How Does Supply Chain Integration Impact Performance? The Role of Supply Chain Conflict

Abstract

AbstractSupply chain integration is increasingly an important supply chain capability. This study tries to explore how supply chain integration impacts operational performance when dealing with supply chain conflict. This study may develop a model of supply chain integration – supply chain conflict – operational performance, to examine the direct and indirect impacts of supply chain integration on operational performance. Data was collected from 213 companies from different regions of China. The findings indicate that internal integration does not only directly improve operational performance, but also contribute to it through releasing the supply chain conflict. Customer integration is an effective enabler for performance improvement, since it can directly impact on performance. Although supplier integration fails to directly improve operational performance, it can contribute to it through releasing customer and supplier conflict. Different from most previous studies on similar topics, this study explored several different paths of internal, customer and supplier integration impacting operational performance. Meanwhile, many existing studies failed to confirm the significant influence of supplier integration. This study proposed that supplier integration is a fundamental capability to deal with supply chain obstructions. The findings may enrich the knowledge of the relationship between supply chain integration and performance.KeywordsSupply chain integrationSupply chain conflictOperational performanceMediating effect