To Make, to Buy or to Ally?
That’s the Question!
Sergeant Jiri Sebastiaan van der Kaaij
August 2011
To Make, to Buy or to Ally?
That’s the Question!
Sergeant Jiri Sebastiaan van der Kaaij
Submitted for the degree of Master in Science
University of Groningen Faculty of Economics and Business
Supervisors University of Groningen drs. A. Visscher
mr. drs. H.A. Ritsema
Supervisor Netherlands Defence organization Colonel ir. R.L.J.R. Pieters
Student number: s1646583
August 2011
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank General-‐Major Mart de Kruif for giving me this opportunity. Without his support, this thesis would not be written.
Not only would I like to thank Colonel Ir. Rob Pieters for his directions during the process of this thesis, but also for his unfailingly positive source of advice.
I would like to thank Brigadier Leanne van den Hoek for giving me a wonderful learning experience. Not only was the time at the Programmabureau Sourcing crucial for the last
part of my thesis, it also shaped me personal.
I would like to thank Chief of Defence General Peter van Uhm for this time. It was an honour to met him and discusses his perspectives about sourcing. He is for me a true
leader!
I would like to thank drs. Ad Visscher for his directions as supervisor of this thesis.
I would like to thank drs. Marc Delen and Cornel Lemmers for their endless patience and help.
I would like to thank all other interviewees for their time and effort.
Abstract
Sourcing is nowadays a common and indispensable business practice among both public and private organizations. However, sourcing is by far not a new phenomenon, although many of us think it is a “miracle” of the last couple of decades. Organizations continuously shape their boundaries through these so-‐called make-‐or-‐buy decisions. In essence, sourcing explains why organizations exist at all. They exist because it is not beneficial or possible to complete certain transaction through the market. It is exactly this principle that explains why society raises militaries. The military exists since nobody can be excluded from consuming the provision of defence. Since private producers cannot exclude people from consuming the military, they cannot charge for it, so there is no incentive for the market to provide it.
For that reason, the government has the ability with its monopoly power to force every party to contribute to the final service via public law.
However, it is not only this reason why society raises militaries. The military is unlike any other public organizations. The military touches the boundary of democratic principles since it makes use of legitimized force on behave of the state. It is therefore that sourcing of military activities is by no means a purely technical issue. Recently, the discussion about what to make and to buy has strengthened, as it moved from straightforward tasks to more complex responsibilities such as providing support services to soldiers in the field. In particular, the support services to soldiers in the field are part of an on-‐going debate around the world. The risks of outsourcing service support services cannot be calculated and questions of accountability and responsibility arise. In particular, the question to what extent militaries should be dependent on private contractors in unsafe conditions is crucial.
In these extreme circumstances, the government is not able to hold these contractors accountable in any meaningful way if failure ultimately results in the deaths of soldiers or civilians. Governments will always be held accountable, and sourcing is by no means an option to decrease this accountability.
In order to make these complex sourcing decisions, the fundamental principles of both the military and sourcing need to be understood thoroughly. In particular, it is necessary to identify how the unique characteristics of the military influence these sourcing decisions. It is exactly this question that the Netherlands Defence organization is struggling
with. The Netherlands Defence organization is forced to make radical sourcing decisions due to substantial cutbacks of the Dutch government. However, in reality the Netherlands Defence organization is predominantly pressured to look outside the organization, hence resembling the outsourcing decision. Although outsourcing can result in significant benefits, it is by no means a panacea. The theoretical underpinnings of sourcing and the unique characteristics of the military will always determine the outcome of the sourcing decision.
Therefore, this thesis will question how the unique characteristics of the military influence the sourcing decision.
