Chuda Basnet, Jim Corner, Joel Wisner and Keah‐Choon Tan
This paper reports on a benchmarking study carried out on supply chain management (SCM) activities of manufacturing organisations in New Zealand. The purpose of the paper is to…
Abstract
This paper reports on a benchmarking study carried out on supply chain management (SCM) activities of manufacturing organisations in New Zealand. The purpose of the paper is to report the current state of the play in this area. A postal survey was carried out to ascertain the status of SCM adoption in New Zealand, and identify the issues in SCM that are significant for New Zealand manufacturers. The findings suggest that although there is awareness of the SCM concept in New Zealand, the adoption of the newer concepts of SCM is not very far advanced.
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Internal supply chain refers to the chain of activities within a company that concludes with providing a product to the customer. This process involves multiple functions within…
Abstract
Purpose
Internal supply chain refers to the chain of activities within a company that concludes with providing a product to the customer. This process involves multiple functions within companies such as sales, production, and distribution. It is obvious that a company's performance would be enhanced by the integration of these functions. However, there is no consensus yet on how integration is to be defined and measured. The purpose of this paper is to present research that was conducted with the goal of developing an instrument for the measurement of internal supply chain integration.
Design/methodology/approach
Scale items were identified from current literature and the resulting survey instrument was sent out to a sample of New Zealand manufacturers. Statistical analysis was conducted to purify and validate the instrument.
Findings
In total, three dimensions of integration were identified, labelled coordination, communication, and affective relationship. This paper makes a contribution towards developing a consensus in the understanding and measurement of the integration construct.
Research limitations/implications
The selection and exclusion of measurement items for the survey have followed established principles of survey research, but may have been affected by the personal bias of the author. While every attempt has been made to comprehensively capture the state of the research up to the time of the study, there may be some omissions. The sample for the survey was drawn from a database of New Zealand businesses, thus the results are generalizable only to the extent that these businesses represent the population of all businesses. Another limitation is that no prior survey/case studies were carried out to collect practitioner's definitions/measures for integration.
Practical implications
The authors hope to have made a contribution here towards building a consensus among practitioners and researchers in defining and measuring internal supply chain integration. For practitioners, the measurement instrument offers a self‐assessment tool for internal supply chain integration. This should help them in identifying areas for improvement.
Originality/value
The contribution of this paper consists of: development of an instrument for the measurement of integration, validating the instrument against a criterion, and the identification of three dimensions of integration – communication, coordination, and affective relationship. The unique contributions of this paper are the validation of the instrument against a criterion and the identification of “affective relationship” as a dimension of internal supply chain integration.
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Presents a report on a postal survey of production managers and production management academics carried out in New Zealand. The managers were asked questions about their tasks…
Abstract
Presents a report on a postal survey of production managers and production management academics carried out in New Zealand. The managers were asked questions about their tasks, responsibilities, and educational needs. The academics provided data on their teaching of production management. The survey particularly focused on the practical relevance of production management topics commonly taught in undergraduate courses of tertiary institutions. Survey results show that the practical relevance of production management education in New Zealand is significant, but there is room for improvement.
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Chhabi Ram Matawale, Saurav Datta and S.S. Mahapatra
In today’s ever-changing global business environment, successful survival of manufacturing firms/production units depends on the extent of fulfillment of dynamic customers’…
Abstract
Purpose
In today’s ever-changing global business environment, successful survival of manufacturing firms/production units depends on the extent of fulfillment of dynamic customers’ demands. Appropriate supply chain strategy is of vital concern in this context. Lean principles correspond to zero inventory level; whereas, agile concepts motivate safety inventory to face and withstand in turbulent market conditions. The leagile paradigm is gaining prime importance in the contemporary scenario which includes salient features of both leanness and agility. While lean strategy affords markets with predictable demand, low variety and long product life cycle; agility performs best in a volatile environment with high variety, mass-customization and short product life cycle. Successful implementation of leagile concept requires evaluation of the total performance metric and development of a route map for integrating lean production and agile supply in the total supply chain. To this end, the purpose of this paper is to propose a leagility evaluation framework using fuzzy logic.
Design/methodology/approach
A structured framework consisting of leagile capabilities/attributes as well as criterions has been explored to assess an overall leagility index, for a case enterprise and the data, obtained thereof, has been analyzed. Future opportunities toward improving leagility degree have been identified as well. This paper proposes a Fuzzy Overall Performance Index to assess the combined agility and leanness measure (leagility) of the organizational supply chain.
Findings
The proposed method has been found fruitful from managerial implication viewpoint.
Originality/value
This paper aimed to present an integrated fuzzy-based performance appraisement module in an organizational leagile supply chain. This evaluation module helps to assess existing organizational leagility degree; it can be considered as a ready reference to compare performance of different leagile organization (running under similar supply chain architecture) and to benchmark candidate leagile enterprises; so that best practices can be transmitted to the less-performing organizations. Moreover, there is scope to identify ill-performing areas (barriers of leagility) which require special managerial attention for future improvement.
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Chin‐Chun Hsu, Vijay R. Kannan, Keah‐Choon Tan and G. Keong Leong
The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of information sharing capability on buyer‐supplier relationships and firm performance. It is proposed that information sharing…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of information sharing capability on buyer‐supplier relationships and firm performance. It is proposed that information sharing capability, the integration of a firm's information/decision systems and business processes with those of supply chain partners, is an antecedent of collaborative buyer‐supplier relationships, defined in terms of supply chain and relationship architecture. Further, it is proposed that these relationships positively impact a firm's market and financial performance.
Design/methodology/approach
This research uses multiple linear regression to analyze a set of survey data from the USA, Europe and New Zealand.
Findings
Results demonstrate positive relationships between information sharing capability and buyer‐supplier relationships, and between relationships and performance.
Research limitations/implications
Information sharing capability and buyer‐supplier relationships are complex, multi dimensional constructs. While this research highlights their role in driving performance, further study is required to more fully capture their impact and to understand the implications for situational factors such as industry sector and transaction type.
Practical implications
Results from the study provide academics and policymakers with insights into key information sharing constructs related to the development of buyer‐supplier relationships. These provide guidance in developing the infrastructure to support such relationships.
Originality/value
This study adds to the extant literature by examining the dimensions of information sharing related to buyer‐supplier relationships and performance.