Boundary Spanning for Supplier Development

Abstract

Motivated by a growing reliance on suppliers, buying firms often engage in supplier development efforts to improve supplier performance. The benefits that both parties can enjoy from supplier development are well established. However, existing literature has tended to conceptualize supplier development as a meso-organizational level behavior typically directed towards a single performance improvement area often assuming that the buying firm has all the required expertise internally. Further, supplier development has primarily been studied within the confines of a single buyer-supplier relationship. Using a qualitative case method, we take a micro level perspective and explore how boundary spanning managers from an OEM attempt to develop a key supplier in multiple performance areas simultaneously. Although our primary focus is on the development efforts towards a specific supplier, we also uncover how efforts vis a vis competing suppliers affect efforts relative to the core supplier. We highlight the boundary spanning challenges that emerge when managers with different and at times conflicting orientations and interests are involved in multiple supplier development initiatives at the same time. Based on our analysis, we identify four boundary spanning mediation roles and make a theoretical contribution that sits in the intersection between boundary spanning and supplier development.