Table of Content
Acknowledgements ... 5
Abstract ... 7
List of abbreviations ... 13
Chapter 1 ... 15
1.1 Introduction ... 15
1.2 Problem statement ... 16
1.3 Objectives and outline ... 20
CHAPTER 2 The Defence of Sourcing ... 23
2.1 Introduction ... 23
2.2 Purpose of the military ... 23
2.3 Military characteristics ... 24
2.4 Conceptualization of military characteristics ... 25
2.5 The essence of sourcing ... 27
2.6 Military sourcing: developments and explanations ... 28
2.7 Military sourcing in practice ... 31
2.8 Motivations and risks of sourcing ... 32
2.8.1 Motivations for outsourcing ... 33
2.8.1.1 Financially driven outsourcing decisions ... 33
2.8.1.2 Strategically driven outsourcing decisions ... 33
2.8.1.3 Politically driven outsourcing decisions ... 35
2.8.4 Risks of outsourcing ... 36
2.8.4.1 Unpredicted and hidden costs ... 36
2.8.4.2 Loss of control ... 36
2.8.4.3 Over-‐sourcing/loss of knowledge and skills ... 37
2.9 Conclusion and moving forward ... 38
Chapter 3 Theoretical Underpinnings ... 39
3.1 Introduction ... 39
3.2 Transaction Cost Economics ... 39
3.2.1 Asset specificity ... 41
3.2.2 Frequency ... 41
3.2.3 Uncertainty ... 42
3.2.4 Probity ... 42
3.2.5 Performance Measurement ... 43
3.2.6 Connectedness ... 44
3.2.7 Summary and conceptualization ... 45
3.3 Resource Based View ... 46
3.3.1 Summary ... 51
3.4 Public Choice Theory ... 52
3.4.1 Summary ... 56
3.5 Conclusions and hypotheses ... 56
3.5.1 Hypotheses Transaction Cost Economics: ... 58
3.5.2 Hypothesis Resource-‐Based View ... 59
3.5.3 Hypotheses Public Choice Theory ... 59
Chapter 4 Methodology ... 60
4.1 Introduction ... 60
4.2 Research approach ... 60
4.3 Research Method ... 61
4.4 Data collection ... 62
4.5 Data analysis ... 63
4.6 Validity ... 64
Chapter 5 Findings ... 66
Part 1 Sourcing and the Netherlands Defence organization ... 66
5.1 Introduction ... 66
5.2 Netherlands Defence Organization ... 66
5.2.1 Structure ... 66
5.2.2 Purpose and tasks of the Netherlands Defence organization ... 67
5.2.3 Essential Operational Capabilities ... 69
5.3 Sourcing in the Netherlands Defence organization ... 72
5.3.1 Introduction ... 72
5.3.2 Developments ... 72
5.3.2.1 Definitions and understanding of sourcing ... 73
5.3.3.2 Sourcing policy of the Netherlands Defence organization ... 74
5.3.3.3 Motivations for sourcing ... 75
5.3.3.4 Risks of outsourcing ... 76
5.3.4 Sourcing process ... 77
5.3.4.1 Introduction ... 77
5.3.4.2 Sourcing agenda ... 77
5.3.4.3 Sourcing test ... 77
5.3.4.4 Quick-‐scan ... 79
5.4 Concluding remarks ... 79
5.5 Summary ... 80
Part 2 Testing hypotheses ... 82
5.5.1 Introduction ... 82
5.5.2 Mechanische Centrale Werkplaats (MCW) ... 82
5.5.3 Trekker-‐Oplegger Combinatie (TROPCO) ... 83
5.5.3.1 Transportation (TROPCO Transport) ... 84
5.5.3.2 Maintenance ... 84
Organic Level Maintenance (TROPCO OLM) ... 85
Intermediate Level Maintenance (TROPCO ILM) ... 85
Depot Level Maintenance (TROPCO DLM) ... 86
5.5.4 Defensie Brede Vervanging Operationele Wielvoertuigen (DVOW) ... 87
5.5.4.1 DVOW 7,5 kN ... 88
5.5.4.2 DVOW 12 kN ... 88
5.5.4.3 DVOW 50-‐100 kN ... 89
5.5.5 Maintenance F100 motor ... 90
5.5.6 Comparative case study ... 92
Chapter 6 Conclusions and recommendations ... 93
Chapter 7 Limitations ... 99
References ... 100
Appendices ... 110
“The first step towards getting somewhere is to decide that your are not going to stay where you are”
List of abbreviations
AIV Advisory Council on International Affairs
CDC Commando Diensten Centra
CDS Chief of Defence
DLM Depot Level Maintenance DMO Defensie Materieel Organisatie
DVOW Defensiebrede Vervanging Operationele Wielvoertuigen
EOC Essential Operational Capability F100 Engine of the F16
ILM Intermediate Level Maintenance MCW Mechanische Centrale Werkplaats MLU Mid Life Update
NPM New Public Management
OEM Original Equipment Manufacturer OLM Organic Level maintenance
PCT Public Choice Theory PMC Private Military Company PPP Public Private Partnerships RBV Resource Based View
TCE Transaction Cost Economics
TROPCO Trekker Oplegger Combinatie
Chapter 1
1.1 Introduction
Sourcing1 is nowadays a common and indispensable business practice among both public and private organizations. In essence, sourcing explains why organizations exist at all, since it is not beneficial or possible to complete certain transaction through the market (Coase 1937).2 However, sourcing is by far not a new phenomenon, although many of us think it is a
“miracle” of the last couple of decades. Organizations continuously shape their boundaries through these so-‐called make-‐or-‐buy decisions (Williamson, 1975; Perry, 1989; Grant, 1996).
