Norms of Conspiracy Between Service Provider and Industrial Customer: A Study on the Role of Registrar in ISO 9001 Certification

When a service provider serves an industrial customer (i.e., a company), its performance not only affect the customer, but also various stakeholders of the customers. The relationships among the three parties constitute a principal-agent-stakeholder triangle. Since the service provider is paid by its customer, it is possible that norms of conspiracy may exist between the two parties, which could hurt the interest of other stakeholders. We study such norms in ISO 9001 certification process, in which the auditee is the principal, the registrar firm is the agent, and the auditee's customers are the stakeholders. We identify factors affecting the norms of conspiracy. The effects of the norms of conspiracy on the exchange outcomes in the triangle are also discussed.