Sustainable service supply chain practices (SSSCPs): a framework development

Applying Industry 4.0 technologies for the sustainability of small service enterprises

Despite the potential of Industry 4.0 (I4.0) to make micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) sustainable, the managers of service MSMEs find it tough to implement it in their firms. Drawing on the TAM and TAM2, this paper identifies I4.0 technologies (I4T) that help improve the sustainability in service MSMEs in the emerging economy of India. Data from different service MSMEs were collected to assess the importance of I4T. Artificial Intelligence, Big Data Analytics, and Internet of Things emerge as the most important I4T for sustainability. Several managerial implications along with theoretical contributions, limitations, and future research have been discussed.

Empirical Research into the Development Mechanism of Industry Innovation of Health and Wellness Tourism in the Context of the Sharing Economy

Health and wellness tourism has become an emerging form of tourism economy. In the era of the sharing economy, it is of theoretical and practical significance to study the development mechanism of the industry innovation (II) of health and wellness tourism. Based on theoretical analysis, hypotheses were proposed for the relationships of industry sharing (IS) as well as its constitutional dimensions with the resource acquisition capability (RAC), policy support (PS), and II of health and wellness tourism. The constitutional dimensions of IS include public operational resources (PORs), infrastructures, and industry cooperation networks (ICNs). In addition, a model for the influencing mechanism of IS on the II of health and wellness tourism was established. Questionnaire surveys were conducted with 542 managers of health and wellness tourism enterprises in 21 provinces (or municipalities) in China, using the empirical research method, and the survey data are subjected to mathematical statistical analysis. Results show that the PORs, infrastructures, and ICNs of the IS of health and wellness tourism have significant positive influences on the II. RAC has a partial mediating effect between the IS and the II of health and wellness tourism. PS exerts a moderating effect between the IS and the II of health and wellness tourism. Finally, suggestions for promoting the II development of health and wellness tourism are proposed from the perspective of optimizing IS.

Assessing sustainable tourism development through service supply chain process maturity and service quality model

Purpose

This study aims to propose a framework for identifying and measuring the gaps between evaluation and goal setting in service supply chain (SSC) processes towards planning and development of sustainable tourism aligned with the firm's real conditions and capabilities.

Design/methodology/approach

By the concept of the service quality gap model, the existing gaps between auditors' evaluation and the managers' goals in SSC processes maturity were examined. Then, each of the designed gaps was measured considering the goals addressed by managers’ and auditors' evaluation. Finally, the strategy and priority of sustainable tourism planning and development were determined based on importance–performance analysis (IPA).

Findings

The gaps caused by the expectations and perceptions of the firm about the dissatisfaction of managers regarding their addressed goals and the evaluation of auditors in the planning and development of sustainable tourism can be classified into three categories of goals gap, assessment gap and main gap. To improve the performance of the firm in each of the evaluation criteria under the results of IPA analysis, solutions were provided.

Practical implications

Realistic evaluation and recognition of the capabilities of the organization's processes through the proposed framework can be effective in goal setting and sustainable tourism development policies.

Originality/value

The framework proposed in this study can be a suitable approach for the balanced growth of all aspects of the firm in planning and developing sustainable tourism and helps firms in setting the right and logical goals.

Conception of circular economy obstacles in context of supply chain: a case of rubber industry

Purpose

Adopting the circular economy (CE) notion in the supply chain perspective is necessary for the sustainability viewpoint. However, such practices are deficient, especially in developing countries like India, because of several obstacles. The purpose of this study was to create an approach for circular supply chain management (CSCM) adaption in Indian rubber industries by identifying and evaluating its associated obstacles.

Design/methodology/approach

A hybrid approach of analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and the grey-based ELECTRE method had been employed in this research to obtain the mutual rankings of the identified obstacles based on their impressions on the CSCM prosperity criteria through a case study and involving diverse expert's opinions.

Findings

Presented study's findings illustrate that “Lack of consumer knowledge and consciousness towards environmental sustainability” was found to be the top-ranked obstacle followed by “Unwillingness towards supply chain re-structuring”.

Research limitations/implications

The obstacles' prioritized rankings could help leaders to create sequential strategies for adapting a resilient CSCM structure by systematically eliminating these obstacles. Moreover, the pinpointed critical obstacles could be investigated further in separate studies and generate future studies' scope.

Originality/value

During the extensive literature survey, it had been found that the CSCM practices are in the fledgling stage in the developing country's context. Moreover, studies related to CSCM adaption in rubber-based manufacturing industries were much lacking. Presented work is peculiar, aiming to accelerate the CSCM adaption in the industrial rubber sector in developing countries like India.

Sustainable service supply chain management: from a systematic literature review to a conceptual framework for performance evaluation of service only supply chain

Purpose

Despite increasing attentions to sustainable service supply chain management (SSSCM), a framework for performance evaluation of sustainable service only supply chain management (SSOSCM) is still missing. This paper tries to fill this gap and provides a novel conceptual framework.

Design/methodology/approach

The articles related to SSSCM are fetched from the databases of SCOPUS and Web of Science. Analysis of 174 articles identified by the systematic literature review is further carried out.

Findings

This research identifies the sustainable practices for service only supply chain (SOSC) as environmental management, social management, economic management, customer management, health, safety and risk management, technical sustainability, institutional sustainability, information and technology management as well as two performance measurement criteria as operational performance and organizational performance. This paper provides a novel conceptual framework for the performance evaluation of SSOSCM. The results call for future exploration in the following three broad directions-(1) customer's perception, involvement and their behaviour towards sustainability in SOSC context; (2) trade-off, incentive mechanism and multilevel evaluation for achieving sustainability in SOSC and (3) sustainability in SOSC from various point of views.

