Supply Chain Relationships Research Articles

Keeping key suppliers alive during the COVID-19 pandemic: artificial supply chain resilience and supplier crisis response strategies

PurposeThe study investigates supply chain leaders’ initiatives to support their partners in the early stages of the coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, identifying measures taken to increase supply chain resilience and their impact on the quality of supply chain relationships.Design/methodology/approachTwo complementary phases are employed. First, an exploratory approach is adopted, with the method of discourse analysis being employed in the identification of the supplier crisis response strategies by S&P500’s top 30 firms. Second, two scenario-based experiments with 983 participants evaluated the impact of such strategies in two dimensions of supply chain relationships’ quality (supplier satisfaction and supplier commitment).FindingsPhase one revealed five initiatives’ groups adopted: safety measures, innovative tools, information and knowledge sharing, supply chain finance and supply chain continuity. Phase two results indicate that supplier crisis response strategies have positive effects on both supplier satisfaction and commitment. Data also suggest that safety measures, innovative tools, and information and knowledge sharing strategies negatively impacted supplier satisfaction and commitment, when compared with strategies adopted by other buying firms competing for the same supplier. Supply chain continuity was negatively associated with both dimensions when other buying firms implemented innovative tools and information and knowledge sharing strategies with their suppliers, while supply chain finance yielded in no differences in comparison to strategies adopted by competing buying firms.Originality/valueThe authors offer a theoretical typology for supply chain resilience (i.e. natural and artificial), providing support for buying firms’ decisions regarding supplier crisis response strategies through the strengthening of artificial supply chain resilience to increase the likelihood of vulnerable key suppliers’ survival.

Towards a sustainable development assessment framework to bridge supply chain practices and technologies

AbstractManaging sustainable practices has received increasing attention in the field of supply chain management to tackle environmental, financial and social issues in an integrated way. However, extant research still lacks a systemic framework explaining how sustainable practices can support individual companies to promote orchestration, collaboration, and coordination in the entire supply chain. This paper aims to provide a systemic framework including a taxonomy of sustainable development practices supporting individual firms in managing supply chain relationships. The proposed framework seeks to connect the supply chain practices and the technological systems that support them. Specifically, the findings highlight the relationship between technology capabilities and supply chain practices, focusing on the benefits their interaction brings to the complex dyadic relationships of supply networks. Finally, this study outlines promising future research directions for scholars and practitioners operating in the field of sustainable supply chain design and supply chain relationship management.

Probabilistic Calibration and Genetic Algorithm-based Bank Credit Strategies for MSMEs and Enlightenment to Tobacco Enterprise Management

Objectives: To further strengthen the role of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) in maintaining the vitality of national economy, governments around the world introduced many special policies. They kept guiding the banking industry to increase the support for MSMEs and reduce their financing difficulties in banks. Basing on the analysis of the bank's credit strategy for small and medium-sized enterprises of similar size, this paper gives the management strategy for small and medium-sized enterprises in tobacco industry to obtain bank credit when they cannot expand their turnover. In this paper, we proposed a binary classification model-based probabilistic calibration algorithm to calculate the default probability of enterprises in the formation of risk measurement model, and found the optimal solution of credit strategy using an improved genetic algorithm. Firstly, we discovered the enterprise’s information and invoice data of 123 micro and medium-sized enterprises with existing credit ratings. We extracted several features from multiple perspectives, such as size, relationship in supply chain, profitability, performance ability, and level of development, and removed the correlations among the indicators using principal component analysis (PCA). Secondly, the retained principal components were used as covariates, and we determined the credit ratings of the firms and the probability of default using discrete variables such as the credit ratings of the firms and whether they defaulted. Finally, we substituted the probability of default into the credit risk model to calculate the loss expectation and profit expectation of the credit portfolio, and used the profit expectation of the credit portfolio as the objective function of the 0-1 programming equation to derive the credit strategy with the lowest risk exposure and the highest return basing on the genetic algorithm.

