarrives at the right time (Holland and Lockett 1997; Kambilet al. 1999), protection against opportunistic behavior (Provan1993), and containment of costs associated with searching(Choudhury et al. 1998).

By decoupling the impact of IT on coordination costs from itsimpact on transaction risk, the “move to the middle” hypoth-esis was developed (Clemons and Row 1992). The hypoth-esis suggests that IT and cooperative relationships are mutu-ally reinforcing through the integration effect (e.g., Bensaou1997; Grover et al. 2002; Kraut et al. 1999), and that firmswill choose hybrid modes of coordination that mix market andhierarchy logic. These “mixed mode” (Choudhury et al.1998; Holland and Lockett 1997) governance models typi-cally take the form of long-term cooperative agreements witha few suppliers (Clemons et al. 1993).

Evidence of the move to the middle hypothesis is not limitedto buyer–supplier relationships, however. It also affects inter-mediaries such as e-marketplaces, namely, interorganizationalinformation systems that institute an exchange frameworkthrough which multiple buyers and suppliers interact toaccomplish market-making activities, including identifyingand selecting trading partners and executing transactions(Choudhury et al. 1998). For example, research has shownthat e-marketplaces that rely on a purely market-oriented logicof search, price transparency, and competition are less likelyto be successful than ones that also incorporate the logic ofcoordination and cooperation by embracing the integrationcapabilities of IT (Bakos and Brynjolfsson 1993; Holland andLockett 1997).

Despite the pervasiveness of transactions that fall betweenmarkets and hierarchies, Kambil et al. (1999) label this con-tinuum “the conflicted middle” and describe it as a place withhigh structural and operational uncertainty, as well as highcoordination costs. They propose that “all-in-one markets”are capable of resolving the conflict associated with themiddle. All-in-one markets are unified, technology-enabledplatforms that aggregate multiple transaction modalities. They provide market-oriented functionality such as search,electronic catalogs, requests for quote, and reverse auctions,as well as hierarchy-oriented functionality such as privatemarketplaces that enable unique pricing, electronic datainterchange, and supply chain management (for a detaileddescription of the capabilities of these e-marketplaces, see Daiand Kaufmann 2002). These technological capabilities, along

with consulting services in the marketplace, facilitate bothelectronic brokerage and integration (Kambil et al. 1999;Malone et al. 1987).

Unfortunately, however, Kambil et al. provide limited insightinto both the nature of the conflict in the middle and themechanisms through which all-in-one markets help resolve it. This is because they focus on uncertainty rather than conflict,thus explaining the role in the middle of all-in-one markets interms of uncertainty reduction rather than conflict resolution. Furthermore, their research is nonempirical and remains at astrategic level of analysis, highlighting choices managers haveto make with respect to designing transactions in mixed-modenetworks rather than dealing with conflict. In this study, weseek to address the gaps in our understanding of hybridnetwork structures and the implications for them ine-marketplaces. We rely on a longitudinal case study of ane-marketplace that evolved into an all-in-one market. Byfocusing on the practices of the e-marketplace, the partici-pating buyer and supplier firms, and their respectiveemployees, we seek to answer the following researchquestions:

• What is the nature of the conflict that characterizes theconflicted middle?

• How do e-marketplaces, specifically all-in-one markets,help resolve this conflict?

Our paper proceeds as follows: Drawing on role, conflict, andtransaction cost theory, we begin by outlining a role-theoreticframework for conceptualizing and analyzing the conflictedmiddle. We further theorize how all-in-one markets helpresolve this conflict. We then describe our research method,which entailed intensive data collection and an interpretiveanalysis. In the data section, we briefly outline thee-marketplace’s evolution and then analyze the various con-flicts that the broker, trading partners, and agents experienced,and how they resolved them. We conclude with answers toour two research questions and a discussion of theimplications of our study for research and practice.

A Role Theory View ofNetwork Governance

Our research questions require that we gain insights into theeveryday workings of hybrid governance relationships, whichare instantiated and maintained by the actions of organiza-tional members (Schultze and Orlikowski 2004). We thusfocus on the practices through which the various participants

124 MIS Quarterly Vol. 35 No. 1/March 2011


Figure 1. Roles in a B2B Exchange Network

in a business-to-business (B2B) e-marketplace enact networkgovernance structures. Practices are recurring human acti-vities that are informed by shared institutional meanings(Schatzki et al. 2001). As role theory “offers a means ofstudying both the individual and the collectivity within asingle conceptual framework” (Biddle 1979, p. 11), we adoptit as the basis of our theoretical framework.

Given that roles represent “the building blocks of socialsystems and the summation of the requirements with whichsuch systems confront their members as individuals” (Katzand Kahn 1978, p. 219), macro-level industry networks can beviewed as a collection of group-level roles such as brokers,buyers, and suppliers, which, in turn, are comprised ofindividual-level roles like sales agents and purchasing agents. By recognizing the mutually constituting nature of roles andaccommodating their interdependencies and interactions(Biddle 1986, p. 68), role theory privileges neither the macro-nor the micro-level actions of a network. This is essential forunderstanding practice.

A role connotes “a set of recurrent behaviors appropriate to aparticular position in a social system” (Polzer 1995, p. 495).This definition highlights three components of roles: socialpositions or role identities (and the role sets they imply),expectations, and behavior (Biddle 1979). Social positions orrole identities (e.g., doctor, manager, or mother) designate arecognizable status within a social structure (Biddle 1979). Role identity situates a role occupant in relation to others (e.g., a mother has children). The roles (e.g., children) thathave the most immediate influence on and direct interactions

with a given focal role (e.g., mother) are collectively referredto as the role set (Kahn et al. 1981).

Role expectations are norms, beliefs, and attitudes associatedwith either a social position (e.g., doctors should wear whitecoats) or a context (e.g., audience members are supposed tobe quiet during an opera performance) (Biddle 1979). Roleexpectations relate not only to behavior but also to goals andvalues (Perrone et al. 2003). Expectations for a given role arenot developed in a vacuum, but in the context of other rolesthat interact with and are dependent on the focal role, and viceversa (Floyd and Lane 2000). Role behavior resembles prac-tice in that it connotes the recurring actions actually taken byrole occupants (Biddle 1979).

Figure 1 shows the roles within a B2B network, which con-sists of both group- and individual-level roles. This schematicshows that the roles in the social system are interdependent. Role sets both enable and constrain the behavior in the focalrole based on what members of the role set consider appro-priate conduct (Perrone et al. 2003). This implies that thestructure of the B2B network, the roles that constitute it, andthe expectations associated with each of these roles areshaped through relational exchanges among networkparticipants.

Figure 1 highlights that the role set of an e-marketplace con-sists of buying and selling organizations, as well as the brokeragents it employs. Both buyers and suppliers look to ane-marketplace to connect them to new trading partners (Fer-nandez and Gould 1994). To the extent that an e-marketplace

Broker(E-Marketplace)

Trading Partner(Supplier)

Trading Partner(Buyer)

BrokerAgents

SalesAgents Pur

chas

ing

Agent

s

MIS Quarterly Vol. 35 No. 1/March 2011 125


Table 1. Types of Role Conflict

Type Definition Example

Goal Disagreements about the ends of a task; i.e., whatis to be accomplished (Jehn 1997).

Expectations that production workers simultaneouslymaximize both quantity and quality.

Behavior Disagreements over the how or means (i.e., thetasks and activities) by which the goal is achieved(Jehn 1997).

Expectations that car sales representatives bothcompete for customers and cooperate with oneanother to provide seamless service to all customers.

Identity Expresses people’s struggle for dignity, recognition,and control over meaning and their destiny(Rothman 1997), and is associated with challengesto a role’s place in its social structure and to the roleoccupants’ beliefs about what is good (Hicks 2001).

Retailer’s fear that new technology will erode theirbargaining power and way of doing business(Clemons and Row 1993).

can deliver on these expectations, the buyers and supplierswill continue to engage with it. In fulfilling this brokeringrole, the e-marketplace collects information about individualbuyers and suppliers as well as the network as a whole. Thisplaces it in a supra-organizational network position charac-terized by increased power and superior social position(Anderson and Anderson 2002; Fernandez and Gould 1994;Kumar and van Dissel 1996).

Buying and selling organizations find themselves in threedifferent roles simultaneously: they are customers of thee-marketplace, trading partners in a supply chain, andemployers. Each role is associated with its own role set andexpectations, which might be misaligned at times. Forexample, the e-marketplace expects loyalty with respect toconcluding business via the brokerage, whereas establishedtrading partners expect that long-standing embedded relation-ships will be honored by conducting business in anunmediated manner.

Individually, broker, sales, and purchasing agents interactwith their employers and their counterparts in the otherorganizations that make up the network. As employees, theirrole is defined by their employment contract, which generallyrequires them to obey orders. In interactions with agents intheir role set, however, they are expected to reciprocate pastfavors, which sometimes requires bending organizationalrules.

As our discussion of Figure 1 highlights, network participantsfind themselves in multiple relationships with members oftheir role set. This implies that participants enact multipleroles, some of which entail contradictory expectations, whichcan lead to role conflict.

Role Conflict

Since network structures are created and maintained throughrole enactment, it is useful to distinguish between the struc-tural and situated aspects of conflict. Contradictions, struc-tural concepts that “tend to involve divisions of interestbetween different groupings or categories of people”(Giddens 1984, p. 198), are frequently the underlying sourceof conflict. However, conflict is the “actual struggle betweenactors or groups” (Giddens 1984, p. 198). Thus, contradic-tions are structural and inherent in social systems, whereasconflict is situated. Conflict only arises when contradictionsare made apparent through the enactment of differentinterests, particularly when this negatively affects one party(Walsham 2002).

