Purchasing in a supply chain environment

Why the interest in purchasing? In the typical company, material costs are 40% to 75% of the cost of goods sold, labor is 5% to 15%, and the balance is burden. The typical company has $4-$5 in purchased cost to $1 in labor. Most companies are implementing material requirements planning (MRP II) and enterprise resource planning systems to control the $1 in labor and have little expectation in the area of purchasing savings. Yet a dollar saved in purchasing goes directly to the bottom line. I ran a survey of 100 Class A users of MRP II; in all 100 of the companies, the biggest payback was in the area of purchasing.     

The ethical responsibility of the hospital to the environment

The ethical responsibility of the hospital to the environment is a relatively new concept. It is complex and ever changing as the whole field of medicine continues to evolve. The recent dilemmas of medical waste washing up on beaches and waste-laden barges not finding an accepting port should convince us that this issue is becoming more serious. Responsible change in this area calls for creative and imaginative leadership. It is a terrible contradiction when an institution committed to the health and wholeness of those whom it serves is not also committed to the health and wholeness of the environment.     

Purchasing management in the luxury industry: organization and practices

Traditional supply chain models were developed mainly for non-luxury companies and find very little correspondence in the field of luxury, which is considered here as a business super-area including heterogeneous enterprises, belonging to different sectors, which have in common customers characterized by the “need for luxury”. The objective of this paper is to investigate, through a multiple case-study research, peculiar purchasing and supply management practices put in place by luxury firms and to provide a classification of the most recurring approaches. Relevant dimensions (i.e. product complexity and sale volume) to classify luxury firms practices have been used: as a result, four groups of companies have been identified and their purchasing practices described.     

Characterising human resources management practices in Portugal: an empirical analysis

The importance of human resources as a fundamental channel towards the competitiveness and sustainability of firms is now theoretically unchallenged. This article provides an overall characterisation of the main human resources management (HRM) practices implemented in Portugal and compares them with the benchmark models proposed in the literature.

To evaluate the degree to which HRM practices diverge from these benchmark models, this article relies on the analysis of five criteria: i) How do the main HRM practices fit the existing management models (familiar, professional or mixed); ii) How does the HRM conform to a work organisation of the matricial type; iii) To identify whether the role of HRM is essentially administrative or strategic; iv) To identify where the responsibility for HRM lies within the firms operating in Portugal; and v) To characterise the relation between HRM and work organisation in Portugal.

Drawing on a representative sample of firms operating in Portugal, we identify three clusters that allow us to characterise and analyse the stylised HRM practices implemented in Portugal (network-based, familiar-based or bureaucratised). Results show contrasting management patterns, which can be interpreted as different stages of evolution in terms of HRM practices in Portugal.     

Factors influencing ethical climate in a nonprofit organisation: an empirical investigation

Drawing from Victor and Cullen's[Victor, B. and Cullen, J. B. (1987) ‘A theory and measure of ethical climate in organizations’, Research in Corporate Social Performance and Policy, Vol. 9, pp. 51–71.],[Victor, B. and Cullen, J. B. (1988) ‘The organizational bases of ethical work climates’, Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 33, pp. 101–125.] theoretical framework a recent study by Agarwal and Malloy[Agarwal, J. and Malloy, D. C. (1999) ‘Ethical work climate dimensions in a not‐for‐profit organization: An empirical study’, Journal of Business Ethics, Vol. 20, pp. 1–14.] examined ethical work climate dimensions in the context of a nonprofit organisation. This paper reviews the framework and extends the study further by investigating several factors that influence the perception of ethical work climate in a nonprofit organisation. The multiple analysis of variance (MANOVA) procedure is employed to test nine hypotheses. Results demonstrate somewhat unique findings regarding factors that influence ethical climate perception in a nonprofit context. Specifically, the findings of this study point to the level of education, decision style and the influence that superiors and volunteers have upon ethical perception. Results also demonstrate that factors that have been employed traditionally by forprofit management, such as length of service, codes of ethics, size of the organisation and peer pressure, do not effectively influence ethical perception in the nonprofit context. Finally implications of this study are discussed. Copyright © 2003 Henry Stewart Publications     