Circular Economy and the evolution of industrial districts: a supply chain perspective

Circular Economy promises to achieve sustainability by decoupling economic growth from resource extraction and environmental losses. However, it requires a systemic change in the design of products, business models and supply chains. In this study the evolution of the supply chain structure and relationships is addressed in the specific context of industrial districts – i.e., agglomerations of small and medium-sized firms territorially concentrated and specialised in one or more phases of a production process – undergoing a transition to Circular Economy. Through the study of the textile industrial district in Prato (Italy), this study addresses two topics that have been limitedly investigated in the literature. First, the potential role of Circular Economy in revitalising an industrial district in a decline phase. Second, how supply chain structure and relationships should evolve in an industrial district transitioning to Circular Economy. This study outlines the causes triggering industrial districts decline and discusses the factors that can induce a Circular Economy based re-organisation of industrial districts. Consequently, we provide insight to managers on how to successfully couple Circular Economy and technological or business model innovations with supply chain management practices. We also provide indications to policymakers on how local and regional actors can support a Circular Economy driven reorganisation of industrial districts. Finally, this study links contributions concerned with the Circular Economy transition, supply chain structure and relationships and evolution trajectories of industrial districts, thus paving the way for a deeper understanding of the interplay among these phenomena.

System dynamics modeling on new generation cooperative as an alternative to enhance bargaining position of potato farmers in Bener Meriah district

This study aims to create a New Generation Cooperative (NGC) model in potato supply chain in Bener Meriah District, which is also the subject of research, by applying the system dynamics method to build a dynamic and complex NGC model. This modeling is carried out as an effort to enhance bargaining position at farm level. The result showed that non-formal partnership relationship in potato supply chain is originated from the gap in capital ownership between farmers and intermediary traders, thus giving rise to motivation to control farmers by providing financial loan to farmers. Loan recipient farmers must commit to sell potato only to financial aid traders. This causes the loss of opportunity to sell potato to other parties, which has an impact on the occurrence of pressure on selling price of farmers’s potato. Farmers face asymmetry information, especially regarding the selling price prevailing in the market. On the other hand, formal partnership starts with the industry motivation that is to obtain raw materials, that meet quality requirements on an ongoing basis. In a formal partnership, technology transfer occurs from partners to farmers. Farmers get marketing and price certainty, wider marketing access, and have the opportunity to earn higher profits. Based on the simulation results, data obtained that farmers who are the NGC members get higher revenue, profit, and business efficiency level, than non-partnership farmers.

Systematic Literature Review of Supply Chain Relationship Approaches amongst Business-to-Business Partners

Managing a business-to-business (B2B) supply chain relationship is an endless challenge. Many recent systematic literature review studies have discussed supply chain relationships from various perspectives. However, a comprehensive analysis, summarising the existing research, explicitly identified the implemented B2B supply chain relationships and found the effects of these relationships on supply chain performance remain lacking. To address the gap, this article presents a systematic literature review based on the PRISMA approach regarding the nature of the supply chain relationships between B2B partners and their effect on supply chain performance. Web of Science and Scopus were used in the compilation of studies published between 2000 and 2020. Findings indicate that the majority of B2B partners use a collaborative relationship approach and that the impacts are marked on the operational, financial, innovation, environmental, social and economic performance of their supply chain. This study seeks to contribute to the existing literature on B2B supply chain relationships by conducting a thorough and unbiased review of previous studies, drawing more general conclusions about the adopted supply chain relationships between B2B partners and providing insights for future research.

