The effect of institutional pressure on cooperative and coercive ‘green’ supply chain practices

Little is known about buyers׳ decisions to implement ‘green’ supply chain management (GSCM) through either coercive or cooperative approaches. This is an important area of study as buyers are increasingly expected to improve and ensure that their purchasing and supply chain practices are environmentally sound. Pressuring and monitoring suppliers to become more environmentally responsible dominates the coercive approach to GSCM. In contrast, a cooperative approach is associated with training and helping suppliers to become ‘greener’. In this study we draw on institutional theory, and argue that the decision to implement such practices and the choice between them will be contingent upon institutional pressures (mimetic, normative and coercive), and downstream customer requirements for GSCM. Using primary survey data from 198 UK-based companies, we find compelling evidence to suggest that coercive and cooperative GSCM practices are driven by substantially different factors. Institutional pressures significantly determine cooperative approaches to GSCM while coercive practices are, to a larger extent, driven by downstream customer demands. Customer pressure is also found to moderate the influence of institutional factors on cooperative practices; no significant effect was found for coercive practices.     

Purchasing practices in small- to medium-sized enterprises: An examination of strategic purchasing adoption,supplier evaluation and supplier capabilities

The benefits that can be derived from effective purchasing have long been recognised in the management literature. Despite a growing body of research on purchasing practices in small- to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), a number of key issues remain under-examined. We investigate SME purchasing practices in terms of (1) the degree to which purchasing is regarded as a ‘strategic’ activity by SMEs, (2) the use of supplier evaluation systems by SMEs and (3) the supplier capabilities emphasised by SME buyers. Through a survey of UK SME managers, we find that purchasing practices varied greatly across SMEs. Purchasing formality is generally low with limited evidence of purchasing being employed strategically and with many firms not undertaking formal supplier evaluations. In terms of supplier capabilities, we find that SMEs differ in the capabilities they prioritise, with three distinct groups evident. These groups are labelled ‘holistic’, ‘process’ and ‘logistics’ based on the supplier capabilities they emphasise. These three groups of firms also differed in terms of the emphasis they placed on strategic purchasing, supplier evaluation, technological focus and how they compete in their main markets, but not in terms of firm size or number of suppliers utilised. The implications of these findings are discussed and areas meriting future research are proposed.     

GREEN STAKEHOLDERS: INDUSTRY INTERPRETATIONS AND RESPONSE*

This paper argues that industrial responses to ‘green’ pressures may fruitfully be explored using a stakeholder framework. However, the common view of an objective configuration of stakeholders is replaced with one that favours an interpretive perspective. Managers are viewed as crucial mediators of stakeholder influence; how they identify, define and construct stakeholders is an important feature of the meaning of greening and an industry's subsequent response. A qualitative study of managers in four UK industries - supermarkets, automotives, power and chemicals - is reported. the effect of a small number of stakeholders - campaigners and regulators - is examined in some detail, distinguished differentially according to their perceived legitimacy and the threat they pose to industry. Also examined is the large group of traditionally powerful stakeholders - customers, creditors and employees - who fail markedly to impact on industry's greening. the implications of the findings for pro-environmental change and stakeholder theory are discussed.     

Co-alignment of supplier quality management practices and cognitive maps – A neo-configurational perspective

Much of the previous research on the ‘purchasing practice–performance link’ rests on the notion of “net effects,” which assumes that specific practices independently of each other impact outcomes. This study challenges this core tenet by adopting a neo-configurational perspective, exploring how different combinations of factors (called “configurations”) affect outcomes. Another limitation of extant studies on the ‘purchasing practice–performance link’ is the narrow focus on practices; more recent behavioral supply management research finds the behavior of managers to be critically influenced by cognitive maps—the lenses through which managers perceive, simplify, and interpret the world. Focusing on supplier quality as a core aspect of the broader ‘purchasing practice–performance link’, this study explores how configurations of different supplier quality management (SQM) practices and SQM-related cognitive maps help firms to manage supplier quality. It uses fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) to identify SQM configurations and a cognitive-linguistic approach for the computerized text analysis of purchasing managers’ cognitive maps in the context of Western companies sourcing from Chinese suppliers. The configurational fsQCA analysis identifies four different configurations associated with overcoming barriers to SQM in emerging markets. SQM-related cognitive maps prove to be a critical component in these four configurations.     