Consistent with Giddens’ (1984) view of conflict as enactedcontradiction, we define conflict as the struggle between oramong two or more individuals, groups, or organizations thatarises from incompatibilities in role expectations and impedesthe parties’ performance and/or attainment of objectives(Gaski 1984). This definition implies that members of therole set of the focal role need to enact contradictions in orderto trigger role conflict. For example, when a single memberof the role set makes contradictory demands on the role (e.g.,expecting the role occupant to make purchases using only asingle, yet unavailable, channel) role conflict arises (Kahn etal. 1981). Table 1 defines the three types of role conflictidentified in the literature.

The likelihood of conflict being enacted and impacting oneparty negatively is influenced by the degree of role integrationand segmentation (Ashforth et al. 2000) (see Figure 2).Highly integrated roles are two roles that are generallyenacted in the same temporal, spatial, or social context (Ash-



Figure 2. Likelihood of Role Conflict

forth and Mael 1989). Because the limit or scope of each rolein the integrated set is ambiguous (shown by broken roleboundaries in Figure 2a), role integration frequently leads toconflict at the micro level due to the uncertainty about whichrole elements are appropriate in a given situation (Sundara-murthy and Kreiner 2008). This uncertainty places aconsiderable psychological burden on the individual roleoccupants, as they determine suitable goals, behaviors, andidentities. For example, as an employee, a purchasingmanager might be expected to enforce compliance with thecompany’s policies to use a new e-marketplace and transactwith suppliers via arm’s-length relationships. However, thesupplier’s agent, with whom the manager has become friends,might expect the manager to honor their embedded relation-ship and demand favorable treatment. Given that the manageris expected to fulfill these two discrepant roles (i.e., friendand employee) simultaneously, it is highly likely that he orshe will experience conflict.

In contrast, segmented roles clarify the temporal, spatial, andsocial context in which they are appropriately enacted (shownby solid role boundaries in Figure 2b). Individual roleoccupants can compartmentalize their roles, thus limitingambiguity and conflict (Sundaramurthy and Kreiner 2008).In our earlier example, the purchasing manager would havebeen less likely to experience role conflict if the companypolicy advocating e-marketplace use only applied to somesuppliers or products, such that the embedded relationshipswith the supplier’s agents would have been unaffected. Theemployee and friend roles would have been separated.

Role Conflict Resolution Strategies

Integration and segmentation are also the fundamental mech-anisms underlying conflict resolutions strategies (Sundara-murthy and Kreiner 2008). However, they do not have thesame effect at different network levels. As our discussion ofintegration and segmentation at the network’s micro level hasindicated, role integration increases conflict because theuncertainty associated with blurred role boundaries becomes

psychologically taxing for the individual (Ashforth et al.2000). In contrast, role integration holds promise as a conflictresolution mechanism for groups operating at the macro level. Given that groups are made up of separate entities, roleintegration helps build cohesion by establishing a commonpurpose, developing similar beliefs, norms, and values, andaligning goals and role expectations (Floyd and Lane 2000). In this manner, divergent goals, expectations, and values,which might otherwise fuel conflict among group members,are brought together. At the micro level, role segmentationstrategies are more effective for resolving individuals’ experi-ences of role conflict. Table 2 summarizes the conflict resolu-tion mechanisms available at the group and individual levels,respectively. The table lists the macro-level integration stra-tegies first to show that they both enable and constrain micro-level conflict resolution strategies.

A Role-Theoretic Framework ofthe Conflicted Middle

While the preceding section outlines role conflict resolutionmechanisms, network governance models themselves canreduce conflict by specifying network role expectations(Floyd and Lane 2000). The two network governance arche-types that delimit the continuum that constitutes the conflictedmiddle are markets and hierarchies2 (Kambil et al. 1999). In

2In order to simplify our vocabulary and use language that is consistent withauthors who have written about hybrid governance modes in the IT context,e.g., Kambil et al. (1999) and Holland and Lockett (1997), we omit the prefix“electronic” from both markets and hierarchies even though, like many of theauthors whose research we cite (e.g., Bakos and Brynjolfsson 1993), we seeIT as a key enabler of both of these governance structures. Furthermore, thetraditional transaction-cost definition of hierarchy includes centralizedownership of and common managerial control over the adjacent steps in asuply chain, that is, vertical integration (Williamson 1985). However, inmuch of the research on IT-mediated markets and hierarchies, the ownershipaspect of this definition is relaxed (Clemons et al. 1993), in part because thisresearch is less focused on outsourcing and the boundary of the firm than onthe modes of interorganizational coordination and network governance struc-tures (Bakos and Brynjolfsson 1993). In this paper, we also omit the com-mon ownership aspect of the definition of hierarchies; instead, we emphasizeintegration between trading partners and centralized managerial control.

GoalsBehaviorIdentity


Role 1 Role 2Role Integration Role Segmentation- High conflict - Low conflict

(a) (b)


Role 1


Role 2



Table 2. Role Conflict Resolution Mechanisms

Mechanism Definition Example

Group-Level (Broker and Trading Partner) Integration Strategies† (Kumar and van Dissel 1996; Stern 1976)

Supra-Organizational

Mechanisms that create alignment amongnetwork players.

• Establishing supra-organizational goals thattranscend the conflicting parties’ differences suchthat they can agree on a common purpose.

• Instituting conciliation and mediation roles such asbrokers.

Interpenetration Provides means of increasing the number ofmeaningful interactions between membersof conflicting organizations.

• Membership-based interpenetration: temporaryexchange of organizational members.

• Ideological interpenetration: informational andeducational activities (e.g., training) aimed ataligning role expectations.

Boundary Focuses on transferring, translating, andtransforming perspectives and knowledgeamong divergent roles in order toaccomplish a task (i.e., boundary spanning)(Boland and Tenkasi 1995; Carlile 2004).

• Boundary spanners: people who rely on theirrelationships and interpersonal skills to persuade,negotiate, and pressure their counterparts in otherorganizations.

• Boundary objects: contracts or technology that areused in trading partner relationships. Theirmeanings are both stable and flexible. Stablemeanings enable trading partners to coordinatetrade at the network level. Flexible meanings allowtrading partners to adapt the objects to specificbuyer-supplier relationships (Star and Griesemer1989).

Individual-Level (Agent) Segmentation Strategies‡ (Ashforth and Mael 1989)

Choice Entails conforming to one role over another,frequently involves hierarchical ordering inthe form of role prioritization.

A purchasing agent may resolve the conflicts relatedto awarding reverse auction contracts to a supplierwith which she has an embedded relationship bydeciding she is an employee first, and a friendsecond.

Compromise Entails partial conformity to the conflictingexpectations of two roles (Gullahorn andGullahorn 1963; Miller and Shull 1962; Vliert1981), and may involve “frequent andusually recurring transitions” (i.e., micro-transitions) (Ashforth and Mael 1989, p. 472) between roles.

Purchasing agents purchase items using bothhierarchical and market trading mechanisms.

†A fourth organization-level conflict resolution strategy identified in the literature is “bargaining and negotiating.” However, as this forms an integralpart of the other three strategies, we do not consider it separately.‡The literature on individual-level conflict resolution identifies two additional conflict resolution strategies: resolution and avoidance. In resolution,the role occupant shifts role identity by changing the values associated with one or both roles in order to eliminate the conflict (Ashforth and Mael1989). Avoidance is defined as complying with neither conflicting role (Vliert 1981). We do not elaborate on these strategies here. The resolutionstrategy is difficult to assess empirically in the context of an organizational case study, as individuals’ shifts in values are frequently subtle andunobservable. The avoidance strategy is poorly defined (Tjosvold and Sun 2002), making it difficult to identify in an empirical context. Also, conflictavoidance is frequently seen as counter-productive in organizational contexts (Floyd and Lane 2000) as it seems to ignore rather than resolveconflict.



this section, we outline the role expectations of key networkparticipants for each of these archetypes. We then integratethe concepts developed thus far to outline our role-theoreticframework of the conflicted middle, which will serve as asensitizing device for the empirical portion of our research.

Role Expectations in Markets and Hierarchies

Markets are characterized by open competition and perfectinformation (Bailey and Bakos 1997), where price is the prin-cipal organizing mechanisms (Hennart 1993). This requiresthat perfect, decentralized, and transparent information bemade readily accessible—through standardized productdescriptions in catalogs (Granados et al. 2006). In such adistributed system of information, individual agents areexpected to act rationally and independently (Anderson andAnderson 2002). Market norms include self-interest andopportunism, as well as utility-maximizing decision making(Bailey and Bakos 1997). In markets, extensive searches,price comparison, and a focus on one-off transactions with thelowest-cost supplier are considered superior. Technology isregarded as a means of rationalizing market transactions, thusreducing overall cost. As a result, trading parties tend to enterinto explicitly negotiated, short-term agreements.

In contrast to the focus of the market-based governance onprice, behavioral constraints are the primary organizing mech-anism in hierarchies (Hennart 1993). Information is cen-tralized in a hierarchy, as is decision making. Private,privileged information, such as inventory levels and businessstrategies, is passed between partner firms, and technology isused to integrate trading partners’ business processes (Maloneet al. 1987). This facilitates coordination, and can also beused to monitor partners’ performance and compliance withthe directives of the hierarchy (Clemons et al. 1993; Groveret al. 2002). Hierarchies enact embedded relationships, whichare defined by “exchange protocols associated with socialnon-commercial attachments [that] govern business dealings”(Uzzi 1999, p. 482). This implies that reciprocity and trustare expected, as well as alignment of interest among tradingpartners. In evaluating and selecting partners the focus is onmaximizing value, with the result that non-contractibleservices such as quality, information sharing, and innovationare taken into consideration (Bakos and Brynjolfsson 1993).