Identifying Critical Thresholds for Resilient Regional Food Flows: A Case Study From the U.S. Upper Midwest

Improving the regional organization of food flow requires an understanding of system constraints. System transformation is necessary if the system is to include regional, independent wholesale food suppliers and to distribute food in an equitable and sustainable manner. Regional suppliers play a pivotal role in overall food system resilience, an emerging issue in wake of the numerous failures in conventional food supply chains exacerbated by COVID-19-related disruptions. Yet alternative supply chains that link local producers with towns and urban centers regionally, represent a small fraction of our nation's food suppliers. They struggle to compete with larger distribution networks that can supply products in-and out-of-season by global procurement. The upper Midwest harbors numerous local and regional food supply chains consisting of farms, processors, trucking companies, wholesalers and other firms that share a commitment to sustainability and local economic development. A constellation of challenges hamper their emergence, however, even as larger scale food supply chains flounder or fail to effectively serve communities. Informed by Donella Meadows's work on leverage points for systemic change, a collaborative, transdisciplinary and systems research effort examined conventional food supply networks and identified key opportunities for shifting food supply chain relationships. System concepts such as stock and flow, leverage points, and critical thresholds helped us to frame and identify challenges and opportunities in the current system. The second and third phase of our collaborative research effort occurred over 4 years (2013–2016) and involved twenty-six people in co-generation of knowledge as a loose-knit team. The team included farmers, supply chain practitioners, students, academic staff and faculty from multiple departments and colleges. Our primary method was to host public workshops with practitioner speakers and participants to identify dominant narratives and key concepts within discourses of different participants in distribution networks. The literature review was iterative, based on challenges, ideas and specific questions discussed at workshops. Our research exposed two meta-narratives shaping the supply chain: diversity and efficiency. In addition to these high-leverage narratives, we identified and examined five key operational thresholds in the Upper Midwest regional food system that could be leveraged to improve food flow in the region. Attention to these areas makes it possible for businesses to operate within environmental limits and develop social structures that can meet scale efficiencies necessary for economic success. We iteratively shared this co-produced knowledge with decision-makers via local food policy councils, local government, and national policy circles with the goal of supplying actionable information. This phased action research project created the environment necessary for a group of food system entrepreneurs to emerge and collaborate, poised to improve system resilience in anticipation of food system disruptions. It forms the basis for on-going research on food flow, regional resilience, and supply chain policy.

The role of collaboration in reducing quality variability in Brazilian breweries

This paper aims to analyse how small-scale breweries undertake vertical and horizontal collaborations to manage their quality performance (when measured by reducing quality variabilities). While vertical collaborations are overemphasised, horizontal and simultaneous collaboration efforts have been understudied. Our contribution lies in proposing an interplay of vertical and horizontal collaborations through information sharing, joint decision-making, and knowledge exchange with intra- and inter-supply chain partners to address quality variability issues. We draw attention to supply chain relationships being predominantly informal, which contribute strongly towards accessing external sources of knowledge. Additionally, such collaborative efforts have led companies to achieve mutual gains in their relationships. Finally, a framework is presented that consolidates the supply chain actors, collaboration types, socialisation mechanisms, and relationship types.

