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Antecedents of i-deals: a transaction cost economics perspective

Yishuai Yin, Yuxuan Zhang, Pengfei Zhang

Chinese Management Studies

ISSN: 1750-614X

Article publication date: 26 November 2024

35

Abstract

Purpose

Idiosyncratic deals (i-deals) are designed to benefit both the employees and employers. While plenty of previous studies uncover the outcomes of i-deals, little research has explored what drives organizations to adopt i-deals in the first place. Drawing on transaction cost economics theory, this paper aims to investigate how employee–employer exchange characteristics affect different types of i-deals.

Design/methodology/approach

Based on a two-wave questionnaire study of 385 employees from information technology industry in China, hierarchical regression analysis was conducted to test the hypotheses.

Findings

The authors found that human asset specificity and task interdependence are positively related to developmental i-deals, and task interdependence was negatively related to flexible i-deals. Furthermore, environmental uncertainty positively moderates the impact of human asset specificity and task interdependence on developmental i-deals.

Originality/value

This paper contributes to research on i-deals by providing a theoretically more comprehensive and balanced analysis of why and when i-deals are adopted in organizations.

Keywords

Acknowledgements

Funding: This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) Youth Project [grant number 72002084] and Humanities and Social Science Project of The Ministry of Education of China [grant number 20YJC630194].

Citation

Yin, Y., Zhang, Y. and Zhang, P. (2024), "Antecedents of i-deals: a transaction cost economics perspective", Chinese Management Studies, Vol. ahead-of-print No. ahead-of-print. https://doi.org/10.1108/CMS-05-2024-0298

Publisher

:

Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2024, Emerald Publishing Limited

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