Purchasing: a necessary partnership

According to a recent survey published in Hospital Purchasing News, a Mcknight Medical Communications publication, the average hospital in the United States spent $16.7 million, not including equipment purchases, in 1994. This represents an increase of 41.6 percent over the amount spent in 1990, $11.8 million. The hospital's objective of having year-end revenues exceed expenses largely depends on the ability to purchase materiel at the best price, not necessarily the lowest cost. This goal can be achieved by partnering with suppliers and customers (hospital administrative and surgical staff, as well as patients) through open communication and trust. Reducing costs by a percent on the dollar could return $167,000 to the average hospital. Partnering can assist in achieving these savings!     

Performance analysis of a focused hospital unit: The case of an integrated trauma center

The concept of focus [Skinner, W., 1974. The focused factory. Harvard Business Review 52 (3), 113–121], notably operationalized in manufacturing entities like cells and focused factories, has also been adopted by the health care industry. Examples include patient-focused care systems and product/service lines. Despite its longevity, there is a paucity of studies analyzing the focus concept and its link to performance, especially in health care. This research is aimed at enhancing our understanding of how a focus-based approach to organization redesign in health care affects processes and practices, and what operational, clinical, and financial outcomes result from such a change. The research setting is a single case site within a large medical center for which costs for trauma care used to exceed income. Using a structured framework, we document the design and operation of this physically and organizationally integrated Level I trauma care center and compare it to its preceding operation. Its pre- and post-conversion performance is analyzed using symmetric event windows covering three-year periods before and after the focused hospital unit (FHU) was established. Under a sizable increase in workload, we find no change in mortality, moderate improvement in length of stay, and a large improvement in net operating margins. Surprisingly, the latter stem not from reductions in cost but in sharply increased hospital reimbursements. Previous studies of hospital restructuring involving focused patient populations have not conclusively supported a positive link between focus and outcomes. However, this investigation of a specific FHU suggests, conceptually as well as quantitatively, that focus can be an attractive element in health care system design.     

HR practices and commitment to change: an employee‐level analysis

This article explores the relationship between HR practices and commitment to change in three health service organisations in Ireland. The research focuses on employee views of HR practices and resulting employee‐level consequences including commitment to change, perceptions of the industrial relations climate and the psychological contract, and work–life balance. The findings indicate that the HR practices valued by employees, and which are related to a range of employee‐related consequences, are very different from the lists of sophisticated HR practices that appear in the high performance literature. The research suggests that organisations need to ensure that attention is still paid to the basics of the employment relationship and that these are not lost in the rush to introduce more sophisticated approaches to managing employees.     

Societal institutions and HRM practices: an analysis of four European multinational subsidiaries in Bangladesh

Using the ‘societal-effect’ approach, a variant of the institutional theory developed and tested in Europe, this study investigates the impact of societal institutions on human resource management (HRM) practices of European multinational subsidiaries in Bangladesh, which is now on the list of the Next-11 economies of the world. In-depth case studies of four European multinational subsidiaries revealed the presence of different degrees of influence – partly attributable to societal effect – on the human resource practices of these subsidiaries. Our study added a new dimension to the interface between the strong and weak institutions and how such interfacing accords both legitimacy and reverse legitimacy to MNC subsidiaries and their societal institutions respectively. Another interesting finding of the study is the emergence of political system as a societal institution and, hence, a determinant of HRM practices in these subsidiaries. The study's implications are given.     

Linking environmental management practices and organizational citizenship behaviour for the environment: a social exchange perspective

This paper reports a field study on the relationship between environmental management practices and organizational citizenship behaviour for the environment via exchange process (i.e. perceived superior support, perceived organizational support and employee commitment). Results from a survey conducted with 407 employees from several organizations suggest that employee is more likely to make extra environmental efforts if he/she perceives that the organization supports his/her supervisor by granting him/her the decision-making latitude and necessary resources to engage in pro-environmental behaviour.     