Forecasting the Real Exchange Rate

This brief examines the historical relationship between exchange rates and relative inflation rates for a group of major industrial countries. It establishes the concept of the ‘real exchange rate’ and the ‘productivity-adjusted real exchange rate’ (PARE) as essential in understanding these relationships and projecting them into the future. It puts the discussion into the context of company decision making, as one important factor in the rate of return likely to accrue from different methods of supplying an overseas market. Differences in productivity between countries explain the divergences in prices of ‘non-traded goods’. To give a simple example, a haircut costs much more in New York than in Madrid since high US wages reflect high productivity which does not apply in many parts of the service sector. These differences rule out the acceptance of the over simple ‘purchasing power parity’ approach which assumes that exchange rates will settle at a point where all prices (in terms of a common currency) are the same everywhere, or move together. Even after account has been taken of differences in productivity growth, productivity-adjusted real exchange rates (PARE) - though reasonably stable - can still show some deviations, or ‘blips’. The ‘blip’ may occur because of rapid changes in the actual exchange rate or in domestic prices, in which case it is likely to prove temporary and the PARE rate will tend to adjust back to its normal level. But it may come from major structural changes, in which case PARE will be altered permanently within definable limits. A way of recognising the different categories of ‘blip’ is suggested in the brief. The PARE framework is then used to provide a guide to UK businesses who are concerned to calculate the future sterling value of foreign currency sales or, more generally, to estimate their competitiveness in supplying specific export markets. (The method used would apply equally well to other countries.) This is done by showing step-by-step the forecasting procedure to compute sterling's effective exchange rate to 1981 on assumptions concerning respective rates of inflation, monetary policy and the impact of North Sea oil. The computation shows that a sustained period of exchange rate stability is possible for the UK, even if UK inflation rates remain significantly above the world level for the next two years.     

Inclusive purchasing and supply chain resilience capabilities: Lessons for social sustainability

In the face of unexpected changes in their dynamic business environment, purchasing and supply chain (SC) managers have been challenged to boost SC resilience while maintaining their sustainability concerns. In this changing environment, this paper aims to explore: (1) how (social) sustainability affects SC resilience and (2) what the role of purchasing is for SC resilience. Through a dynamic capability view as the theoretical lens, we investigate whether and how an inclusive purchasing programme could enhance SC resilience capabilities to cope with the Covid-19 outbreak. We developed a Case study with various SC members of a multinational cosmetics company that, despite suffering from a sudden demand disruption during the outbreak, maintained its sustainability actions. The results show that four operational SC resilience capabilities were amplified: ‘visibility’, ‘adaptability’, ‘collaboration’ and ‘financial strength’. In addition, a new capability entitled ‘empowerment’ was mobilised during this period. These factors helped the inclusive purchasing maintenance and were essential to supporting social sustainability. In addition, our results show that sustainable PSM, which is overlooked in the literature, is key for SC resilience. This article contributes to theory and practice because it demonstrates the role and relevance of (inclusive) purchasing in a company's ability to cope with SC disruptions, such as those resulting from the outbreak.     

Drivers of green supply management performance: Evidence from Germany

Five potential drivers of green supply management performance were identified in the literature review: green supply management capabilities, the strategic level of the purchasing department, the level of environmental commitment, the degree of green supplier assessment, and the degree of green collaboration with suppliers. These constructs were used to form a structural model explaining the environmental performance and the purchasing performance. The model was analysed with SmartPLS 2.0 using data collected among German purchasers. The results suggest that the degree of green supplier assessment and the level of green collaboration exert direct influence on environmental performance. These two practices are driven by the strategic level of the purchasing department and the level of environmental commitment of the firm. Whereas commitment influences green assessment directly, the impact of commitment on green collaboration is mediated by the capabilities of the purchasing department. Furthermore, the results show that environmental performance has a positive impact on purchasing performance.     