Corporate Earnings Pressure and Supply Chain Real Earnings Management

Listed companies face multiple earnings pressures from stakeholders in their operations. When normal operations cannot achieve earnings expectations or having opportunistic motivations, companies often choose to conduct earnings management under earnings pressure. With the enhancement of the recognition and supervision of accrual-based earnings management, real earnings management has gradually become the main earnings management tool for companies under earnings pressure. Due to the concealment of real earnings management and information asymmetry, it is difficult for the company’s external stakeholders to detect real earnings management. Meanwhile, the high degree of supply chain concentration is one of the important characteristics that distinguish the Chinese market from the West. It is also a typical scenario for relational transactions in China. Transactions with customers and suppliers can directly affect the company’s earnings, and long-term transactions provide the basis for forming relationship and conducting relational transactions. Therefore, whether the company will conduct earnings management based on the supply chain relationship is an important research question with Chinese characteristics. Our research on this problem can help to improve investors’ understanding of the company’s real earnings management, and improve the efficiency of capital market in information transmission and resource allocation.This paper uses A-share non-financial companies listed in Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges from 2007 to 2019 as the main research sample to examine the impact of earnings pressure on the company’s supply chain real earnings management. The empirical results show that: Corporate earnings pressure has a positive effect on the company’s supply chain real earnings management, and bargaining power and executive shareholding of the company separately strengths and weakens this impact. Moreover, there is an alternative relationship between supply chain real earnings management and upward accrual-based earnings management under earnings pressure. This paper also further analyzes the implementation of supply chain real earnings management and its economic consequences. We mainly find that supply chain real earnings management is different from the company’s excess production, and is more pronounced when earnings pressure is positive; for economic consequences, the implementation of supply chain real earnings management can help the company meet or beat analysts’ forecasts, so as to increase the company’s market value and analysts’ coverage, but there will be a reversal of supply chain real earnings management in the following year.This paper makes two primary contributions: First, this paper enriches the literature on the impact of earnings pressure on corporate operation and accounting behaviors. It examines the company’s supply chain earnings management under earnings pressure, and proves that the company’s response to earnings pressure can be reflected in external cooperative earnings management, rather than be limited to the company’s internal environment. Second, this paper contributes to the relevant research on real earnings management. It studies the company’s real earnings management by supply chain under earnings pressure, and explores its specific implementation conditions, which enriches the existing research content of the company’s real earnings management methods. It also can help investors better understand the company’s earnings management approach under earnings pressure, and improve the effectiveness of the capital market signal mechanism.

Managing Supply Chain Disruption Recovery: The Role of Organizational Justice

AbstractSupply chain disruptions negatively impact the economy and individual organizations. However, as many companies recover from disruptions (COVID-19 being a recent example), less attention has been paid to how these events impact business-to-business (B2B) relationships characteristic of supply chains. Drawing on justice theory, we examine how the suppliers’ management of the recovery process affects behavioral reactions in the context of supply chain relationships. This study empirically examines the role that partners’ recovery process, honesty, effort, availability, and outcome fairness play in influencing satisfaction, future business volumes, and word-of-mouth. Using ordinary least squares (OLS) regression to test survey data, results indicate that how recovery processes are managed positively affects satisfaction, reduces the likelihood of future business loss, and affects the propensity to communicate negatively about a relationship partner. Unexpectedly, outcome fairness (distributive justice) has a significant positive impact on negative word-of-mouth, indicating that increased perceptions of distributive justice actually increase negative behavioral outcomes in certain settings. We conduct exploratory post hoc serial mediation analysis to further examine this finding and uncover a potential extension to the boundaries of a justice lens. These post hoc results, which generally confirm the OLS results, drive opportunity for better understanding of complaining behavior and navigating the tricky environment associated with managing B2B relationships in a post- disruption environment.

Implication of Ethics in Supply Chain Function

This research study examines the importance of ethics in supply chain management functions. The data sample consisted of 30 respondents collected using a questionnaire administered randomly to firms’ employees or representatives. Results show, there is no strong and sufficient evidence to infer the existence of unethical behaviours and the significance of ethics in a supply chain function within the players or parties in a supply chain relationship. Thus, this study recommends that parties in a supply chain relationship should act ethically right for long lasting relationship within the supply chain functions in firms or companies. Essentially all businesses to including banking and non-banking firms have needs that require the use of supply chains. have responsibilities that require the use of supply chains. Therefore, the outcome of this study is useful applicable to all sorts of business entities.

Revitalization of Food in Sweden—A Closer Look at the REKO Network

Can parts of the future food system include bi-weekly opportunities to purchase uneven stocks of produce at semi-remote locations? Current development in the Swedish food system suggests so. In the last few years, the Swedish Alternative Food Network ‘REKO’ has grown at an explosive pace. This anthropological article describes and discusses the organizational structure and motivations of the network, as well as discusses it from a revitalization perspective. From a netnographical and policy analysis perspective it is shown how the network uses social media and policy to convey a low bureaucracy, end to end, commercial space for local food—understood as a more “simple” way to achieve direct relationships in the food supply chain and thus create opportunities for local food networks. By adopting a view of the conventions and values of this Alternative Food Network as representing a parallel system aiming at facilitating direct relationships between ends in the food supply chain, the REKO initiative can be understood as a feasible model for a more satisfactory culture without needing to replace the mainstream food supply. The findings of the research deepen the understanding of REKO in Sweden by pointing towards how it can be understood as a sign of change of consumer preference and of prioritization of official policy concerns. The article also points towards how grass root movements can replicate success rapidly using policy documents capturing experiences and best practices spread online through social media.