This brief overview of markets and hierarchies illustrates thecontradictions between these two structural alternatives.Table 3 summarizes how the respective logic of thesealternatives translates into contradictory role expectations.

Framework of Conflict in the Middle

Building on Kambil et al.’s (1999) depiction of markets andhierarchies as delimiting the middle, Figure 3 summarizes ourtheoretical framing of the conflicted middle. The frameworkshows that when the boundaries between market and hier-archy roles blur, brokers, trading partners, and agents experi-ence uncertainty with regard to network role expectations. This increases the risk of goal, behavior, and/or identityconflict (Floyd and Lane 2000). Furthermore, the frameworkshows that all-in-one markets have the potential to resolvethis conflict by implementing integration and segmentationstrategies.

However, even in the face of these structural contradictions inthe middle, conflict is not a foregone conclusion. Conflictwill only emerge if the contradictions between expectationsassociated with markets and hierarchies appear through theenactment of different interests. When these enacted contra-dictions negatively affect one party, conflict is likely(Walsham 2002). Additionally, the ability of participants tointegrate and segregate market and hierarchy roles will impactthe likelihood of conflict occurring. The interaction betweenthe role elements and the broker, trading partner, and agentroles in the enactment of structural contradictions is the focusof our first research question, which explores the nature of theconflict in the conflicted middle.

Using Kambil et al.’s argument that all-in-one markets canhelp resolve conflict in the middle, the framework depicts theall-in-one market as enacting the broker role in the center ofour framework. Associated with it are role integrationstrategies that enable groups to resolve conflict, as well asrole segmentation strategies that enable individuals to resolveconflict. How all-in-one markets help resolve conflict in themiddle is the second question that we seek to answer with theempirical portion of our research.

Method

The case study method is well-suited to our research objec-tives for two reasons (Walsham 1995). First, there is a lackof prior theory on the nature of conflict in the middle.Second, social context is important in exploring not only theconflict, but also the role of technology in resolving it. Werely on a single interpretive case study for this research. Wedo not seek to impose an a priori theory on our data or to testour theoretical framework (Orlikowski and Baroudi 1991);



Table 3. Role Expectations in Markets and Hierarchies

Role Market Hierarchy

BROKER:e.g., E-marketplace

Goal Match buyers and suppliers in a man-ner that fosters transparency, marketcompetition, and rational decisionmaking among distributed participants(Anderson and Anderson 2002).

Build integrative relationships between buyersand suppliers in a manner that streamlinescoordination and information sharing amongtrading partners to promote long-term mutuallybeneficial relationships (Malone et al. 1987).

Behavior Rely almost exclusively on technologyto perform information-intensivematching activities between buyers andsellers in a scalable fashion (Andersonand Anderson 2002).

Draw on human capital in addition to technologyto provide more personalized, value addedservices such as problem solving by offeringguarantees, preserving anonymity, and tailoringgoods and services (Anderson and Anderson2002).

Identity Unbiased broker that pursues itsinterest independent of buyers andsellers (Fernandez and Gould 1994).

Biased broker that aligns and integrates witheither buyers or suppliers by selectively pre-senting information from one side of the net-work to the other (Fernandez and Gould 1994).

TRADINGPARTNERS:

e.g., Buyers andSuppliers

Goal Buyers: minimize cost/price.Suppliers: maximize revenue/price(Bakos 1998; Gaski 1984).

Buyers: minimize total cost/maximize value.Suppliers: maximize total revenue/maximizevalue (Bakos and Brynjolfsson 1993; Mithas etal. 2008).

Behavior Enter into explicit short-term agree-ments and maintain arm’s-lengthrelationships (Schultze and Orlikowski2004).

Negotiate long-term agreements that includenon-contractible elements and cultivateembedded relationships (Schultze andOrlikowski 2004).

Identity Undifferentiated buyer and supplier ofcommoditized goods and services(Schultze and Orlikowski 2004).

Differentiated trading partners that seek andprovide value-added goods and services(Granovetter 1985; Uzzi and Gillespie 2002).

INDIVIDUALAGENT:

e.g., Sales Agent,Purchasing Agent,and Broker Agent

Goal Maximize rewards by maximizing outputmeasured at market prices (Hennart1993).

Maximize rewards by maximizing inputmeasured in terms of complying withmanagement directives (Hennart 1993).

Behavior Make independent decisions: collectthe best information available and acton it (Hennart 1993).

Obey orders: channel information tomanagement and then obey orders (Hennart1993).

Identity Independent agent (Hennart 1993). Salaried employee (Hennart 1993).

rather we developed our theoretical framework through itera-tions with the data and the literature to help us make sense ofour case data and to generate rich and empirically groundedinsights about the conflicted middle (Klein and Myers 1999;Walsham 2006).

For our case study, we chose EnergyX,3 an all-in-one marketthat served the utility industry in the United States. Founded

in March 2000 by a consortium of 21 utilities, EnergyX’spurpose was to prepare the industry for deregulation. Weselected EnergyX for theoretical sampling reasons (Patton1990). Theoretical sampling involves choosing cases thatexhibit the phenomenon of interest naturally and intensivelythus allowing the researcher to examine and elaborate on thetheoretical constructs under investigation. Because of theutility industry’s historical preference for relationships, andthe utilities’ dual roles as owners and customers of EnergyX,we expected conflict to occur naturally during the e-market-place’s introduction and adoption. EnergyX thus representeda suitable case for studying the conflicted middle.

3All names are pseudonyms. EnergyX was part of a larger dissertation studythat included three other e-marketplaces. The study investigated e-market-places in their development stages and factors leading to e-marketplacesuccess.



Figure 3. Conflicted Middle Framework

Data Collection

Insights were gathered from a wide range of marketplaceparticipants using a variety of data gathering techniques. Theorganizations that participated in the study ranged fromutilities and suppliers that relied on EnergyX extensively tothose that did not join EnergyX at all. Even though the firstauthor stayed in touch with a key informant, a procurementservices manager at BigU (one of the utilities that hadinvested in EnergyX), and continued to review secondary dataon EnergyX though 2009, most of the data for this study werecollected between August 2000 and May 2003. During thistime, the first author spent time at EnergyX, as well as withthe utilities and suppliers that were trying to adopt thee-marketplace. Data collection techniques included shad-owing employees and spending non-work time with them(i.e., lunches, driving to meetings), attending meetings (8),taking plant tours (2), participating in EnergyX technologydemonstrations (2), and conducting interviews (50 interviewswith 30 people from different functional areas and organi-zational levels). Appendix A summarizes the organizationsinvolved in the study and the job titles of the interviewees.

In total, approximately 300 pages of single-spaced field noteswere generated for the EnergyX case. Interviews averagedabout 90 minutes, and were not tape-recorded because of theutilities’ concerns regarding (1) inadvertent disclosure ofconfidential information regarding EnergyX, which theyexpected to go public in short order, and (2) governmentrestrictions on collusion.4 Thus, the first author took exten-sive notes during meetings and interviews and then wrotethem up immediately afterward, capturing as many of theinterviewees’ verbatim expressions as possible. As a result,typing up field notes usually took at least four times as longas the visit itself.

The first author also shadowed the EnergyX implementationteam on eight different occasions. During these visits, whichtypically lasted about 6 hours, she observed their workpractices and conducted numerous informal interviews. About 90 percent of the data collection occurred in face-to-

4Preceding meetings that involved a group of utilities, the facilitator read astatement regarding the Robinson-Patman Act. Each utility had to confirmverbally that they were not colluding.

H-Goals

H-Behavior

H-Identity

M-Goals

M-Behavior

M-Identity

Conflicted Middle

All-in-One Market

Agent Role

Trading Partner Role

Broker Role

Legend:

M-Goals

M-Behavior

M-Identity

Market (M) RoleExpectations

- Conflict Resolution: Integration Supra-organizational, Interpenetration, and Boundary Mechanisms- Conflict Resolution: Segmentation Choice and Compromise

H-Goals

H-Behavior

H-Identity

Hierarchy (H) RoleExpectations

Hierarchy

Market



face settings; the remaining data were collected over thephone or via email. In addition, supporting materials such asbusiness plans, sales presentations, brochures, reports, andpress releases were gathered and analyzed.

Upon concluding her data collection at EnergyX, the firstauthor discussed the field experiences with her dissertationcommittee, which consisted of five academics who wereunfamiliar with the field sites. Furthermore, the first authorshared her emerging interpretations with study participantsand practitioners by having informal conversations, sharingher dissertation with the key informant at BigU, presentingresearch results at a BigU management meeting, two pur-chasing manager conferences, and in a trade publication. Thissubjected her interpretations and representations of events tochallenges from multiple perspectives.

