RELATIONSHIP QUALITY AS INTER-ORGANIZATIONAL RELATIONSHIPS FEATURE

Abstract

This study aims to recognize the specificity of relationship quality in an inter-organizational context, especially concerning its importance and feature type (first-order or second-order).Methodologically, this paper follows the qualitative approach, specifically 18 in-depth interviews were used to acquire the data from two groups of software development firms – 3 software developers and their 15 strategic partners (i.e., cooperators or coopetitors).Obtained results suggest that relationship quality plays a key role in inter-organizational relationships, including both their establishment and long-term exploitation. Moreover, it seems to be the second-order feature as directly resulting from partners’ behaviors and actions undertaken under the relationship. As an original value, this paper introduces empirical findings of inter-organizational relationship quality in the software industry. In turn, using marketing and strategic management underpinnings, our study presents inter-organizational relationship quality in a different perspective than in quality management literature, where quality is usually presented as a first-order relational feature.

Keywords: relational quality, relationships attributes, interorganizational relationships, cooperation

JEL classification codes: L14, L2, C7