A socio-economic and environmental vulnerability assessment model with causal relationships in electric power supply chains

The electric power industry is uniquely vulnerable to natural and human-made risks such as natural disasters, climate change, and cybersecurity. This study proposes a vulnerability assessment framework to identify and assess the risks associated with the electric power supply chain in the United Kingdom and study the causal relationship among them with the neutrosophic revised decision-making trial and evaluation laboratory (NR-DEMATEL) method. We further introduce a novel hesitant expert selection model (HESM) to assist decision-makers with expert selection and weight determination. We present a case study in the United Kingdom power supply chain to demonstrate the applicability and efficacy of the proposed method in this study. This is the first comprehensive risk interdependence analysis of the United Kingdom's power supply chain. The findings reveal natural disasters and climate change are the most crucial risks followed by industrial action, affordability, political instability, and sabotage/terrorism.

Determinants of the transition towards circular economy in SMEs: A sustainable supply chain management perspective

This paper develops a model to explore the relationships between social pressure, environmental commitment, green economic incentives, supply chain relationship management, sustainable supply chain design, and circular economy capability. Through data gathered from 212 small and medium enterprises (SMEs), this study applies confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and structural equation modelling (SEM) to test the model developed. The findings provide three main contributions to the body of literature. First, they confirm that environmental commitment and green economic incentives have a significant positive impact on supply chain relationship management and sustainable supply chain design. Second, they highlight the role of supply chain relationship management and sustainable supply chain design to improve the circular economy capabilities of SMEs. Third, they show a positive effect of social pressure on environmental commitment and green economic incentives. These results induce practitioners, academicians, and policy makers to design strategic plans to encourage circular economy transition of SMEs and supply chains, as well as to focus their attention on the role of sustainability in supply chain management domain.

Assessing Performance and Risk in Complex Supply Chains and Tying Performance Measures to Strategic Concepts

ABSTRACT Despite the popular notion that ‘supply chains rather than individual firms compete’, an intensive review of supply-chain performance metrics proposed in published works reveals that most measures apply to individual supply-chain participants and relationships with specific supply-chain partners, rather than to the supply chain as a whole. Indicators of supply-chain risk (or stability) tend to have a broader view but are less developed and receive less attention by managers of supply-chain functions. Tying measures to strategic concepts helps to show interrelationships among strategic goals and the trade-offs that can occur as particular strategies are employed to improve supply-chain performance. We find that more research is needed on how to assess competitive dynamics and opportunism within supply chains and to assess the costs and risks associated with international business activity.

The Influence of Supply Chain Relationships on The Adoption of Open Standards Inter-Organizational Information Systems: A Conceptual Framework

This study provides a conceptual framework to analyze where the formal and informal inter-organizational interactions influence the adoption decisions of open standards inter-organizational information systems (IOIS). Based on the Internet, open standards IOIS can help companies access to broader markets and make interfirm collaboration much easier and cheaper.In spite of these benefits, open standards IOIS have not been widely adopted by companies for external connection, which leads to questions about the importance of higher openness for inter-organizational systems. We argue that the characteristics of supply chain networks are fundamental for companies' choices of IOIS. The levels of linkages and interdependence between companies will affect how companies respond to external influences as well as heat demand for broader connection or tighter integration. Personal guanxi, the informal connections between individuals, also play an important part in companies' adoption decisions, especially in Asian countries where guanxi is prevalent business culture. Combining the different theoretical perspectives, we propose a conceptual framework and several integrative propositions for the analysis of the adoption decisions of open standards IOIS in the inter-organizational context.