Practical implications

The managers can use the framework to assess the performance of the organization while researchers can explore the discussed research gaps.

Originality/value

This is the first paper that provides a novel conceptual framework for the performance evaluation of SSOSCM as well as potential future research directions.

Sustainability evaluation of service supply chains: a case study of an Indian hospital

Purpose

Increasing pressure from the stakeholders makes the inclusion and evaluation of sustainable practices in the service supply chain (SSC) inevitable. Therefore, this paper aims to evaluate the sustainability status of a case organization and discover the barrier to sustainability in the SSC.

Design/methodology/approach

From the literature review, five sustainability dimensions, seventeen attributes and sixty-five subattributes of the SSC are identified. A three-level conceptual model drawn on human perception is developed. The overall sustainability status of the SSC is determined by using the multigrade fuzzy logic approach. The fuzzy concept incorporated helps in overcoming the challenges of vagueness and impreciseness in the responses. The case SSC is a WestIndia–based hospital.

Findings

The study evaluates the case hospital to be “very sustainable” but far from the “extremely sustainable” level. Six barriers are identified which are reduction in solid waste, compliance with applicable environmental laws and regulations, water usage efficiency, training and education of employees, return on investment and safety equipment for employees. These barriers hinder the hospital from achieving an “extremely sustainable” level.

Practical implications

This paper evaluates, helps the management in identifying the barriers and thus enabling them to work upon these barriers and achieve a greater level of sustainability.

Originality/value

The sustainability practices adopted in this paper for the evaluation of the sustainability status of the SSC have not been used in previous studies. In this study apart from environmental, social and economic aspects, customer management and health, safety and risk management are also incorporated for evaluating the performance of the SSC which makes this study unique. The proposed model can be taken as a benchmark for evaluating the sustainability performance of any SSC.

Sustainability Orientation and Focus in Logistics and Supply Chains

Sustainable development, logistics, and supply chain are being combined into three increasingly connected and topical global research areas. Therefore, this paper’s novelty identifies and defines the priorities of the UN Sustainable Development Goals and sustainable development dimensions in supply-chain- and logistics-management-related studies in the last decade. Knowing logistics and supply chain sustainability focus and orientation is valuable information for researchers and managers to adapt and mitigate their business logistics according to the forecasted trends. The paper provides a systematic and comprehensive review of the literature and is based on 116 scientific papers published between 2010 and 2020 in 73 international journals in the Scopus and Web of Science databases. The study defines focus with integrating environmental, social, and economic sustainability for logistics- and supply-chain-related studies. It emphasizes primary and secondary links of investigated studies with 17 United Nations sustainable development goals. The bibliometric analysis also examined keyword relations. One of the main contributions is that economic sustainability was identified as the most represented one-dimensional sustainability focus. It was revealed that supply chain studies integrated all three sustainability dimensions more frequently (50.60%) than logistics studies, which were equally related to studying two- or three-dimensions of sustainability (39.39%). The most significant findings are also that studies were identified to be oriented primarily towards “responsible consumption and production”, “industry, innovation, and infrastructure” and “affordable and clean energy” and secondary especially on “sustainable cities and communities”.

Measuring the maturity of service supply chain process: a new framework

Purpose

The aim of this study is to develop a framework for measuring of service supply chain (SSC) maturity process.

Design/methodology/approach

The main framework of the SSC maturity was developed by reviewing the concepts and models of SSC, business excellence, maturity and supply chain performance evaluation. Then, the maturity level of each excellence criterion was defined in the proposed model by using the excellence criteria for SSC and the concept of Plan, Do, Check and Act (PDCA) cycle in combination with the process survey tools maturity model. Based on the excellence criteria and their maturity levels, a questionnaire was designed to practically measure the proposed framework.

Findings

The concepts and features of maturity levels defined for each of the excellence criteria were used to implement and operationalize the proposed framework and evaluate the SSC processes.

Practical implications

Through the assessment of the existing status of SSC processes, the findings allow managers to reach a better understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of such processes. Then, some opportunities are provided for improving each excellence criterion to enhance the performance of each process.

Originality/value

In fact, this study provides guidelines for organizations to measure their progress and performance and improve their management systems. The main advantages of the proposed SSC measurement framework include self-assessment facilitation, calculation of criteria scores and development of uses. The proposed model, like quality and productivity awards, can pave the way for increased competitiveness of the service industry.

Investigating the interplays between integrated reporting practices and circular economy disclosure

Purpose

This study seeks to: (1) discuss how the integrated reporting (IR) framework may provide the principles, concepts and the key elements to support the analysis and representation of circular economy (CE)–related activities and information; (2) explore how and to what extent current IR practices are including and disclosing CE-related information; (3) investigate through an exploratory case study the interplays between IR and CE.

Design/methodology/approach

Building on a theoretical analysis of the interplays between CE and IR, this study first performs textual content analysis on a dataset of 84 integrated reports to determine the type and extent of CE-related disclosure. Subsequently, the article presents and discusses an exploratory case study developed according to an action research perspective.

Findings

Through textual content analysis, the study provides data on CE-related reporting practices for 74 organizations operating worldwide, highlighting differences in reporting choices and emphasizing the role played by IR concepts. Through the exploratory case study, this article provides insights on how IR principles support the analysis and the (re)presentation of CE-related information.

Research limitations/implications

Content analysis is used to explore how and to what extent companies disclose CE-related information, not to investigate the quality of such disclosure. Only one single exploratory case study is used.

Practical implications

This article advocates to embed CE data into integrated reports and according to IR principles. The exploratory case study offers useful insights and examples.

Originality/value

This work represents one of the first studies advocating and exploring the interplays between CE and IR. Additionally, this study aids in the development of a more standardized and established terminology for CE research and reporting practices.