MANAGEMENT, MASCULINITY AND MANIPULATION: FROM PATERNALISM TO CORPORATE STRATEGY IN FINANCIAL SERVICES IN BRITAIN*

This article is concerned to demonstrate that paternalism and strategic management as forms, styles or ‘techniques’of managing people and organizations, are both constitutive of and embedded in what we term a ‘discourse of masculinism’. Within the context of the UK financial services industry, we examine how this discourse reflects and reproduces management practices, and reconstitutes individuals in accordance with masculinist priorities. This has the effect of privileging men vis-a-vis women, serves to rank some men above others, and maintains as dominant certain forms and practices of masculinity. We identify two of these as ‘paternalistic masculinity’and ‘competitive masculinity’respectively, regarding them as concrete manifestations of the interplay between historically shifting forms of management and masculinities in operation.     

Sustainable Purchasing in Food Retailing: Interorganizational Relationship Management to Green Product Supply

Stakeholders’ demands for product sustainability redefine the focus of corporate purchasing strategies from the traditional concern with financial performance to considerations of ‘triple bottom line’ viability. This adds to the complexity of managing interorganizational relationships and poses a question regarding corporate ability to effectively leverage suppliers over environmental and social performance of supplied goods. Since it is not clear what type of purchasing relationship is more favorable for greening a product supply, the current paper aims to investigate how food retailers manage their relationships with suppliers in order to influence the environmental and social performance of procured goods and improve the availability of sustainably produced supply. The research is based on two case studies of Swedish supermarkets and supplementary semi‐structured interviews with Swedish, British and Danish supermarkets. The results of the study contribute to the existing body of academic knowledge in the field of sustainable supply chain management by developing a typology of sustainable purchasing relationships with detailed insights into the nature of collaborative practices, structure of incentives, sustainability ambition, and approaches to verification of compliance. The study has also revealed the dependence of sustainable purchasing relationships on the characteristics of the procurement context, namely the presence of well‐established sustainability certification schemes, perceived by purchaser's situation with availability of sustainability certified supply and purchaser's interpretation of the state of power dependence in relationships with suppliers. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment     

Green supply chain practices and company performance in Portuguese manufacturing sector

Green supply chain management is an important organizational approach to reducing strain on the environment. Many companies are under pressure from customers, media, governments, and investors, among others, to implement green practices. This exploratory paper investigates the relationships between internal and external green practices of eight Portuguese companies from different industrial sectors and their impact on economic and environmental performance. The relationship was analyzed based on the data collected from 22 semi‐structured interviews with general managers, procurement and environmental/safety managers, and through secondary data collected from reports, websites and companies' internal documentation. The analysis identifies the most important green practices considered by managers, as well as the performance measures that are most appropriate and most widely used to evaluate the influence of green practices on corporate performance. A conceptual model was derived to assess the influence of green practices on focal company economic and environmental performance. The results support four of five propositions of this research, and it is possible to conclude that the companies believe that with the adoption of green supply chain practices, they can be more competitive in the market. Due to the scope of the green practices, the relationship between green practices and economic performance was inconclusive. Internal and external green supply chain practices contribute to improved environmental performance because for all companies, there is a positive relationship between green practices and environmental performance in terms of energy, water consumption, waste, and air emissions reduction.     

Training and development deficiencies in ‘high skill’ sectors

Policy debates across advanced industrial economies are stressing the centrality of skills and training to compete in the new ‘knowledge economy’. In the UK increasing importance is being placed on improving workplace learning, yet policy has so far failed to confront the issue of employers' lack of investment in training and development. This article examines whether the high skill sectors that exist within the UK can provide a model of workplace learning for other such sectors to emulate. By using case study research from the aerospace and pharmaceutical industries, training and development practices are examined in relation to the requirements of the business and individual employees. The article will argue that the companies in question, despite their favourable product market position, remain constrained by the broader institutional environment.     

