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Supply management orientation and supplier/buyer performance

Increasing global cooperation, vertical disintegration and a focus on core activities have led to the notion that firms are links in a networked supply chain. This strategic viewpoint has created the challenge of coordinating effectively the entire supply chain, from upstream to downstream activities. While supply chains have existed ever since businesses have been organized to bring products and services to customers, the notion of their competitive advantage, and consequently supply chain management (SCM), is a relatively recent thinking in management literature. Although research interests in and the importance of SCM are growing, scholarly materials remain scattered and disjointed, and no research has been directed towards a systematic identification of the core initiatives and constructs involved in SCM. Thus, the purpose of this study is to develop a research framework that improves understanding of SCM and stimulates and facilitates researchers to undertake both theoretical and empirical investigat...

Understanding supply chain management: Critical research and a theoretical framework

The impact of supply chain relationship quality on quality performance

The mechanisms are examined by which environmentally informed business practices and technologies may diffuse through industry as a result of the ‘greening’ of purchasing and supply. The efforts of official bodies in the UK to raise environmental awareness among industrial purchasers are reviewed. It is then argued that the supply chain model is an important way of interpreting the industrial landscape from a green perspective and that it is in some ways a more hopeful and positive starting point for achieving industrial transformation. The results of an analysis of some UK companies practices in using their purchasing policies to ‘green’ their supply chains are presented and opportunities for further research indicated.

Purchasing and environmental management: interactions, policies and opportunities

Purpose – To empirically investigate the problems encountered in trying to integrate supply chains in the UK construction industry and to set these problems in the context of the extensive literature on supply chain management and partnering.Design/methodology/approach – A brief review of current supply chain issues in the construction industry is provided. Three case studies of leading construction clients were carried out and these included public and private organisations from different sectors of the economy, public transport, information and communications technology and vehicle manufacturing. A large number of interviews were conducted with the various clients, their main contractors and key subcontractors and suppliers.Findings – The findings reveal that the large number of supply chain partners and the significant level of fragmentation limit the levels of integration that are achievable. The interplay of environmental and procurement related factors renders the realisation of truly integrated sup...

Construction supply chain integration: an elusive goal?

Supply chain management is examined and why supplier quality improvement is sometimes more apparent in speech than in action. The concern is that to obtain the required higher quality the suppliers are simply “running faster” on the traditional treadmill. A guide to managing the supply chain is provided and recommendations made for future “best practice” in the light of existing processes.

Getting the Message Across? Supplier Quality Improvement Programmes: Some Issues in Practice

Supply chain management can be seen as an approach to obtaining the benefits of Vertical Integration without ownership. Vertical Integration has the potential to offer benefits of increased control as well as cost reduction, but supply chain approaches can theoretically provide these same benefits through effective organisation. The concerns with supply chains are discussed under the headings of: innovation, competence and value added, investment flexibility, networks rather than single chains, proprietary design knowledge and dependence. The conclusion is that, where supply chains are identified (even within vertically integrated organisations), then an approach based on effective management of each of the customer‐supplier relationships is key to success. Reference is made to work and materials produced by the Supply Chain Management Group at the University of Glasgow Business School which emphasises the need to implement “best practice” at each point in each chain.

Neil Ferguson

Papers

Getting the Message Across? Supplier Quality Improvement Programmes: Some Issues in Practice

Strategic Aspects of Supply Chain Management

Lessons in buyer-vendor relationships with JIT

Alianzas con los proveedores: un enfoque integrado de la cadena de suministro