Improving retail supply flexibility using buyer-supplier relational capabilities

Developing customer convenience and experience through increased competency and efficiency: A strategic approach to retail operations mastery

Retailers who are part of supply chains are crucial in attracting customers to physically visit their stores and thereby increase supply chain revenue. Retailers in supply chains are responsible for handling a high volume of transactions and high customer contact, thus better management of retail operations is necessary to provide greater convenience and experience for customers. In this regard, retail operations must be properly managed, particularly during times of crisis like COVID-19, to ensure that customers purchase their basic needs promptly and safely. Since customer contact is high, the retail operations can have a greater say in improving the customer convenience and experience but this perspective has not been specifically emphasized both in research and practice. Thus, the current study attempted to evaluate how well retail operations can improve customer convenience and experience so that retailers can do well even during times of uncertainty. The study, which is grounded in the resource-based view theory, thus looks at how well retailers' competency and efficiency in running the operations help in achieving better customer convenience and experience. In this regard, sample data from 416 practitioners belonging to the Indian retail industry has been selected to examine the mediating role of retailers' efficiency to retailers' competence in achieving better customer convenience and experience. This study importantly confirms that while more competence can help retailers operate more efficiently, it cannot, by itself, provide customers with greater convenience or a better shopping experience. This study found that retailers concentrate on streamlining their operations in order to overcome capacity limits because it is expensive and limited. The empirical evidence shows that retail operations have significance say in offering better convenience and experience customers.

Impacts of R&D investment on absorptive capacity and firm innovativeness: contingent roles of dysfunctional competition

Purpose

Drawing upon relative absorptive capacity (AC) perspective, this study proposes a research model connecting R&D investment, three types of supply chain AC—AC from suppliers, customers and university and research institutes (U&RIs)—and firm innovativeness and investigates the contingent effects of dysfunctional competition on the link between R&D investment and supply chain AC.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors used data collected from 262 manufacturers in three areas of China to empirically examine the conceptual model. The corresponding hypotheses were tested with structural equation modeling and regression analysis.

Findings

The empirical results demonstrate that AC from customers and AC from U&RIs play significant mediating roles in the relationship between R&D investment and firm innovativeness. Moreover, R&D investment has a significantly greater effect on AC from U&RIs under high levels of dysfunctional competition.

Originality/value

First, by conceptualizing AC from a relative view, this study discloses the unique roles of knowledge from different supply chain partners in realizing the benefits of R&D investment in innovation. Second, the exploration of the contingent roles of dysfunctional competition in the emerging economy of China enriches insights on the roles of institutional environment on knowledge absorption and the knowledge on relative AC in emerging economies.

The mediating effect of supply chain flexibility on the relationship between supply chain integration and supply chain performance

Purpose

Supply chain integration (SCI) and flexibility (SCF) are recognised as crucial business practices and capability in the global competitive market. However, limited research has paid attention to study the relationship between SCI, SCF and their impact on supply chain performance (SCP). Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to establish a relationship between integration, flexibility and performance.

Design/methodology/approach

The structural equation modelling technique was used to analyse the 187 data collected from Indian organisations through the survey methodology.

Findings

Findings indicate that external integration contributes significantly to realise SCF and SCP. Sourcing and logistics flexibility also help to improve the SCP. The mediation analysis showed that the association of customer and supplier integration with SCP is partially and fully mediated by logistics flexibility, respectively. This study suggests that integration influences the SCP when the firm has a strong association with downstream partners and enough capability for logistics flexibility.

Research limitations/implications

The study has collected cross-sectional data to analyse the relationship between SCI, SCF and SCP. However, as integration requires an effort of the years, longitudinal data and industry-specific studies may provide comprehensive views to validate the results of this study.

Originality/value

Building on relational view theory and dynamic capability theory, the study has proposed the SCP assessment framework based on the relationship between SCI and SCF.

Multi-Level Optimization Process for Rationalizing the Distribution Logistics Process of Companies Selling Dietary Supplements

The commission sales form is a very significant channel of sales today, which is especially true in the field of dietary supplements. In parallel, the prevailing digitalization trends have opened up further new opportunities for this form of distribution. The multi-level optimization process presented in the publication makes it possible to optimize the distribution logistics processes of companies producing food supplements at a high level by exploiting these new possibilities. The operation of the procedure is also illustrated through a practical example.

