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In 2009, the European Operations Management Association (EurOMA) celebrates its 15th anniversary and its precursor, the UK OMA, its 25th anniversary. The purpose of this paper is to review the origins and foundations of today's EurOMA and how it has progressed to being a vibrant and successful organisation.

The review draws on archived documents, especially newsletters and board minutes, as well as memories of all of those involved.

The review shows an important evolution from two groups of like minded individuals, through building annual conferences and brings these together as one. It then shows how it has evolved both through formalisation of its activities, building international links and, most importantly, developing a portfolio of activities to develop and support young researchers.

Where records are not available, the paper draws on individual memories of events from a long time ago.

As well as providing an invaluable record, it can provide a model for the development of similar organisations.

Services are highly important in a world economy which has increasingly become service driven. There is a growing need to better understand the possibilities for, and requirements of, designing modular service architectures. The purpose of this paper is to elaborate on the roots of the emerging research stream on service modularity, provide a concise overview of existing work on the subject, and outline an agenda for future research on service modularity and architecture. The articles in the special issue offer four diverse sets of research on service modularity and architecture.

The paper is built on a literature review mapping the current body of literature on the topic and developing future research directions in service modularity and architecture.

The growing focus on services has triggered needs to investigate the suitability and implementation of physical-product-focused modularity principles and theories in service contexts, and to search for principles/theories that enhance services. The expanding research stream has explored various aspects of service modularity in empirical contexts. Future research should focus on service-specific modularity theories and principles, platform-based and mass-customized service business models, comparative research designs, customer perspectives and service experience, performance in context of modular services, empirical evidence of benefits and challenges, architectural innovation in services, modularization in multi-provider contexts, and modularity in hybrid offerings combining service and tangible product modules.

Nine areas are recommended for further research on service modularity and architecture. The introductory piece also discusses the roots of service modularity and provides an overview of current contributions.

The need to make a “theoretical contribution” is a presumed mandate that permeates any researcher’s career in the Social Sciences, yet all too often this remains a source of confusion and frustration. The purpose of this paper is to reflect on, and further develops, the principal themes discussed in the “OM Theory” workshop in Dublin in 2011 and the special sessions at the 2011 and the 2013 EurOMA Conferences in Cambridge and Dublin.

This paper presents six short essays that explore the role and use of theory in management research, and specifically ask what is a good or meaningful contribution to theory. The authors comment on the current state of theory in Operations Management (OM) (Harry Boer), the type of theories the authors have in OM (Chris Voss), the role of theory in increasing the general understanding of OM problems (Roger Schmenner), whether the authors can borrow theories from other fields or actually have theory “of our own” (Matthias Holweg), the different ways in which a contribution to theory can be made (Martin Kilduff), and how to construct a theoretical argument (Mark Pagell).

The authors argue that theory is fundamental to OM research, but that it is not the inevitable starting point; discovery and observation are equally important and often neglected avenues to contributing to theory. Also, there is no one right way to making a contribution, yet consistency between ontology, epistemology, and claimed contribution is what matters. The authors further argue that the choice of theory is critical, as a common mistake is trying to contribute to high-level theories borrowed from other fields. Finally, the authors recommend using theory parsimoniously, yet with confidence.

The paper presents a collection of viewpoints of senior scholars on the need for, and use of, theory in OM research.

This paper provides a cross‐country examination of service management practice and performance of service organizations in the UK, USA and Germany. The findings reported are based on a sample of firms from the international service study (ISS) from four service sectors: financial services, professional services, hotels, and utilities. The paper argues that generally there are differences in services management practices and performance and, more specifically, that service quality performance may be explained by the nature and market dynamics of the service sector within the individual countries.

The world is changing – economically, technologically, politically, and socially. As an academic discipline, operations management (OM) is, almost by definition, close to practice. Are our OM research methods fit for purpose for the new age? This paper reflects on and develops the principal themes discussed in the “OM Methodology” Special Session at the 2011 EurOMA Conference in Cambridge, UK. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

The emerging landscape in which future OM research will be conducted is discussed. The paper provides a range of perspectives on the research challenges facing the discipline with respect to what the authors research and how the authors research it. The range of methods open to us and their relative merits and challenges are debated.

The traditional research divide between quantitative modelling, often normative in outlook, and the more reflective modes of qualitative enquiry, with a wide spectrum of empirical work in between, is reflected in the different academic traditions, groupings, conferences, and publications across the discipline. Research should not be driven by methodological convenience but by the needs of a changing world. Rather than a sterile “quants versus qual” debate, the paper argues that a rich diversity of approaches can provide a reinforcing cycle to generate relevant, interesting and exciting research underpinned by robust and valid theory.

The paper presents detailed reflections from leading researchers on contemporary and future OM research, arguing that research approaches must evolve that reflect the new realities to further enhance OM as a theoretically sound and practically relevant discipline.

The research reported examines the role of service in manufacturing. Focuses on the degree to which Chase′s “Service Factory” concept is applicable in the UK. Also examines the role of service in four manufacturing companies. It was found that the roles reported by Chase in the USA are also used by a number of UK companies, and it is concluded that the service‐factory concept is robust and is not necessarily embedded in some of the cultural norms of the USA, as are some TQM practices. The case data indicated that the source of customer service may be in customers being served by various parts of the organization, that customer service is complex and that service levels are a function of both manufacturing and distribution. This would seem to point to the distribution view of customer service, the field‐service view and/or the service‐factory view being too narrow in terms of the company as a whole.

The purpose of this paper is to explore different modes of service innovation by examining business model innovation alongside two traditional modes: product innovation and process innovation.

The authors first empirically test a typology using archival data from 69 service innovation projects in a major mobile telecom company. The authors then extend the typology by investigating the interrelationships among service product, service process, and business model innovation based on empirical evidence from multi-mode service innovations. Finally, the authors study the patterns of modes in a networked environment.

The results indicate that the typology is applicable and all three modes of service innovation exist in the sample. The authors find that all of the business model innovations involve external partnerships during the development process, while only a small proportion of service process innovations involve external partnerships.

This study has empirically validated a typology of service innovation and discussed the theoretical and managerial implications of multi-mode innovations, contributing to service innovation literature and practices.

This paper contributes to, and links the areas of quality management and buyer‐supplier relationships. In doing so, we seek to address two broad research questions. To what extent do quality practices impact upon the various dimensions of quality performance, manufacturing performance and, in turn, business performance? To what extent is the relationship between quality practices and quality performance contingent upon the nature of buyer‐supplier relationships? To address these questions, we developed a path model incorporating quality practices, design quality, conformance quality, external quality‐in‐use, product cost, time‐to‐market, customer satisfaction, business performance and buyer‐seller relationships. The model was tested with data collected from 200 suppliers in the electronics sector in the Republic of Ireland. Data analysis of the data indicated considerable support for the conceptual model.