Data Analysis

Our data analysis followed an interpretive approach (Kleinand Myers 1999; Orlikowski and Baroudi 1991). We initiallyread the field notes seeking to understand EnergyX’s evolu-tion. This revealed the intermixing of market and hierarchylogic and how this created conflict throughout the network.We then consulted the literature on transaction cost eco-nomics and e-marketplaces, as well as role and conflicttheory. We read the field notes and supporting documentsagain, and identified the examples of conflict. Through comparison and contrast, we looked for patternsamong the conflict examples. This led us to group them bythe roles that experienced them (i.e., agents, trading partners,and broker), to what they pertained (i.e., goal, behavior, andidentity), and how they were resolved (i.e., integration andsegmentation). These tentative categories solidified as wedeveloped a better understanding of role theory, whichbolstered their meaning. In order to tie the different elementsof conflict together both theoretically and empirically, wedeveloped our theoretical framework of the conflicted middle(Figure 3). Using this framework, we analyzed the data yetagain to identify empirical support for the various constructsin our framework and to answer our research questions. Thus,our analysis consisted of numerous iterations of making senseof theory in terms of the data, and vice versa.

Case Study: EnergyX

Traditionally, utilities in the United States have been regu-lated. Each utility was responsible for delivering uninter-

rupted power for a specific geographic region. Quite literally,their mission was “to keep the lights on.” The utilities had torecover quickly from outages caused by natural disasters orequipment failure and thus tended to cooperate with eachother and rely on embedded relationships with their suppliers. When one utility ran out of infrastructure products (e.g., woodpoles, transformers, meters, or pipe) during a natural disasteror equipment failure, suppliers tended to help out by runningextra shifts or selling products earmarked for other customers. Additionally, other utilities would make their excessinventory available.

These characteristics evidence a hierarchical governance logicin this industry. As supplier relationships served as a hedgein times of emergency, the utilities valued these relationshipsmore than they did competitive pricing. The chief executiveofficer (CEO) of EnergyX described the industry’s biastoward relationships as follows:

[The utilities] have a bias toward relationships andthat’s not bad. But sometimes these companiesdon’t get it when we tell them “your supplier ischarging you a 400 percent mark-up.” They say“yes, but we do have a relationship with them.”

In the late 1990s, however, the utilities faced deregulation,which raised many concerns about the industry’s readiness foran open market and the business practices necessary forcompetition. To respond to these challenges, several utilitiesengaged a consultant. In March 2000, this effort culminatedin 21 utilities investing in the formation of EnergyX, a B2Be-marketplace. EnergyX’s vision was to transform theutilities from regulated entities that “had no responsibility fortheir pricing”5 to competitive energy companies by usingInternet technology to introduce market logic into the utilities’sourcing practices. To this end, EnergyX focused on infra-structure products, as these represented a significant “spend”for the utilities. While the utilities’ spent substantially moreon fuel for energy production, there was already a disciplineof competitive sourcing and established markets in thisdomain. One challenge with the infrastructure domain,however, was that it dealt with complex, engineered productsthat were often bundled with services, such as draglinebuckets.6 This made standard descriptions and productcatalogs difficult to implement.

5Quotes in the text that are not attributed to specific individuals are takenfrom the field notes.

6Dragline buckets are digging buckets, which are part of excavationmachines.



Given that EnergyX’s market vision clashed with the hier-archical relationships that characterized the industry, mostsuppliers refused to participate. EnergyX’s price-based com-parison made the suppliers comparatively worse off vis-à-visthe utilities. In the spring of 2001, EnergyX began addressingthis issue by morphing into an unbiased e-marketplace. According to its CEO, EnergyX “actually tried to distanceitself from the utilities” and hired staff with intimate supplierknowledge to convince suppliers that EnergyX was a neutralplayer that sought to cut inefficiencies and costs out of theentire industry’s supply chain. EnergyX held meetings tolearn about suppliers’ functional requirements for thee-marketplace while trying to exploit the distrust some of thesuppliers had for the utilities. For instance, EnergyX empha-sized that auctions would “force utilities to be clear aboutwhat they wanted,” which was advantageous to suppliers.

EnergyX’s nearly exclusive focus on developing the supply-side and new technical features for the e-marketplace strainedits relationship with the utilities. By April 2001, many of thefounding utilities considered abandoning the EnergyX ven-ture, making it even more difficult for EnergyX to attract acritical mass of supply-side members. As the purchasingmanager from ReliableU, one of the utilities that foundedEnergyX, pointed out, “They [EnergyX] were trying to createrelationships with suppliers and didn’t realize the utilitiesalready had these relationships and they [EnergyX] neededthe utilities’ help in creating these relationships.”

In June 2001, EnergyX began evolving into an all-in-onemarket by incorporating more hierarchical elements into itsbusiness model. To develop and implement these elements,EnergyX employed “buyer development managers” who werecharged with building embedded relationships with the pur-chasing managers and buyers in the utilities. EnergyX’sbuyer development managers were typically given officespace in the utilities’ procurement departments and partici-pated in contract negotiations between the utilities and theirsuppliers. EnergyX hoped that these efforts would result inutilities leveraging their supplier relationships to helpEnergyX build up its supplier network. For example, pur-chasing agents called on the supplier sales agents with whomthey had good relationships and began exploring how theutility, the supplier, and EnergyX could work together toimprove procurement efficiency. The suppliers’ sales agentsagreed to participate because they saw their work withEnergyX as part of maintaining their relationship with theutilities.

Some of these efforts resulted in new utility–supplier con-tracts referred to as “EnergyX collaborative agreements,”which typically involved the development of common speci-

fications for engineered infrastructure products. For example,each utility in the southeastern United States had slightly dif-ferent product specifications for wood poles (e.g., resin versus no resin, flat versus pointed), yet sourced them from a singlesupplier. The buyer development managers facilitatedmeetings between these utilities and the wood pole manu-facturer to reduce the product specifications from 500 to 100,which also lowered both production and transaction costs.

By October 2001, EnergyX had evolved into an all-in-onemarketplace. In addition to the electronic catalogs andreverse auctions that were characteristic of public e-market-places, EnergyX began to offer private e-marketplaces andsupply chain management technologies. In 2002, it began topursue services in indirect goods (e.g., office supplies andtechnology). In addition to developing technology to stream-line how utilities purchased indirect goods, EnergyX aggre-gated the utility industry’s collective demand for these pro-ducts to negotiate lower prices. Table 4 summarizes the keyevents in EnergyX’s evolution.

Conflict and Conflict Resolution in the Middle

As EnergyX moved to and eventually operated in the middleas an all-in-one market, conflicts proliferated within itsnetwork. Relying on our conceptual framework, our analysisfocuses on the roles in which conflict was the most evident,nevertheless acknowledging that other network roles experi-enced conflict also. In our discussion below, we highlight theconflicts that role occupants encountered in their everydaywork, how they resolved them, and what implications this hadfor others in their role set. We commence our description ofthe conflicted middle at the micro level.

Agent Role Conflict: Purchasing Agents

At the individual level, role conflict was particularly evidentamong the utilities’ purchasing agents. When EnergyX wasintroduced, the utilities’ goal was to migrate all purchasingactivity to the e-marketplace, in part to adopt more price-competitive sourcing practices and in part to maximize theirreturn as investors in EnergyX. Given that the purchasingagents were salaried employees, this shift in the utilities’direction did not represent a goal change for the purchasingagents: consistent with hierarchy logic implicit inemployment contracts, they were still expected to obeymanagement’s orders.

Nevertheless, the behavioral expectations related to the roleof purchasing agents shifted dramatically. While in the past



Table 4. Case Time Line

INCEPTIONLate 1990s–January 2001

MOVING TO THE MIDDLEJanuary 2001–October 2001

OPERATING IN THE MIDDLE October 2001–Present

Events Late 1990s: Utility industry,historically characterized byhierarchical relationships, bracesfor deregulation.

3/2000: 21 utilities form EnergyXto introduce market logic into thesourcing of infrastructure items.

1/2001: Suppliers refuse to joinEnergyX because its market visionclashed with their hierarchicalbusiness practices.

3/2001: EnergyX tries to distanceitself from the utilities by developingsupplier relationships.

4/2001: Utilities considerabandoning EnergyX.

6/2001: EnergyX hires buyerdevelopment managers to developrelationships with utilities and createvalue-added services.

10/2001: Buyer developmentmanagers begin helping utilitiesand suppliers understand whenand how to use EnergyX. Utilitiesbegin to bring their suppliers toEnergyX. Utilities and suppliersbegin to incorporate EnergyX intotheir purchasing practices.

10/2002: EnergyX developspurchasing agreements withindirect good suppliers.

Market-placeOfferings

• Public marketplace• Electronic catalogs• Reverse auctions

Additional offerings: • Supply chain consulting• Business process services• Human capital management

Additional offerings:• Collaborative agreements • Private e-marketplaces

customized to a given utility • Supply chain management

technologies with functionalitylike request for quote, elec-tronic requisitioning, contractmanagement, and supplierperformance monitoring

RevenueModel

Buyers and suppliers pay anannual membership fee of $85,000and a $2 transaction fee for everyinvoice processed through thee-marketplace.

EnergyX revised its revenue modelby waiving suppliers’ membershipand transaction fees.

EnergyX charged utilities a 10%commission on the cost savings†

that the e-marketplace generated(e.g., EnergyX helped a utilitysave $2.8 million dollars to pro-cure a dragline bucket, earning a$280,000 commission).

†These cost savings were measured as the difference between each utility’s preexisting contracts and the contract that EnergyX helped negotiate.

they were expected to purchase from negotiated contracts andrely on their relationships with the suppliers’ sales agents tomaximize value (hierarchy logic), they were now supposed touse the e-marketplace to shop for the lowest prices (marketlogic). The following quote from EnergyX’s vice presidentillustrates the conflict in behavior in which the purchasingagents were supposed to engage. On the one hand, manage-ment encouraged them to use EnergyX, but on the other, thepurchasing agents were not supposed to engage in “maverick”purchasing by leveraging their increased access toinformation.