Although the dichotomy between make and buy is somewhat simplistic3, it is the principle of sourcing. However, in each simplified story there are exceptions, which needed to be treated individually and mostly with care. The military is such an exception. Therefore, this thesis will investigate how the uniqueness of the military influences these sourcing decisions.
The military is seen as one of the oldest and traditionally most prominent examples of a formal organization. However, it is the very nature of the principal mission for which society raises militaries that sets them apart from other public and private institutions within society. The use of legitimized force and extreme “hot”4 working conditions gives the military that unique character. It is therefore that only the state has the power to exercise these sovereign transactions. However, the last couple of decades there have been a trend to challenge this principle by outsourcing military activities. When those powers are delegated to outsiders, the power to control is challenged. In particular, since military
1 Sourcing stems from the verb “to source”, which is defined by the Oxford Dictionary as: “to find out where
2 In his famous article “The nature of Firms”, Coase explains why organizations exist and why they produce certain activities in-‐house and buy other on the market. He contributes this to the principle of marginalism (Coase 1937 p. 404) and relates this concept to the problems of the setting of the boundaries of the firm. He states:
“A firm will tend to expand until the costs of organizing an extra transaction within the firm become equal to the costs of carrying out the same transaction by means of an exchange on the open market or the costs of organizing in another firm” (Coase,
1937, p.395).
3 Soeters et.al (2010) state that: “sourcing includes the “make-‐option” (in-‐sourcing), the “buy-‐option”
(outsourcing) and all kinds of ways to create value by “working together” with different partners”
4 Soeters et al. refer to both cold hot conditions to characterize the difference between peace and war, or safe and unsafe.
outsourcing tests the boundary of state sovereignty (Verkuil 2007).
In many countries, like the Netherlands, there is no room for discussion to outsource the combat5 component. It has been lawfully prescribed that combat functions should be performed by those that are trained to do so. However, one might expect that only the combat component are taking lives and building and destroying things by military personnel in the name of freedom, democracy, and sovereignty, even personnel of support activities must be prepared to do so. Indeed, should the need arise, service members of all specialties are not only expected to perform such acts, they are duty bound to do so. For that reason, the military chain of production was predominantly produced in-‐house. However, the Dutch Armed Forces has undergone a considerable transformation. The most prevalent part of this transformation has been the externalization of support activities through outsourcing, contracting out, the privatization of activities and entities not at the core of public administration, and Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) (Torres & Pina 2002). Governments have increasingly stimulated the use of sourcing as it demonstrates efficiency principles that can improve performance. However, as these activities become more typically military in nature, the importance and complexity in the make-‐or-‐buy decision increases.
The theme of this thesis is embodied in the heart of the Netherlands Defence organization. The Netherlands Defence organization is continuously concerned with these complex sourcing decisions: it may choose to produce an activity publicly; or it may choose to contract a private firm to produce an activity; or it can choose to make a combination of both practices (partnerships). However, irrespective which decision will be made, the central question arises: how can the Netherlands Defence organization determine the outsourceability6 of military activities?
1.2 Problem statement
Karl von Clausewitz wrote once “war is an extension of politics, but by other means”.
Continuing on this quote, the military can be seen as an instrument for this extension.
However, governments are by no means static organizations. Driven by elections,
5 Boëne (1990) suggests that military activities could be divided into two different components, the teeth (or combat component) and the tail (or supply and support component).
6 Outsourceability is defined as the extent to which outsourcing is financially or strategically superior compared to insourcing, given the characteristics of the activity (transaction), the organization, and its environment.
