Vested Research and Vested Outsourcing
The Vested business model evolved from a research project conducted by the University of Tennessee Center for Executive Education and funded by the U.S. Air Force to find a better way to outsource. Led by Kate Vitasek, research faculty studied some of the world’s most successful business relationships–relationships based on true collaboration that achieved real results. Not only results, but transformational, game-changing, award-winning results.
What researchers found was that these companies had created a radically different type of business relationship. Relationships that transcended traditional buy-sell transactions which focus on one party “winning” while the other “loses.” Relationships where both parties worked together towards shared goals to drive innovation, create value and reward success. But while they seemed radical compared to most business relationships today, researchers realized that these companies were actually leveraging Nobel Prize-winning concepts from Nash’s equilibrium theory to Williamson’s transaction cost economics. This new business model based on highly collaborative win-win business relationships was coined “Vested.”
It quickly became clear that these new rules for achieving remarkable business relationships weren’t only applicable to outsourcing. The focus then shifted to codifying the “rules” of these successful relationships and creating a framework for Vested agreements that any businesses could adopt.
The methodology researchers developed from these principles has a transformative power that could rival LEAN and Six Sigma. The Vested methodology can reach across all industries and markets and create sweeping changes in how business is done.
Vested research has become a movement that will continue to evolve and expand even beyond the initial vision for rivaling LEAN and Six Sigma. Why? Because Vested relationships create “wins” that would not be possible otherwise–and those successes create more successes.