Large organizations with trained procurement peopledo not want their employees to shop. They aren’tinterested in price comparisons. They want theiremployees purchasing off of negotiated contracts.Large organizations want to limit their employees’field of view; they don’t want a place to compareprices in professional procurement shops. Theywant to keep people away from maverick procure-ment processes.

In addition to struggling with these inconsistent behavioralexpectations, the purchasing agents also faced numerous



identity conflicts with the introduction of EnergyX. Pre-viously, their beliefs about what it meant to be a competentpurchasing professional (e.g., choosing value over price) wereconsistent with those of the utilities’ management. As onee-procurement manager at BigU put it,“Some vendors mightbe cheaper but they may not invoice you in the way you wantto be invoiced.” Now, however, their role as purchasingprofessionals was at odds with their employee role.

In addition, the purchasing agents had traditionally viewedthemselves as valuable contributors to the utilities’ success. After all, they helped ensure that the utilities had the infra-structure products they needed “to keep the lights on” even inthe face of unforeseen disasters. They attributed thiscapability to their industry-specific knowledge and embeddedrelationships with suppliers. Thus, EnergyX’s market logicthreatened their professional identity and social status.Furthermore, when management invested in EnergyX andsought to implement the market-oriented purchasing practices,many purchasing agents feared that “management thoughtthey weren’t doing a good job” and that “the e-marketplacewas going to replace them.” BigU’s e-procurement managerexplained that the purchasing agents’ concerns were justified.

EnergyX was going to combine the utilities’ pur-chasing and have a commodities manager take theusage pattern and leverage that to buy products atgreat prices. This would move all buying and nego-tiations to go through EnergyX.

Not only was their professional identity under threat, but alsotheir very livelihood and financial situation. One purchasingmanager at BigU noted perks available to the purchasingagents through their relationships with sales agents, such assporting event tickets, lunches, and dinners, were particularlymeaningful given that salaries in the utilities were relativelyfixed.

In order to deal with their behavior and identity conflict, thepurchasing agents pursued two conflict resolution strategies.They used the e-marketplace selectively, completing onlinepurchases primarily for indirect goods, and they tried tooutperform the e-marketplace. In light of the role conflictthey experienced (i.e., price-based shopping via EnergyX asemployees versus value-based buying off negotiated contractsas purchasing professionals), the purchasing agents adoptedboth purchasing behaviors, albeit in different product seg-ments. They limited most of their online shopping to officesupplies and other indirect goods. In this segment, EnergyXhad a pricing advantage since the purchasing agents’ extantsupplier relationships were not strong. This strategy allowedthe purchasing agents to comply with management’s direc-tives while maintaining their professional identity.

The purchasing agents’ strategy of outperforming the market-place involved “beating” and “undermining the e-market-place” by leveraging their supplier relationships. As onenational sales manager explained,

It is common for purchasing agents to call me outand say that their management joined the e-market-place and they want to prove that they can get abetter price than the e-marketplace. One time thishappened my firm was the firm on the e-market-place. In that case, I had to contact the representa-tive from my company that was responsible for thee-marketplace. I explained that I was going to givethe guy that called me a lower price and underbidthe price my company was offering on thee-marketplace.

This type of situation highlights how the purchasing agentsused their embedded relationships to deal with their identityconflicts. By achieving better prices than the e-marketplace,the purchasing agents demonstrated to themselves and to theirmanagement that they were providing value and thereforedeserving of a place in the organization. However, the pur-chasing agents’ efforts to outperform the e-marketplacecreated goal, behavior, and identity conflicts for supplierorganizations and behavior conflicts for the broker.

Trading Partner Role Conflict: Suppliers

In trading partner roles, conflict was primarily apparentamong supplier organizations. Suppliers had traditionallypursued a goal of maintaining a hierarchical governancestructure with their utility customers in order to maximizetotal revenue and provide value-adding services (e.g., helpingout during natural disasters). Established suppliers had thusinvested in embedded relationships with the utilities and didnot see participating in EnergyX as an opportunity to marketthemselves. Instead, they feared that it would commodifytheir goods and services through catalogs, product standardi-zation, and price transparency. Furthermore, as one seniorcontract manager at BigU explained, they were justifiablyworried about losing revenue:

Several of BigU’s suppliers tried to circumventEnergyX from day one. They feared that their costwould increase by adding this third party into themix. They didn’t see EnergyX as a place to markettheir products. They thought that EnergyX wantedto squeeze their margins away. They feared that the10 percent profit they might get on an item would goto EnergyX instead of to them. In one sense, they



were right. With the wood poles [collaborativeagreement], EnergyX and the buyers did cut into themanufacturer’s profit.

The suppliers also struggled to understand the utilities’ambiguous expectations. Did the utilities want low-cost orhigh-value suppliers? Did they want arm’s-length or em-bedded relationships with their suppliers? On the one hand,the utilities encouraged suppliers to join the EnergyX market-place and, without the suppliers’ consent, made the suppliers’product information available for inclusion in the EnergyXcatalog, which set the stage for arm’s-length contracting. Onthe other hand, they assured the suppliers that their use ofEnergyX was experimental and temporary and that embeddedrelationships would prevail. For example, an e-procurementmanager at BigU illustrated how the utility responded to itssuppliers when they questioned BigU’s decision to do areverse auction with a new set of suppliers:

BigU is catching some flack about doing the reverseauction because we are getting involved with somepeople that we would not normally do business with.We are trying to explain to our vendors that we arenot getting involved permanently with the vendorsfrom the reverse auction; rather it is just a one-timething.

The conflict apparent in the suppliers’ role goals also mani-fested itself in the utilities’ expectations around the suppliers’behavior. Some suppliers, at the behest of the utilities, joinedEnergyX. According to the e-procurement manager at BigU,“we convinced them [the suppliers that were reluctant to join]that the relationship was still between BigU and the vendorand that EnergyX was just the medium.” However, as one ofthe suppliers pointed out, the technology-mediated way ofdoing business required a considerable integration effort andbehavioral change on the supplier’s part:

As a supplier, you have to really work with themarketplaces. Because if the marketplace doesn’twork correctly and your order isn’t delivered to thecustomer, the customer blames you.

In one instance, BigU leveraged its embedded relationshipwith ISC, an industrial supply company that specialized inbearings, chemicals, and hydraulics, to streamline the processof purchasing from their negotiated contract by convincingISC to join EnergyX. An ISC account executive explainedthe benefits they anticipated from this:

We saw the benefit of participating in EnergyX asintegration with BigU. If we work with BigU ondoing business over the e-marketplace, we have

higher integration and it is more difficult for BigU todivorce us.

To achieve this technology-enabled integration, ISC and BigUneeded to develop standard item identifiers and descriptions,which then became part of EnergyX’s product catalog. Thisendeavor required a significant investment. However, as oneof the e-commerce account executives at ISC pointed out, ISCfound it difficult to capitalize on this investment:

There is a disconnect between what the customer’scorporate office wants to do and what the people outin the field do. They sign up because corporatewants to do it but then the company’s buyers keepdoing it the old way. I think they don’t like tochange. We don’t like to be the bad guy and tell thepeople placing the orders, “Hey your corporate of-fice told us you wanted to do business this way andhad us invest in all of this and you aren’t using it.”

This quote illustrates how the conflicts experienced by theutilities’ purchasing agents’ manifested within supplierorganizations. While the utilities’ corporate managementexpected the suppliers to join EnergyX, the utilities’ pur-chasing agents were not expected to complete all transactionsvia the e-marketplace. As suppliers sought to fulfill thepromise of technology-mediated transacting by trying to per-suade utility purchasing agents to use the e-marketplace, theyalso worried about putting their relationships and inter-personal modes of transacting with the purchasing agents injeopardy. Thus, the suppliers experienced behavior conflict.

Confronted with these goal and behavior conflicts, the sup-pliers struggled with increasing uncertainty about theiridentity, particularly with regard to what their relationshipswith the utilities meant and what the relational capital theyhad built up over the years was worth. Were they supply-chain partners or undifferentiated providers of goods andservices? On the one hand, the utilities used their relationshipwith the suppliers to lure them onto EnergyX with thepromise of tighter integration. On the other, they issued noedicts that directed the utilities’ purchasing agents to use thee-marketplace. Furthermore, once on the e-marketplace, theutilities were going to compare the suppliers on price, side-by-side and indistinguishable from their competition on thepublic marketplace.

Moreover, market-based mechanisms such as reverse auctionswere frequently used to generate lower prices with which theutilities then pressured all suppliers, including non-participating ones, to offer better deals. Furthermore, theutility purchasing agents solicited the supplier agent’s help tooutperform the marketplace by reducing prices even further.



All of these challenges that the suppliers’ faced in theirrelationship with their utility customers, coupled withquestions about what constituted a good supplier (e.g., highvalue versus low cost), shaped the suppliers’ identity conflict.

To manage this conflict, the suppliers relied on price ambi-guation as a conflict resolution strategy. By not posting theirfinal, bottom-line prices on the public e-marketplace, theysought to render price comparison difficult, if not meaning-less. A purchasing manager at ReliableU explained thispractice:

The suppliers are very reluctant to give EnergyXtheir best price because that leaves no room fornegotiating and giving the utilities that they haverelationships with their better pricing. GivingEnergyX the best price will hurt these suppliers’profit margins.