governments, and subsequently the military, are changing continuously. The last couple of decades, in particular since the last financial crisis, the political sound of a smaller and cheaper public administration has risen. In 2011 the Dutch Ministry of Defence has announced radical cutbacks in Dutch government spending, including the Netherlands Defence organization. The Dutch Government stated in their recent report:
The situation of the state budget forces the government to take radical measures. The Department of Defence is no exception and to cut structural 635 million, about 9 per cent of the total budget represents a major challenge (Hillen, J.S.J. April 2011 p.1)7
Furthermore, they have indicated that in order to achieve this radical change, about 12000 jobs will disappear. Thousands of employees need to leave the organization and sourcing is seen as a one of the instruments to achieve this goal. Hillen states:
Outsourcing can result in cost and personnel reduction....and can reduce organizational complexity and an increase in flexibility (Hillen April 2011, p. 9)8
However, sourcing of military activities represents a major challenge that needs to be fully understood before making these complex decisions. Hillen continues:
…The choice to outsource needs to be considered thoroughly case-‐by-‐case, and there should be a method to assess whether there is a core competence in question that the Dutch Ministry of Defence needs to have to guarantee the deployment of the Armed Forces. (Hillen April 2011, p. 9)9
This last sentence is the core topic of this thesis. The discussion about what to make and to buy has strengthened lately, as it moved from straightforward tasks such as cleaning and garbage collection to more complex responsibilities such as providing support services to soldiers in the field (Jensen & Stonecash 2004). In particular the support services to soldiers
7 Defensie na de kridietcrisis: een kleinere krijgsmacht in een onrustige wereld. (Hillen, April 2011)
8 Ibid.
9 Ibid.
in the field is part of an on-‐going debate around the world. The risks of outsourcing service support services cannot be calculated and questions of accountability and responsibility arise. In particular, the question to what extent the Netherlands Defence organization should be dependent on private contractors in “hot” conditions is crucial. In these extreme circumstances, the government is not able to hold these contractors accountable in any meaningful way if failure ultimately results in the deaths of soldiers or civilians. The Dutch government will always be held accountable, and sourcing is by no means an option to decrease this accountability. The idea of accountability is a prevalent one and involves the responsibility to answer for one’s decisions and actions when authority to act on behalf of one party (the principal) is transferred to another (the agent). It is this concept that constantly needs to be taken into consideration when assessing sourcing opportunities.
However, there is second reason why the practice of sourcing has intensified in the Netherlands Defence organization. Since a couple of decades a new generation of warfare has evolved: the fourth generation warfare (Hammes 2005).10 The most important development of fourth generation warfare is that the state loses its monopoly on warfare. It is characterized by a return to a world of cultures, not merely states, in conflict in a global arena. It is characterized by a blurring of the lines between warfare and politics, and military and civilian. These characteristics make fourth generation warfare complex. In fact, many fourth generation wars have been unsuccessful. The United States has been unsuccessful in different fourth-‐generation conflicts: Vietnam, Lebanon, and Somalia. It continues to bleed Russia in Chechnya and the United States in Iraq, Afghanistan and around the world against Al Qaeda (Hammes 2005). It is therefore not surprising that most Western militaries are changing to regain their competitive advantage. The fourth generation of warfare has new demands on the military. Consequently, the Netherlands Defence organization is re-‐shaping its current boundaries and a number of existing activities are placed outside the organization, whereas other activities are internalized (the typical make-‐or-‐buy decision).
These two drivers have caused that sourcing has become such a widely adopted practice the past couple of decades, however also a much-‐discussed phenomenon. Although we have seen some prominent sourcing examples in Iraq and Afghanistan (such as the Blackwater11 case), most of the consequences have not yet been visible. In fact little is
10 For an overview of the different generations of warfare see Hammes (2005)
11 See Blackwater by Jeremy Scahill (2007)
known if military sourcing is indeed efficient, especially under all conditions, at all. Several scholars have made reasonable assumptions about this phenomenon. For example, Verkuil (2007) suggests that when the idea of military outsourcing is carried too far, there can exist a perceived threat to the democratic principles of accountability and sovereignty. In addition, Kavanagh and Parker (1999) found that the costs of managing contracts, including arranging bids, monitoring outcomes and taking legal action for contract failures, might counterbalance any efficiency savings. The need to contribute to this complex issue is interesting and necessary for both academic as well for the military practitioners.
In order to contribute to this discussion, sourcing has received considerable attention in politics and academic literature. Although these documents are helping to solve some of the complex puzzles, many problems of military sourcing are not yet fully understood nor developed. This is not surprising since many militaries around the world are changing from self-‐sufficient organizations in which all activities were performed in-‐house to organizations in which financial and pressures and the nature of warfare challenge the organizational boundaries. Likewise, the Netherlands Defence organization is in the middle of this transformation and many cases prove that they are yet not able to completely understand and implement the principle of sourcing successfully. On the one hand, many old traditions within the Netherlands Defence organization are still noticeable and hinder the transformation towards its new appearance. On the other hand, the limited amount of time that the organization is given by the Dutch government to transform itself and the overwhelming pressure to outsource military activities, can result in poorly defined decisions. Although it is certainly not the question that concerns who or what is right or wrong, the debate that exists about military sourcing in operational areas is vital. The statement of the Advisory Council on International Affairs (AIV) (2007) illustrates this debate:
“In the AIV’s view, however, a more in-‐depth and wider-‐ranging debate on the provision of private services in operational areas is sorely needed, as this is by no means a purely technical issue.”