The conceptual framework on integrated flexibility: an evolution to data-driven supply chain management

Purpose

This paper aims to establish a relationship between supply chain integration (SCI) and supply chain flexibility (SCF) to develop a two-dimensional approach, i.e. integrated flexibility.

Design/methodology/approach

Building on a relational view and dynamic capability theory, this paper argues that integrated flexibility is the strategy that enables organisations to achieve different positions and states to create distinctive capability. The article has proposed the conceptual framework that connects different supply chain strategies and practices to improve supply chain performance (SCP) considering the cross-disciplinary approach.

Findings

The conceptual framework around the new perspective, i.e. integrated flexibility, is built to deal with issues related to operations management. The paper suggests examining the mediating effect of SCF between SCI and SCP and the moderating role of knowledge management (KM), data analytics (DA) and quality management (QM) practices on their relationship. Moreover, research direction in terms of propositions and implications are developed to showcase how underlying practices streamline the supply chain and lead to superior SCP.

Practical implications

The proposed framework discusses the degree of integration and flexibility levels to guide practitioners in designing a supply chain strategy with their partners and answering how much resources need to be extended to achieve flexible operations and realise SCP.

Originality/value

Authors have developed an entirely new integrated flexibility concept that provides a base to sustain in the competitive market. The foundation of integrated flexibility is built on relational view and dynamic capability theory and supported by DA, QM and KM.

Performance effects of entrepreneurial orientation, strategic intent and absorptive capacity within coopetitive relationships

Purpose

While the significance of organizational resources and capabilities is widely discussed, little is known about their interrelationships as well as benefits for firms that are involved in coopetitive relationships. Against this backdrop, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the performance effects of entrepreneurial orientation, strategic intent and potential absorptive capacity as well as their complementarity effects on operational and innovation performance for firms involved in horizontal coopetitive relationships.

Design/methodology/approach

Drawing upon the resource-based-view, dynamic capabilities and the relational view theories, this study forwards numerous hypotheses between the constructs of interest. The proposed hypotheses are tested utilizing survey data collected from 313 horizontal coopetitive relationships.

Findings

The results clearly suggest that entrepreneurial orientation, strategic intent and potential absorptive capacity could positively impact innovation and operational performance outcomes independently. In addition, the authors also find strategic intent and potential absorptive capacity to have differential moderating effects on the relationships between entrepreneurial orientation and the performance outcomes.

Originality/value

The findings suggest that although strategic intent and potential absorptive capacity could lead to performance benefits independently, when it comes to coopetitive relationships, the use of both these capabilities may not substantially increase the positive impact of entrepreneurial orientation on performance outcomes. Specifically, given that these capabilities could intensify competitiveness as well as hostility between partners, they seem to affect the firm's performance differently.

Value of supply chain resilience: roles of culture, flexibility, and integration

Purpose

Building supply chain (SC) resilience is crucial for business continuity given the ever-changing environmental conditions. Based on the resource orchestration and organizational culture theories, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the business value of SC resilience with the consideration of the roles of internal integration (II) and external integration (EI), risk management culture (RMC) and SC flexibility (SCF).

Design/methodology/approach

This study investigates how RMC, SCF and intra and interorganizational integration affect the performance of SC resilience. It collects primary and secondary data from 194 manufacturing firms listed in the Taiwan Stock Exchange and Taipei Exchange.

Findings

Results validate the authors’ hypothesis that RMC, SCF and II improve the financial performance of firms through SC resilience efforts.

Research limitations/implications

This study uses firms from Taiwan manufacturing industry, which might introduce country and industry bias.

Practical implications

This study helps managers improve the financial performance of their SC resilience efforts by developing RMC, SCF, II and IE across functions and partner firms.

Originality/value

This study contributes to the literature by empirically testing the relationship between SC resilience and financial performance, and how the relationship is moderated by RMC, SCF, II and EI based on the theories of organizational culture and resource orchestration.