In part, their price ambiguation strategy was a defensivemove: suppliers needed to protect their margins from addi-tional discounts that the utilities’ purchasing agents wouldinvariably seek in private, off-EnergyX negotiations. Theposted prices nevertheless presented a risk for suppliers inthat they established a baseline above which they could notcharge. Furthermore, if a supplier’s prices were much higherthan those of competitors, it was unlikely that utilities wouldcontact that supplier for further price negotiations. Since theprice ambiguation strategy undermined the transparencypromises of the e-marketplace, it created conflicts in thebroker role.

Broker Role Conflict: E-Marketplace

As the broker, EnergyX experienced several conflicts thatemanated primarily from the utilities’ dual role as EnergyXinvestors and customers. As investors in the context of thedot-com era, the utilities’ goal for EnergyX was to transform,indeed revolutionize, the utility industry. EnergyX wasenvisaged as a change agent and visionary leader for whosesuccess the utilities hoped ultimately to take credit. Thus, theutilities saw themselves as EnergyX’s partners: highly inte-grated and with aligned interests (hierarchy logic). As such,the utilities realized their need to use the e-marketplace tohelp it achieve critical mass, market fluidity, and financialsuccess.

As customers, however, the utilities’ expectations for thee-marketplace represented the market logic. While theywanted all of the benefits of an e-marketplace, such as morecompetitive prices, more efficient procurement, and an

expanded supplier base, they did not embrace the painfulorganizational change effort this required. They only wantedto use EnergyX when it delivered superior value. Onepurchasing agent illustrated the utilities’ conflicting goals forEnergyX in the following way: “We’re not going to do stupidthings just to use EnergyX.” Thus, EnergyX was viewed asa supply chain option that constantly needed to prove itsworth, which was made more difficult by the fact thatpurchasing agents constantly tried to outperform the e-marketplace in an effort to resolve their conflicts. Further-more, both BigU and ReliableU developed decision supportsystems that helped them determine when to bypass EnergyX.

In addition to the utilities’ conflicting goal expectations, thee-marketplace also faced challenges from the supply-side ofthe network. EnergyX’s close association with the utilitiesmade it difficult to deny its bias and convince the othercustomer set of its value proposition. This was remediedwhen EnergyX began relying on the utilities to recruit thesuppliers.

In time, EnergyX relinquished many of its market-orientedbehaviors. It shifted its mode of operating from high-tech tohigh-touch by employing agents, titled “buyer developmentmanagers,” who were physically located in the utilities. These broker agents were tasked with helping the utilities useand get value out of the e-marketplace by, for instance,negotiating long-term contracts with suppliers. One seniorcontract representative at BigU highlighted that EnergyXincreasingly downplayed technology:

While EnergyX really started as a marketplace, ithas evolved. Now it focuses more on being a supplychain expert than on technology. Now, EnergyXfocuses 75 percent on taking costs out of the supplychain and 25 percent on technology.

Furthermore, as the vice president of sales at EnergyX pointedout, they reversed many of their market-oriented ideals:

Our marketplace is not really for shopping and com-paring prices. The idea of shopping on-line andcomparing is dead. Now, a marketplace is a way toaccess an organization’s own negotiated contractsand integrating with suppliers.

This illustrates the interdependence of conflicts across theB2B exchange network. The purchasing agents’ behaviorconflict created conflicts for their suppliers, which resulted inEnergyX’s struggle regarding whether to pursue high-tech orhigh-touch modes of operation.



Unfortunately, the hierarchy logic that guided EnergyX’sbehavior was not reflected in its identity. As evidenced by theway the utilities remunerated the e-marketplace, they sawEnergyX as an independent supply chain provider, not as apartnered broker. It was difficult for EnergyX to keep trackof and get paid for all the transactions it had affected. Theutilities commonly used the results of an EnergyX collabora-tive agreement and/or an EnergyX auction to completecontract negotiations outside of EnergyX. This was due toEnergyX’s failure to secure exclusive contracts with theutilities and suppliers’ price ambiguation strategy, whichactively encouraged utilities to complete contract negotiationsoff-EnergyX. Furthermore, EnergyX’s final revenue model,namely a commission on the cost savings achieved via thee-marketplace, which represented a purely outcome-basedreward structure (market logic), failed to recognize the fullvalue generated by EnergyX. One purchasing agent at BigUsummarized the conflict as follows:

EnergyX has improved many of BigU’s procurementprocesses and management has failed to recognizethe value from these process improvements.EnergyX has knocked 2 weeks off of BigU’s requestfor quote process.

Despite the many goal, behavior, and identity conflicts thatEnergyX, its supplier and buyer customers, and their respec-tive agents encountered during the period under investigation(2000-2003), EnergyX was still operating in late 2009.7 Wecontend that EnergyX’s ability to resolve the conflictsexperienced by its network members contributed to itssurvival.

Discussion

The purpose of our interpretive case study of EnergyX, ane-marketplace that evolved into an all-in-one market, was toanswer two research questions regarding (1) the nature ofconflict in the mixed-mode governance structures that occupythe continuum between markets and hierarchies, and (2) howe-marketplaces, specifically all-in-one markets, resolve theconflicts in the middle. We address each question in turn.Table 5 summarizes the results of our data analysis.

Nature of Conflict in the Middle

Table 5 summarizes the conflicts we identified within theEnergyX case. It highlights that our study yielded con-siderable evidence of different types of conflict in bothmacro- and micro-level roles. Of the roles we focused on inour analysis, only the utilities’ purchasing agents did notexperience goal conflict because their role as salariedemployees was unaffected by EnergyX’s implementation.

Our analysis allows us to draw four conclusions about thenature of conflict in the middle. First, the structural contra-dictions between market-based and hierarchical modes ofgovernance, which are intermingled in the conflicted middle,underpin the goal, behavioral, and identity conflicts in thevarious roles that constitute the network. As Table 5 high-lights, the empirical examples of all three conflict typesreflect the opposing logic of market- versus hierarchy-basedgovernance structures (outlined in Table 3).

Second, even though structural contradictions underpin con-flict generally, conflict only arises when contradictoryinterests are enacted in a way that impedes one role’s abilityto meet its objectives. Our data highlight that conflict wastriggered, for example, when the same member of a role setplaced contradictory demands on a focal role (Kahn et al.1981). As investors in EnergyX, the utilities had expectationsincommensurate with their expectations as customers. As aresult, EnergyX experienced goal, behavior, and identityconflicts. Conflict was also triggered when there were incon-sistencies among the goals, behavior, and identity elements ofa given role. An example of this can be found in the brokerrole. Even though EnergyX increasingly aligned itself withthe utilities and relinquished its original market-orientedideals, especially with regard to its behavior, its position vis-à-vis the utilities continued to reflect a market logic. This wasexemplified by EnergyX’s remuneration based on costsavings, that is, outcomes. EnergyX’s challenges withmonetizing its contributions are indicative of its ongoing roleconflict as a non-exclusive broker.

Third, the conflict types are interdependent, suggesting thattriggering one type of role conflict increases the likelihoodthat another conflict type will occur. For instance, if twoparties in a role set hold contradictory expectations of a focalrole’s goals (i.e., what should be done), this is likely tocascade into disagreements regarding the role’s behavior (i.e.,how this goal should be achieved). In our case study, thisrevealed itself in the utilities’ expectations of the suppliers’role, which led not only to goal but also behavior conflictsince the suppliers could not count on the utilities’ manage-ment to enforce the use of the e-marketplace internally. How-

7In 2005, EnergyX merged with another e-market. As of late 2009, themerged e-marketplace, which is still an all-in-one marketplace, is servingmore than 200 buy-side clients in a variety of industries including health,hospitality, and financial services. Thirty of its clients were utilities in theUnited States. Its supplier network numbered 2,000 vendors.



Table 5. Summary of Conflicts and Conflict Resolution Strategies

Role Agent: Purchasing Agent Trading Partner: Supplier Broker: EnergyX

Conflict

Goal Conflict None Arm’s length relationshipsemphasizing price versus valueadding embedded relationships

Achieving market-oriented improve-ments for utilities versusrevolutionizing the industry

BehaviorConflict

Price minimization by shoppingversus value maximization bypurchasing from contracts

Technology-mediated integra-tion versus human-centeredcontracting

High-tech versus high-touch modesof operating

IdentityConflict

Procurement professionalversus employee

Undifferentiated provider versussupply chain partner

Independent supply chain providerversus partnered broker

ConflictResolutionStrategies

Segmentation Strategies Integration Strategies Integration Strategies

Choice: Outperforming themarketplaceCompromise: Selective use

Boundary Mechanisms: Priceambiguation

Supra-organizational Mechanisms: broker position, collaborative agree-ments, and transcendent vision

Interpenetration Mechanisms: hiringemployees from participant organiza-tions and training network members

Boundary Mechanisms: boundaryspanning by buyer developmentmanagers and the use of boundaryobjects such as technology

ever, as our discussion of the supplier’s role conflict shows,behavior conflict does not necessarily lead to goal conflict. As the purchasing agents remained salaried employees whosegoals were to maximize their rewards by complying withmanagement’s directives, no goal conflict was evident. Nevertheless, due to the change in management’s directives,behavior conflict ensued.

Fourth, conflicts are interdependent within a role set. Forinstance, the purchasing agents’ behavior conflicts, whichrevolved around their reluctance to shop via the e-market-place, shaped the suppliers’ behavior conflicts. This made itdifficult for the suppliers to develop a coherent channelstrategy. Similarly, the utilities’ lack of clarity aroundwhether EnergyX was a partner tasked with revolutionizingthe industry or merely a supply chain provider that had toprove its worth continuously (i.e., goal conflict at the brokerlevel) cascaded to the supplier and purchasing agent roles,where it manifested itself as behavior conflict.