The AIV’s view that sourcing of military activities in operational areas is by no means a technical issue is entirely true. Obviously, to a certain extent sourcing is a technical issue
where existing theory can help to guide the decision. However, military sourcing is different and moves beyond these theoretical underpinnings. It will touch the boundaries of democratic principles, as the use of legitimized force could be in question. Furthermore, history supports the thought that no one can predict future outcomes, certainly not if it concerns warfare. This thesis opened by quoting John Pierpont Morgan: “The first step towards getting somewhere is to decide that you are not going to stay where you are” to illustrate the ambition of this thesis. This thesis will move beyond the existing theory and alter it to the specific characteristics of the military organization.
1.3 Objectives and outline
It are the unique characteristic of the military that makes it complex to theoretically give a complete answer to the problem that I have depicted above. Most theories, as we will see, offer incomplete explanations and no clear answers. They even raise more questions. An investigation purely based on these theoretical frameworks will be totally beside the mark and is unable to offer reasonable conclusions. For that reason, the objective of this thesis is to investigate the relation between the military and sourcing. The main research question of this master thesis is:
How do the unique characteristics of the military influence sourcing decisions?
In order to answer the main research question, a number of sequential steps are taken to progressively solve this complex puzzle piece by piece. In addition, it is necessary to divide these steps into two parts. Whereas the first part of this thesis will be the theoretical foundations of this thesis and will be purely based on existing literature, the second part will be based on the data that have been collected for this thesis. Chapter 2 will develop an understanding about the unique characteristics of the military. It will conceptualize the most prevalent characteristics into a matrix that will help to develop the hypotheses. In addition, it will discuss the principles of (military) sourcing. Chapter 3 will discuss the theoretical underpinnings of sourcing. This chapter will develop a number of factors that are hypothesized to determine the outsourceability of military activities. There will be continuously linked to the matrix that has been developed in Chapter 2.
The second part of this thesis will test the hypotheses. Chapter 4 will discuss the
methodology. This chapter will discuss how this thesis answers the research question and which methods are used to collect and analyse the data. Chapter 5 will discuss the empirical results of this thesis. This chapter will answer three different sub questions. The first question will describe what the unique characteristics are of the Netherlands Defence organization. It will use the purpose, tasks and capabilities to describe these characteristics.
The second question will examine how the practice of sourcing is adopted in the Netherlands Defence organization. This question will first examine how sourcing is evolved and how it is currently practiced in the Netherlands Defence organization. Second, it will discuss what the crucial elements are in the sourcing process. The third question will examine how the outsourceability of activities is determined by the Netherlands Defence organization. It will test the hypotheses of this thesis by studying four different cases. These cases are all part of an intense debate in the Netherlands Defence organization about the outsourceability of maintenance activities. It is therefore that these cases have been selected to test the hypotheses. Since 2000 the Netherlands Defence organization has investigated the outsourceability of a number of activities including the four that have been used for this thesis. Chapter 6 will provide the conclusions from this master thesis and explain how these results can help to improve sourcing decisions in the Netherlands Defence organization. Finally, chapter 7 will discuss the limitations of this thesis and the possibilities for future research.
Figure 1 Thesis Outline
CHAPTER 2 The Defence of Sourcing
Background and Literature
2.1 Introduction
Military organizations are unlike other public and private organizations. Soeters et al. (2010) start their book managing military organizations with the following sentence: “The military is not just another organization, at least not all of it, all the time.” (Soeters et al. 2010 p. 1).
This chapter elaborates on this statement and will give a complete understanding of the military and its unique characteristics. Furthermore, it will discuss the principles of sourcing and connect it to the unique characteristics of the military. Furthermore, this chapter will discuss how the concept of sourcing is developed and how it is currently practiced. Finally, this chapter will discuss the motivations and risks of military sourcing
2.2 Purpose of the military
So why is it that the military exists? As Snider puts it, “The military derives from the purpose or tasks for which society raises militaries” (1999). The military could be seen as a national insurance policy against all sort of possible risks. In essence, we can consider the military as an organization that provides security. Although the core service of the military is still considered within its national borders, it operates more and more in the today’s globalized world. After 9/11, the Western cultural conceptualization of war was ended. Since then, risks became more tangible and could manifest themselves quickly close by. Risk turned out very much to be a central part of our globalized world (Soeters 2010).12 The military needs to perform these core tasks anywhere, anyplace and anytime. However, this task cannot be executed by anyone. Here we can see why the society raises the military in the first place. It should therefore be not surprising that the military has unique characteristics that set them apart from other public and private organizations.