Environmental regulation and innovation driving ecological design in the UK automotive industry

The theory of ecological modernization asserts that economic and environmental goals can be integrated within a framework of industrial modernity. Its central tenet is that environmental regulation can stimulate the application of ‘clean’ technologies or techniques. Ecological modernization also contends that environmental regulation can offer business benefits from innovation through improved product design and economic performance. The EU End of Life Vehicles Directive (ELVD) reflects many of these principles, as it compels all car manufacturers to ‘take back’ and dismantle vehicles at the end of their useful lives and to remove the hazardous substances from the production process. Each component will then be either reused or recycled. The legislation forces designers to introduce ‘clean design’ and ‘design for disassembly’ practices. In light of this, we examine the impact of the directive on UK automotive component manufacturers. We find limited evidence that the EU ELVD Directive has driven product innovation beyond short‐term, incremental technological trajectories. We therefore conclude that a more radical approach, in line with the ‘dematerialization’ thesis by Dobers and Wolff (1999), is needed to generate more radical, ecological design solutions within the UK automotive industry. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.     

Towards a framework for supply chain finance for the supply side

Buyers increasingly offer financing alternatives to their suppliers – so called supply chain finance (SCF) practices for the supply side. Expected benefits however do not always materialize for involved actors. Guidance is needed when to provide these SCF practices to suppliers and why to select different types of practices. To provide this guidance, the paper involves an exploratory multiple-case study design including data within eight buyer-supplier-financial service provider triads. The findings explain contextual situations for the provision of SCF practices based on the contingency approach. They distinguish endogenous, relationship-related and exogenous contingencies within the aforementioned triads. Differentiation criteria are determined for the selection of SCF practices along the dimensions ‘time of financing’ (pre- versus post-shipment) and ‘source of funds’ (supply chain internal and external). Testable propositions and key learnings summarize the derived findings and form the basis to develop a contingency framework on SCF practices for the supply side.     

我国企业实施绿色采购的影响因素研究

绿色采购是企业减少浪费提高效率提升竞争力的重要环节。基于对144家企业的调查,使用统计软件SPSS进行因子分析提取出了影响企业绿色采购实施的五个主因子,在此基础上进行了回归分析,结果发现领导的支持对企业绿色采购的实施影响最为显著,而环境管理成本将阻碍企业绿色采购的实施。     

Barriers to the development of teamworking in UK firms

This paper is based on an empirical study of barriers to the adoption of teamworking in seven UK firms, including small manufacturing units, pharmaceutical organisations and telephone call centres. Such barriers arise from the tension between the ‘microcultures’ of teamworking at firm level and the logistical pressures of the supply chain. Successful adoption is seen as depending on management's ability to embed teamworking practices in the development of supply chain relationships.     

The Evolution of Indian Industrial Relations: A Comparative Perspective

This article examines the evolution of Indian industrial relations in an historical and structural context. In India, the evolution of industrial relations has been ‘incremental’ and ‘adaptive’ and not ‘discontinuous’ and ‘revolutionary’. The relationship between changing industrialisation strategies and industrial relations institutions and practices in India is considerably more subtle than is often supposed in comparative industrial relations narratives, especially when detailed endogenous political economy considerations are taken into account.     