How All-In-One Markets ResolveConflicts in the Middle

Our second research question addresses how all-in-onemarkets resolve conflict in the middle. Table 5 summarizesour findings and shows that EnergyX implemented multipleintegration strategies which then enabled trading organiza-tions and their agents to resolve conflict. Role integrationwas apparent at the macro- or group-level, whereas rolesegmentation was evident at the micro- or individual-level.By altering role boundaries, these strategies helped preventthe structural contradictions between markets and hierarchiesfrom escalating into conflict and also helped manage conflictsafter they had been triggered.

The Broker’s Integration Strategies

EnergyX employed supra-organizational, interpenetration,and boundary mechanisms as part of its integration strategy.



With its supra-organizational mechanisms, EnergyX soughtto align the network participants’ interests and bring themtogether into a common structure and vision. Furthermore,EnergyX itself functioned as a supra-organizational mech-anism, mediating buyers’ and suppliers’ inherently conflictinggoals (i.e., price minimization versus profit maximization).The collaborative agreements were indicative of the value-adding role that EnergyX could play as a broker. Forexample, in the wood pole collaborative agreement, severalutilities developed common specifications, demonstratingEnergyX’s ability to leverage its supra-organizational positionto help the entire industry network envisage a total supply-chain cost reduction goal that transcended the buyer–supplierconflicts.

EnergyX’s membership-based and ideological interpenetra-tion mechanisms were aimed at reducing the distinctionamong the network players such that more meaningfulinteractions could develop. EnergyX’s membership-basedinterpenetration strategy included hiring employees fromutilities, suppliers, and technology providers in order to gaininsights into the assumptions and expectations of thesenetwork participants. Ideological interpenetration, intendedto create a shared understanding among network participants,took the form of guidelines that described best practices forusing the all-in-one market. Disseminated via training ses-sions, conference presentations, and white papers, theguidelines outlined the use of different purchasing strategiesbased on product type, situation, and procurement phase. Forinstance, they encouraged buyers to pursue embedded rela-tionships and use private markets for products like switchgear and cable, which were central to “keeping the lights on.”

EnergyX’s boundary mechanisms managed the intersectionbetween EnergyX and its customers. EnergyX’s buyerdevelopment managers served as boundary spanners. Theywere charged with facilitating the three-way integrationamong EnergyX, the utilities, and the suppliers. Because theyserved multiple role sets, these boundary spanners dealt withconflicts on an ongoing basis (Friedman and Podolny 1992);they absorbed conflict as part of their everyday job.EnergyX’s technology served as boundary objects in that itsapplications conveyed a meaning stable enough to enablenetwork transactions while offering enough flexibility tosupport more unique, local meanings (Star and Griesemer1989). So, even though a reverse auction on EnergyX impliedthat a utility was pursuing a market-based logic—that is,prioritizing price above relationships and seeking bids fromnew suppliers, which might lead suppliers to successivelyunder-bid their competitors—both utilities and suppliersmight interpret the reverse auction as part of either theirextant or anticipated hierarchical relationship. For example,

a supplier might bid on the single reverse auction deal as if itwere part of an embedded relationship, or the utility might notaward the deal to the lowest bidder. The boundary objects’interpretive flexibility was facilitated by the integration ofapplications that embedded contradictory logic (e.g., publicand private marketplaces) on a single platform as this legiti-mated the coexistence of both arm’s-length and embeddedrelationships in the same utility–supplier dyad.

Supplier’s Integration Strategies

As trading partners, suppliers relied on price ambiguation asa boundary mechanism for conflict resolution. The publicmarket’s catalog was leveraged as a boundary object in thatthe prices listed were essentially suggested rather than final orbest prices. Thus, the situated meaning of the price in thecatalog entry was sufficiently flexible for experiencedpurchasing agents to perceive it as a starting point for furthernegotiations. Despite this common practice, the listed priceswere nevertheless stable enough in their meaning tocoordinate network transactions. The interpretive flexibilityof the application (e.g., catalog) and its content (e.g., price)created the opportunity to determine the mode of transactingin a highly contextual manner (i.e., based on product type,situation, and procurement phase).

Purchasing Agents’ Segmentation Strategies

Purchasing agents relied on two role segmentation strategies,namely choice and compromise, to resolve the conflicts theywere experiencing. Outperforming the marketplace by lever-aging their embedded relationships to negotiate better dealsthan were available via EnergyX represented a choicestrategy. Simultaneously confronted with their roles as em-ployees who were rewarded for their input (i.e., using themarketplace in order to comply with management directives)and their role as procurement professionals who wererewarded for their output (i.e., the best deal), they prioritizedthe latter. This seemed a relatively safe choice, because itwas unlikely that someone would lose his/her job for savingthe utility money.

The purchasing agents’ selective use of the e-marketplacerepresents a compromise strategy. Using the public market-place to purchase indirect goods (e.g., cell phones and com-puters) allowed the purchasing agents to fulfill their role asemployees, while purchasing infrastructure goods (e.g., wireand transformers) on private marketplaces allowed thepurchasing agents to maintain their role as independentprofessionals. EnergyX’s integrated platform enabled micro-



transitions between the purchasing agents’ roles as employeesin the indirect goods space and as professionals in the directgoods arena. This temporal segmentation of the two roleshelped the purchasing agents resolve their role conflict.

Based on the insights gained from analyzing how all-in-onemarkets resolved conflict in the middle, we draw threeconclusions. First, all-in-one markets resolve conflict byimplementing integration strategies which then enable tradingpartners to implement integration conflict resolution strategiesand individual agents to implement segmentation conflictresolution strategies. Second, the technology of all-in-onemarkets is critical to resolving conflict in the middle.EnergyX’s technology (i.e., a platform on which applicationsrepresenting the market and hierarchy logic were offered side-by-side) was key to the suppliers’ and the purchasing agents’conflict resolution strategies. As boundary objects, theindividual applications proved stable enough to coordinatetransactions, but also sufficiently flexible in their meaning toenable their adaptation to local needs and specific buyer–supplier relationships. This suggests that the interpretiveflexibility of all-in-one markets’ technology helps prevent thestructural contradictions between markets and hierarchiesfrom being enacted as conflict.

Third, within all-in-one markets, conflict resolution mech-anisms, and strategies are interdependent. For instance,EnergyX’s buyer development managers played a key role inimplementing not only EnergyX’s boundary mechanisms, butalso its interpenetration and supra-organizational mechanisms. The buyer development managers conveyed EnergyX’stranscendental vision (i.e., supra-organizational) and trainednetwork members (i.e., interpenetration). Furthermore,EnergyX hired many of these managers from participantorganizations (i.e., interpenetration) and leveraged theirknowledge and relational capital in the negotiation of collab-orative agreements (i.e., supra-organizational).

Implications

Our study enriches the current understanding of B2B e-marketplaces, especially those supporting mixed-modegovernance structures. In contrast to prior research on hybridnetwork structures, which has focused on their movementtoward unbiased markets (Granados et al. 2007) or hierarchies(Ganesh and Madanmohan 2004; Hess and Kemerer 1994),our study focuses on these mixed-mode networks as morepermanent structures. We view the middle as a place wherethe contradictions between markets and hierarchies can giverise to conflict at any point in time. This implies that themiddle is not a transient state through which networks move

on their way to more stable structures such as pure markets orpure hierarchies, but an enduring structure riddled withconflict.

In the middle, conventional understandings of technologiesand meanings are challenged. While it is frequently arguedthat marketplace technologis such as reverse auctions are notsuitable for procuring highly engineered products or value-added services (Choudhury et al. 1998; Mithas et al. 2008),our research highlights that reverse auctions can effectively beused to procure such items when they are run against a back-drop of embedded relationships. However, in the absence ofconflict resolution mechanisms or all-in-one markets, conflictis likely to arise.

Since the meanings of market- and hierarchy-based tech-nologies and expectations shift in the middle, the notion ofprice transparency based on the availability of price discoverymechanisms like reverse auctions and published catalogs (Sohet al. 2006) is challenged. As our study has highlighted, thesuppliers relied on catalogs as boundary objects, whosemeaning is stable at the global level but flexible at the locallevel. Thus, even though the use of catalogs might be viewedas an indicator of price transparency, in many buyer–supplierrelationships they are merely a means of signaling suggestedprice. Our study thus amplifies calls for the development ofless “crude measures of price transparency” (Soh et al. 2006,p. 713) and suggests that such measures will need to considerthe strength of the relationships between the trading partners.

Given the preponderance of mixed-mode governance models(e.g., Hennart 1993; Holland and Lockett 1997; Kambil et al.1999), our study offers insights to practitioners, that is, tobuyers, suppliers, and brokers operating in the middle. Ourtheoretical framework for understanding conflict and itsresolution in the middle should be useful. Our insights intohow conflict is triggered and how it manifests itself in thevarious network roles (Table 5) should help practitionersmake sense of the conflict they might be experiencing, andidentify its triggers and root causes (Table 3). With thisknowledge, combined with the insights into how differentconflict resolution strategies are effectively deployed in thenetwork (Table 5), they should be able to develop conflictmanagement strategies by viewing conflict situations from amore analytical and less emotional point of view.