Dominance and collaboration in logistics triads: the case studies from New Zealand

The study focuses on understanding how different supply chain stakeholders' power dynamics influence supply chain relationships' stability and dynamics in a logistics triad. The study uses a qualitative research approach (multiple case studies) to collect data from the perspectives of logistics service providers (LSPs), suppliers, and customers. Having unique resource/service capability helps the LSP dominate long-term triad relationships by controlling its partners and impeding changes in embedded dyads. The identified theoretical and empirical outcomes provide insights to academics and practitioners to understand the supply chain relationship dynamics based on LSP's dominant power. This study's originality primarily focuses on the dominant player—LSP—to influence triadic supply chain relationships, which is significantly different from the traditional view—the dominant power controlled by suppliers or customers.

Roles of supply chain network centralities on firm performance: an explorative study on Tokyo manufacturing industries

PurposeThis paper aims to explore the impact of supply chain centralities on sales performance moderated by reputation and stock listing.Design/methodology/approachEmpirical data on supply chain relationships were drawn from the context of electronics and electrical appliance industries in Tokyo, sourced from Teikoku Data Bank in year 2017–2018. On average, the authors analyzed an industrial network of 4,181 focal firms with 3.6 and 3.8 supplier and customer ties, respectively, using social networks and moderated regression analyses.FindingsThe authors find that in-(out-)degree, closeness and betweenness centralities are positively related to the focal firm’s annual sales performance. Hubs and authorities as ways of measuring reputation are found to not directly affect performance; hubs negatively moderate the relationship between betweenness and performance. Stock-listing was also found to negatively moderate the relationship between in-degree centrality and performance.Originality/valueThis study adds to existing literature by conducting a supply network analysis in a new industrial context, introducing a new method for assessing firm reputation in supply networks and showing how the structural characteristics of supply networks influence business performance.

Formal Contract Violation and Conflict: The Mediating Mechanism of Psychological Contract Violation

Although contract violation has a great negative effect on the supply chain relationship, few studies have deeply explored its influence. Based on the institutional theory, this study investigates how formal contract violation affects conflict in emerging economies. We extend the contract violation literature by suggesting that formal contract influents conflict through the psychological contract violation. The findings from a dataset of 186 firms in China indicate that formal contract violation has a positive effect on psychological contract violation. And psychological contract violation has a J-shaped relationship with conflict. Moreover, legal enforceability and relationship orientation strengthen the positive effect of formal contract violation on psychological contract violation.

Security, sustainability and supply chain collaboration in the humanitarian space

PurposeTo extend humanitarian supply chain relationships beyond logistics concerns of delivery, quality and cost. As humanitarian actors continue to face increasing numbers of natural disasters, armed conflicts and attacks on aid workers, security (risk) and sustainability are issues of growing importance. Aiming to inspire discussion, the paper concludes with a research agenda.Design/methodology/approachThis is a conceptual paper inspired by relevant statistics, news reports and academic literature.FindingsWorldwide natural disasters and armed conflicts are on the rise. So are deliberate attacks on aid workers. Thus, humanitarian supply chain design must include considerations of security and sustainability. Agencies have several options for integrating matters of security and sustainability with the delivery of aid, from being reactive to creating internal solutions to forming proactive relationships with security and sustainability experts.Research limitations/implicationsThere are numerous opportunities for research in the areas of security, sustainability and supply chain relationships.Practical implicationsThrough advocacy and supply chain relationships, humanitarian agencies can enhance security for aid workers and civilians affected by conflict and disasters. Looking to the future, they can also make a positive difference on issues of sustainability.Social implicationsThere is an opportunity to enlarge the “humanitarian space” – and increase security for aid workers and civilians, especially in areas of armed conflict. In the long term, aid agencies can also help eliminate social problems such as gender inequality.Originality/valueThis appears to be among the first papers to discuss matters of security and sustainability in the context of humanitarian supply chain collaboration.