12 Beck states (1992, p.10) “We are moving away from a world of enemies to one of dangers and risks, where the risks are unquantifiable, nor do we know the specifics of the risks, not the time, likelihood or locations they may manifest themselves. They are not geographically nor temporarily contained, but are global and intinite in nature.”
2.3 Military characteristics
The literature identifies several characteristics of that makes this organization unique. The first characteristic of the military is given by Clausewitz’s thought “war is not a mere act of policy but a true political instrument, a continuation of political activity by other means.” In this phrase the soul of the military is demonstrated. The military is as good as the politicians – the representatives of society – allow them to be. These officials allocate the resources to the military. That is, they determine the number of personnel and the budget for the military. In addition, the politicians determine which operations and missions the military has to perform and even the resources with which they have to do this job (Soeters et al.
2010). This makes the military a true political instrument.
Although some other public organizations share the somewhat same principles (for example police), the most prevalent characteristic of the military is their authority to use violence or their license to kill on behalf of the state. However, this monopoly of violence has not always been the standard and in the last few years have been under pressure by the rise of terrorist and other stateless groups. In the Netherlands and other western states, the dominant understanding of the ‘state’ has for the last two centuries drawn upon Weber’s definition that a political association “...can be called a ‘state’ if and in so far as its administrative staff successfully upholds a claim to the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force in the enforcement of its order” (1947, P. 154). This monopoly encompassed actors that provided internal legitimate force, like the military.
The use of violence is not without risks and is combined with the unique conditions in which it takes place. The military derives it purpose to perform its tasks in these unsafe conditions. Throughout this paper the term theatre will be used to illustrate the area in which the military performs its tasks. This paper has already mentioned that the nature of warfare has changed from national borders to international environments. However, historically many empires have reached far beyond its original borders, nowadays most theatres, like Afghanistan and Iraq, are isolated from civilization and take place at large distances from the military’s national borders.
In every act of violence, fear plays a dominant role. Unsurprisingly, many organizational mechanisms of the military attempt to limit the impact of fear among its personnel and limit the use of unjust violence. One mechanism to limit the impact of fear is
described by Weber (1947) as the bureaucracy. He suggests that the bureaucratic organization is characterized by a division of labour based upon laws and regulations, a clear hierarchy, management based upon written documents, specialization based on training, the full involvement of the official and the acceptance of general rules (King 2006). Although the military is nowadays characterized as being a prime example of bureaucracy, it is a relative new idea in the military. Pre-‐bureaucratic armies equipped and provisioned themselves.
However, when there were an inadequate number of people who could afford to equip themselves, bureaucratization became unavoidable. The bureaucratic structure of the army goes hand in hand with the technological progress and the capital investments required.
These developments are far beyond the means of the individual (Weber 1947; Solomon 1954). The last couple of decades, the bureaucracy par excellence has become under pressure of a vast amount of critique. Not surprisingly, as Weber's interpretation of bureaucracy more or less assumes an on-‐going, steady, and unchanging character of the organization (Solomon 1994). However, modern militaries need to be dynamic, flexible, versatility, multitasking, seeking to adapt rapidly to changing conditions largely outside its control. And yet, Weber’s characteristics of bureaucracy should not be neglected. The military bureaucracy has also developed as a response to unwanted organizational phenomena such as nepotism, corruption and organizational misbehaviour (Soeters et al.
2010).
2.4 Conceptualization of military characteristics
The above-‐depicted characteristics illustrate the military perfectly. However, it fails to give quantifiable characteristics. Or at least it does not provide us with any viable solution to solve the problem in this paper. In order to link the military characteristics to the concept of sourcing, quantifiable characteristics are necessary. However, no previous study has given a framework that can help to assess these characteristics. Two studies, however, do give dimensions that together can provide a practical framework. Soeters et al. (2010) suggest that one can dichotomize between the “cold” (or peacetime and routine conditions), hence resembling conventional business practices, and “hot” conditions, during crisis and peace operations or outright war (Soeters et al. 2010). The most extreme form of “hot” conditions