Contributions and Limitations

Our paper is the first to explore Kambil et al.’s (1999) notionthat hybrid network relationships are characterized by con-flict. Even though there is increasing evidence that most



network relations reflect mixed-mode logic, many have notedthat there is little empirical research on these hybrid structures(Carter and Hodgson 2006; Mithas et al. 2008). Further, thereis support for the observation that using a theory base oftransaction cost economics alone, which is frequently the casewith studies of mixed-mode networks (Ganesh andMadanmohan 2004; Granados et al. 2007; Hess and Kemerer1994), is inadequate. This paper is a first step in addressingthese concerns. Not only do we examine hybrid networkrelationships in terms of recurring human action (i.e., prac-tices), but we also build a framework using multiple theories,namely role, conflict, and transaction cost theory.

Our focus on practices also allowed us to theorizee-marketplace technology, that is, the IT artifact, in its socialcontext of use by paying attention to what actors do and theworkarounds they employ to make technology work (Markusand Silver 2008; Orlikowski and Iacono 2001). In addition toanswering calls to integrate practice into our theories oftechnology in general (Markus and Silver 2008), ande-marketplaces in particular (Mithas et al. 2008), this researchprovides a valuable socio-cultural perspective in an areawhere the economic perspective has been dominant.

This research also develops a role-theoretic perspective ofpractice, which allows us to explore the intertwined, situatednature of network relationships among agent, trading partner,and broker roles. These roles are rarely considered simul-taneously in research on B2B e-marketplaces, which tends tofocus either on brokers (e.g., Matook and Vessey 2008; Sohet al. 2006) or trading partners (e.g., Mithas et al. 2008).

We relied on an interpretive case study of a single e-market-place comprised of buyer and supplier firms and their respec-tive employees. Even though there are a few case studies onB2B e-marketplaces that draw on primary data (Bensaou1997; Grover et al. 2002; Kraut et al. 1999), an interpretiveapproach is rare (e.g., Schultze and Orlikowski 2004). Themajority of case studies in this space use secondary, publisheddata for their empirical base (Granados et al. 2006; Hess andKemerer 1994; Lee and Clark 1996; Soh et al. 2006).

The rich, empirical illustrations of the conflicted middle andthe role of all-in-one markets in conflict resolution presentedin this paper has allowed us to move beyond previousresearch (Kambil et al. 1999; Kumar and van Dissel 1996),which described the conflict in the middle in terms of uncer-tainty rather than conflict. By focusing on conflict, we extendKambil et al.’s (1999) conceptual framework and elaborate onthe role of all-in-one markets in resolving conflict, not merelyreducing uncertainty. Our research thus developed an empi-rically validated framework for understanding the conflictedmiddle in terms of contradictions and conflict. An interesting

opportunity to extend our theoretical frameworks lies inexploring the relationships between the various conflictresolution strategies and the different conflict types (i.e., goal,behavior, and identity conflict).

These contributions need to be considered in light of thelimitations of our research. First, we relied on a single casestudy, which frequently raises questions about the generali-zability of the results to other empirical settings. This is aparticular concern when the case was chosen for theoreticalsampling purposes.8 Since we chose our case study fortheoretical reasons, we can make no claims of across-casegeneralizability. However, our study does achieve within-case generalizability (Lee and Baskerville 2003). By devel-oping a theory of the conflicted middle (Figure 3) throughiterative exploration of prior theory and our empirical data,we achieve generalization from empirical description totheory. Our reliance on both induction and deduction meansour research results should be both testable and empiricallyvalid, especially for network participants operating in amixed-mode governance structure.

Second, most of our case study data was collected severalyears ago, when e-marketplaces were topical in both theacademic and practitioner communities. However, as B2Be-marketplaces continue to operate alongside hierarchicalprocurement methods, there is no doubt that these conflictsare still prevalent today. Nevertheless, given that our researchfocused primarily on EnergyX’s formative stages, additionalresearch on current procurement practices within more matureall-in-one markets is necessary. This will help us betterunderstand how these conflicts have been resolved over timeand what new conflicts have surfaced.

Conclusion

This paper seriously considers Kambil et al.’s (1999) descrip-tion of mixed-mode governance structures as the conflictedmiddle: we seek to understand the nature of conflict in themiddle and the role of all-in-one markets in resolving it. Withregard to the nature of conflict in the middle, our studyindicates that the enacted conflicts were based on the struc-

8We chose EnergyX because we wanted to study conflict and two ofEnergyX’s characteristics made conflict likely: buyer-ownership and imple-mentation in an industry characterized by embedded relationships. However,neither of these characteristics is unusual in the B2B space. Many e-marketplaces are buyer-owned (Yoo et al. 2007) and embedded relationshipsare common in many industries (Bensaou and Anderson 1999; Dyer andSingh 1998).



tural contradictions between markets and hierarchies, the twogovernance modes that are mixed in the middle. Furthermore,conflicts are interrelated across types (i.e., goal, behavior, andidentity) and roles (e.g., agents, trading partners, and brokers). This suggests that once one type of conflict is triggered, thelikelihood of another type of conflict arising within the roleset increases.

All-in-one markets helped resolve these conflicts by imple-menting integration strategies to foster a common under-standing among the network participants. These strategiesincluded the formulation of a supra-organizational vision thattranscended the contradiction between markets and hier-archies, as well as technology stable enough to coordinatetransactions yet flexible enough to adapt to local needs.Boundary spanners helped individual agents and tradingorganizations understand these strategies and implement theirown. Buyers and suppliers relied on boundary mechanisms,an integration strategy, to resolve conflict in their relation-ships. Purchasing agents resolved conflict by separating theirroles as employees from their roles as purchasing profes-sionals. In sum, all-in-one markets play a significant role inresolving conflict in the middle by managing role boundaries.

Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank Varun Grover and Suprateek Sarker fortheir guidance on this paper; Baylor University, Texas A&M Uni-versity, and Southern Methodist University for providing support;and our industry partners.

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About the Authors

Hope Koch is an associate professor in the IS program at BaylorUniversity, where she leads the program’s career developmentefforts. Hope has received numerous awards for her programbuilding efforts including the 2008 ConocoPhillips FacultyDevelopment Fellowship and the 2009 Southwestern BusinessDean’s Association Innovative Achievement Award. Her researchinterests align with her program building efforts and includeattracting students into technical fields and the use of socialnetworking technologies in the workplace. Hope’s work hasappeared in numerous academic outlets including Journal of Stra-tegic Information Systems, Communications of the Association forInformation Systems, and a best paper at the Americas Conferenceon Information Systems. Hope has prior industry experienceworking as a CPA for the #1 company on the Fortune 500 list: Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.

Ulrike Schultze is an associate professor in Information Technologyand Operations Management at Southern Methodist University’sCox School of Business. Her research tends to explore the impactof information technology on work practices. While her initialresearch focused on knowledge work and knowledge managementtechnology, her more recent research projects are in the area ofInternet-based technologies and virtual worlds. Ulrike frequentlyrelies on multimethod research designs, which include ethnographicobservations, interviews, and surveys. Her research has been pub-lished in, among others, Information Systems Research, MISQuarterly, and Information & Organization. She currently serveson the editorial boards of Information & Organization, Journal ofInformation Technology, and Scandinavian Journal of InformationSystems.



Appendix A

Interviews Conducted

Company† Interviewee Job Title/Number of Interviews‡ Interview Date(s)

E-marketplace President and Chief Executive Officer 6/7/02

Sales Vice President 6/7/02

Buyer Development Manager 5/21/02

Portfolio Manager 4/3/02

Project Manager 4/3/02

Senior Buyer Development Manager* (2 field visits) 9/10/04, 4/14/05

BigU Procurement Services Manager (9 field visits) 2/19/00, 1/9/01, 3/15/01, /15/01, 6/28/01,10/15/01, 12/10/01, 4/3/02, and 5/21/02

Senior Contract Representative (4 field visits) 1/9/01, 3/15/01,6/28/01, and 4/3/02

Procurement Services Specialist (2 field visits) 1/9/01,3/15/01 and 6/28/01

Information Technology Manager (4 field visits) 1/9/01, 3/15/01, 6/28/01, 10/15/01, and12/10/01

Work Management Manager 3/15/01

Wood Pole Buyer 3/15/01

Nuclear Procurement Services Manager 4/3/02

Senior Buyer 4/3/02

Nuclear Purchasing Manager 4/3/02

Procurement Vice President and EnergyX Board Member 6/28/01

Information Technology Specialist 6/28/01

LittleU Purchasing Manager 8/15/02

NationalU Director, Strategic Procurement and Supply Chain 5/13/03

ReliableU (Regulated) Corporate Purchasing and E-Procurement Manager 8/12/02

ReliableU (Unregulated) Purchasing Manager 8/15/02

Dragline supplier Manager Capital Projects 7/17/02

Industrial Supply Company(ISC) (i.e., bearings,chemicals and hydraulics)

E-Commerce Account Executive 7/9/02

Lubricants supplier E-Business Director 3/9/01

E-Business Sales and Marketing Director

Manager Operations, Packaging, and Additives

Vice President Supply, Manufacturing and Distribution

Office supplies supplier President 7/2/02

Vice President Strategic Accounts

Division Customer Service Representative

Quality Manager

Tools, services andtransmission materialsdistributor

National Account Manager (3 interviews) 7/3/07, 8/29/07, and 1/16/09

Total number of interviews 50

†To protect anonymity, we use pseudonyms for the utilities. For suppliers we describe the type of product they supplied.‡Unless otherwise noted, each person represents one interview.*Italics denotes our key informant, who changed jobs three times during the study.


stuck in the conflicted middle: a role-theoretic perspective on b2b

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