Neo-colonial philanthropy in the UK

UK philanthropic foundations are being subjected to greater scrutiny in how they address racial inequality with their funding distribution, yet the deeper critical question of whether these foundations perpetuate racial inequality in their very ethos, practices and existence remains unanswered. These foundations provide over £6.5billion of grants annually to the charitable sector, hold substantial power and influence over social movements and justify their charitable status by stating that they are addressing issues such as poverty and inequality. Yet many private foundations were built on a Victorian paternalistic model of gracious benefactor and grateful beneficiary and against the historical context of empire-building, slavery and colonialism which embedded ideas about ‘race’ within philanthropy. Furthermore, delineation between the deserving and undeserving poor connected with these formulations of race, to position subjects of colonies inequitably within this charitable paradigm and reinforce stereotypes. At the time, this formed the justification for the expansion of missionary or colonial philanthropy overseas which was the biggest philanthropic cause of the pre first world war era and which can be traced back as the basis for the ‘white saviour complex’ exhibited today within UK foundations, as they continue to operate a colonial social architecture. This inherent and unchallenged colonial social architecture used for grantmaking and funding distribution imbues processes and practices with the same ethos and principles exhibited by colonialism, resulting in a ‘neo-colonial philanthropy’, the tenets of which are identified and explored. In addition, as racial inequality remains one of the most critical issues of our time, it is asserted that foundations will need to understand the historical context of the UK’s colonialist history in order to recognise the link with racial disparities exhibited in communities today. This direct connection together with their own inbuilt colonial architecture necessitates an urgent conversation for Foundations about whether reparative or restorative justice is a more effective operational paradigm and the long term solution needed to address neo-colonial philanthropy or the ‘Empires new clothes’.     

Sustainable development in small and medium enterprises: The role of entrepreneurial orientation in supply chain management

Organizations are under increased pressure to improve their sustainable performance through the adoption of green supply chain management (GSCM) practices. Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) have lagged behind larger corporations due to a number of factors. Chief among these factors is the lack of resources and capabilities. In this study, we investigate whether entrepreneurial orientation as a distinctive firm-level resource contributes to the successful implementation of GSCM practices within SMEs. We use primary data obtained from 316 manufacturing SMEs and analyze the data by using a fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA). Our findings show four equifinal configurations of GSCM practices and the components of entrepreneurial orientation (EO) that lead to high environmental performance. Two practices, “eco-design” and “internal environmental management”, are present in all configurations, with the latter being the single core condition. The components of EO are present in all the configurations. Three distinct configurations lead to the simultaneous achievement of high environmental performance and high economic performance. Some noticeable differences appear in these configurations: “internal environmental management” is no longer a core condition, instead external practices (“green purchasing,” “cooperation with customers including environmental requirements,” and “investment recovery”) and “risk-taking” become core conditions. We exptrapolate our findings into a set of propositions that expand theory on the link between entrepreneurial orientation and sustainable performance. Our study provides insights for managers who seek to infuse entrepreneurial thoughts and actions into their green supply chain initiatives.     

What's in it for the customers? Successfully marketing green clothes

Most green marketing literature is strongly based on the assumption that a consumer's environmental awareness is a pre‐condition for green purchasing. While following such a ‘behaviouristic’ green marketing both scholars and companies seem to have neglected that green products are bought only if customers perceive the products as superior to competitors’ offerings. This paper argues that economic theory can give additional valuable input to green marketing. A first important step for marketing according to the economic approach is to identify how consumers perceive the products' cost and benefits. In this paper, cost and benefits are differentiated into different categories, which may help companies in finding their products' value added. In a second phase, companies can focus on stressing product advantages rather than on overcoming barriers. Using the example of green clothes this contribution shows what such a marketing strategy can look like. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment     

Green supply chain management in the automotive industry: A study in Brazil

The auto industry is experiencing a time of restlessness, which stems from several elements that currently threaten the stability and status quo of its supply chains. Among these elements are autonomous driving, connectivity, electrification, and trip sharing that has led to new forms of mobility. In this context, this article presents the results of a research, which had three main objectives: (1) to identify the green supply chain management (GSCM) practices most commonly implemented in all industrial sectors worldwide, (2) to evaluate how these practices are considered by professionals in the automotive industry and by researchers working on the subject in Brazil, and (3) to identify and evaluate which practices are most widely adopted within these companies and/or supply chains and influence their environmental performance. The research method combined a qualitative research step (Delphi) with another quantitative one (survey). The results show that most of the reality of the automotive industry in Brazil is in line with studies on GSCM practices worldwide, but some specific findings have also been identified and discussed.