Operations strategy of cloud-based firms: achieving firm growth in the Big Data era

Purpose

Cloud computing is a major enabling technology for Industry 4.0 and the Big Data era. However, cloud-based firms, who establish their businesses on cloud platforms, have received scant attention in the extant operations management (OM) literature. To narrow this gap, the purpose of this paper is to investigate cloud-based firms from an operations strategy perspective.

Design/methodology/approach

A two-phase multi-method approach was adopted. In the first phase, content analysis of 27 reports from cloud-based firms was conducted, aided by text mining keyword extraction. Two data-related operations capabilities were identified and hypotheses were posited regarding the relationships between data resources (DR), operations capabilities and firm growth (FG). In the second phase, a sample of 190 cloud-based firms was collected. Seemingly unrelated regression and bootstrapping method were employed to test the proposed hypotheses using the survey data.

Findings

The content analysis indicates data as a key resource and both data processing capability and data transformational capability as critical operations capabilities of cloud-based firms. FG is regarded as a top priority in the cloud context. The regression results indicate that DR and the two capabilities contribute to the growth of cloud-based firms. Moreover, a follow-up bootstrapping analysis reveals that the mediating effects of the two capabilities vary between different types of FG.

Originality/value

To the authors’ best knowledge, this is one of the first OM studies on cloud-based firms. This study extends the operations strategy literature by identifying and testing the key operations capabilities and priorities of cloud-based firms. It also provides insightful implications for industrial practitioners.

Identification and causal assessment of supply chain flexibility

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to map the causal relations among various supply chain flexibility (SCF) dimensions having significant impact on the Indian personal hygiene industry.

Design/methodology/approach

The author(s) have gone through extensive literature review and extracted 22 SCF dimensions. After conducting field visits and expert interaction in the firm related to case industry, 11 major SCF dimensions that seem to have a significant amount of influence on supply chain performance of the firms were retained for further consideration. The author(s) have used decision making trial and evaluation laboratory (DEMATEL) to establish initial causality and structural equation model (SEM) to investigate the contribution of different flexibility dimensions on overall SCF.

Findings

After DEMATEL analysis, three major SCF dimensions were considered for SEM modeling. The result shows that product flexibility and physical distribution flexibility have favorable influence on the SCF, while the demand management flexibility adversely impacts overall SCF.

Practical implications

The approach adopted in the study can help firms to determine and exercise the flexibility dimensions of a particular supply chain. The DEMATEL and SEM offer a facilitation to explain the causal relationship between the different dimensions to take long-term decisions and address the uncertainty in the demand and supply side.

Originality/value

This paper has made an attempt to evaluate the supply chain flexibilities, prioritize them and evaluate the relationship amongst these flexibilities and the degree to which they affect or are affected by one another in the Indian personal hygiene industry.

Conceptualizing a circular framework of supply chain resource sustainability

Purpose

In response to calls for conceptual frameworks and generic theory building toward the advancement of sustainability in supply chain resource utilization and management, the purpose of this paper is to advance a circular framework for supply chain resource sustainability (SCRS), and a decision-support methodology for assessing SCRS against the backdrop of five foundational premises (FPs) deduced from the literature on resource sustainability.

Design/methodology/approach

Taking a conceptual theory-building approach, the paper advances a set of SCRS decision-support criteria for each of the theoretical premises advanced, and applies the theory of constraints to illustrate the conceptual and practical applications of the framework in SCRS decision making.

Findings

This study uses recent conceptualizations of supply chains as “complex adaptive systems” to provide a robust and novel frame and a set of decision rules with which to assess the interconnectedness of environmental, economic, and social capital of supply chain resources from pre-production to post-production.

Research limitations/implications

The paper contributes to theory building in sustainability research, and the SCRS decision framework developed could be applied in tandem with existing quantitative hybrid life-cycle and input-output approaches to facilitate targeted resource sustainability assessments, with implications for research and practice.

Originality/value

The novel SCRS framework proposed serves as a template for evaluating SCRS and provides a decision-support methodology for assessing SCRS against the five theorized FPs.