Integrating strategic cost management with a 3DCE environment: Strategies,practices, and benefits

The overall objective of this exploratory research was to examine the possible competitive advantages when organizations integrate strategic cost management into the simultaneous design of products, processes, and supply chains. The concept of concomitantly designing products, processes and supply chains is referred to by Fine [1998. Clockspeed. Perseus Books, Reading, MA] as three-dimensional concurrent engineering (3DCE). While many organizations have adopted concurrent engineering to design new products, few have simultaneously considered cost issues related to designing the supply chain. Fewer still were found to integrate strategic cost management with 3DCE. Thus a case study approach was deemed necessary. Based on case studies of five firms, a framework of testable propositions was developed. The initial findings indicated there is a positive relationship between the customer's and supplier's extent of participation in new product development, supplier development practices, and the integration of strategic cost management practices with 3DCE. The integration of strategic cost management with 3DCE should result in a higher level of operational performance in terms of product performance, supply chain responsiveness, and conformance to quality. Integration should also result in lower product and process costs, faster time to market, and fewer product launch problems. The overall result is a higher level of company performance and competitiveness.     

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.     

High-involvement information sharing practices: an international perspective

The type of information shared within organizations is a key aspect of strategic human resources management. In this exploratory study, we expand our understanding of high-performance work systems (HPWSs) by examining the information sharing practices of firms operating in different countries to assess the extent that high-involvement-oriented information sharing in organizations is influenced by home-country economic structures and national cultural factors. We assess firm-level data from a 12-country sample to evaluate the use of formal information sharing practices for non-managerial employees. The results of our analysis support the contention that information sharing practices varies by country, and that cultural similarities based on geographical region exist within the three information content areas of business strategy, financial performance, and organization of work. Specifically, we found significant variance in information sharing practices of firms based in different countries but homogeneity of practices among geographical neighbors. There is a modest positive relationship between sharing business strategy information and perceived firm performance that is significantly stronger in North America compared to other regions. These results have important implications for the ongoing theoretical development of mechanisms underlying the use of HPWS practices in an international context.     

Ten years after: Interference of hospital slack in process performance benefits of quality practices

We investigate the long-term relationship between an organization's quality management practices and process-level performance. Further, we examine whether availability of organizational slack over the study interval interferes with the relationship between quality practices and process performance. Organizational slack consists of the available and accessible resources in an organization; we focus here on unabsorbed slack in the form of financial resources. We investigate the quality practices of U.S. general acute care hospitals, measured by their depth of implementation of practices characterizing a total quality management system, and use them to predict process performance related to four medical conditions. Analysis reveals differing effects that are dependent on hospital slack conditions. In hospitals with high slack, quality practices significantly predict three of four studied process performance measures. In contrast, in hospitals with low slack, quality practices predict only one of the four process performance measures, while other factors outweigh the effects of quality practices. This study lends support to management taking a long-term perspective related to implementation of quality management systems, and highlights the relevance of slack conditions in garnering the benefits of such systems.     

经济全球化与现代化进程:后发国家经济发展的环境分析

经济全球化是影响发展中国家经济发展极其重要的外部环境,经济全球化发展存在着客观性与多面性;现代化是发展中国家经济发展的内在条件,现代化发展存在着不平衡性;发展中国家现代化与全球化存在着相互依存、相互制约的关系。     

Innovation in work practices: a practice perspective

Dynamic capability theory argues that organizations' internal capabilities enable sustained competitive advantage. Innovations in work practices (commonly termed ‘high performance’, ‘high commitment’ or ‘high involvement’ practices) are an important source of these internal capabilities but research evidence shows low levels of penetration. Using a practice perspective, case study analysis of 7 establishments in the aerospace sector identifies three themes that are under-attended to in current research on innovations in work practices: industry and production context; distributed nature of management activity, and social embeddedness. Implications for future research are discussed.