Craig H. Wood

Collaboration and technology linkages: a strategic supplier typology

This study uses frameworks from the strategic management and operations strategy literatures to explore the relationships among collaboration, technology, and innovation in small and medium‐sized manufacturers. Statistical analysis of the responses of 200 New Hampshire manufacturing companies in four SIC code industries (fabricated metals, industrial equipment, electrical and electronic equipment, and instruments) leads to the development of a strategic supplier typology which is useful in explaining the differences in the composition and performance of various types of suppliers. Copyright

Collaboration and teaming in the software supply chain

Knowledge-based, nonphysical (or intangible) products such as software and information and financial services present a different set of supply chain management challenges than those encountered by manufacturers of tangible products. Yet as intangible product manufacturers have developed more complex service and quality characteristics in their product-service bundles, they have adopted the supply chain practices of physical product manufacturers. One of the most salient differences between the two types of manufacturing is the reliance of intangible producers on collaboration and partnering with customers and suppliers created as a result of the reexamination of make-versus-buy decisions for nearly all components and services. This study focuses on software firms to identify and understand how these changes affect firm behavior. Contrary to our expectations, software firms do not fully exploit risk-sharing (teaming) alliances. We attempt to explain this via the lenses of trust and asset specialization between supply chain partners.

The Communication of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Through the Supply Chain: A SME Perspective

The increasing use of strategic supply chain alliances provides a potentially rich and growing communication link between suppliers and customers about how they should conduct their economic, social and environmental relations. These communications can be either intended or unintended and may be expected as part of day-to-day practical interactions between suppliers and customers. Intended communications include performance expectations in quality level and consistency, pricing, delivery time and demand forecasts from the customer upstream to suppliers, and technical data about component improvements and new technologies from suppliers downstream to customers. Unintended communications may include transfer of sensitive proprietary information and indications of operating problems. We postulate that many of these communications include topics about the role of business in society, which has commonly come to be known as corporate citizenship or corporate social responsibility (CSR). But, far from being accepted, the fundamental contents of these issues are constantly being debated on both the academic and the practitioner stage. And placing them in a supply chain context potentially adds several more layers of disagreement and debate (New and Westbrook, 2004, p. v). As New (2004b) points out, the subject of ethics and social responsibility in the supply chain ‘remains . . . one of heated controversy, and is the subject of a vast and incoherent literature’ (p. 253). We set out here to clarify the concepts and issues that define corporate social responsibility and propose an agenda for the further study of the communication of CSR principles and practices through the supply chain as a first step toward coherence. In a market economy, corporations provide the most effective vehicle for generating new wealth and for sustaining communities. Although much attention has been given to how and why corporations voluntarily link their futures to the community and environment in which they operate, little research exists on how corporations may require or encourage one another to develop these environmental, community and social capabilities through their supply chain relations, even in the context of the partnership or relational contracting form. Because supply chains play an important, if not leading, role in global economic activity (Dyer and Chu, 2003), the influence of this communication network needs to be better understood. CSR is an umbrella term for a wide-ranging collection of social issues of concern to the firm’s stakeholders (Smith, 2003). Although CSR is generally defined as consisting of

The Development and Application of Priority Profiles

Strategic management research and practice suggest that consistent decision making across functional lines of a business can improve profitability. Using a survey database of 123 manufacturing firms, three unique strategies are identified in this study which reflect emphasis on different combinations of competitive priorities: customer service, high product performance, and product cost or value. A diagnostic tool called priority profiles is developed to measure the relative consistency of decisions across selling, manufacturing, and purchasing functions. Examples are included.