Martin Spring

Flexibility from a supply chain perspective: definition and review

Purpose – A growing body of literature has begun to recognise that in the era of supply chain management it is important to look beyond the flexible factory to the flexible supply chain. This paper seeks to further our understanding of supply chain flexibility and provide a comprehensive review of the available literature.Design/methodology/approach – Published literature on supply chain flexibility has been considered. Where appropriate, additional insights have been obtained from related streams such as manufacturing flexibility, agility and supply chain responsiveness.Findings – Much of the existing research has a limited definition of supply chain flexibility and describes flexibility simply as a reactive means to cope with uncertainty. Supply chain flexibility has emerged from the manufacturing flexibility literature and hence to date is largely confined to a manufacturing context (neglecting the role of services). Empirical research often takes the form of a cross‐sectional postal questionnaire cond...

Third party logistics: a literature review and research agenda

Purpose – To provide a taxonomy of third party logistics (3PL) research and, based on that, to develop a research agenda for this field of study.Design/methodology/approach – The proposed 3PL research classification framework is based on a comprehensive literature review, which concentrates on peer‐reviewed journal papers published within the period 1990‐2005. A total of 114 academic sources have been retrieved and analysed in terms of research purpose and nature, method employed, theoretical approach and level of analysis.Findings – The review reveals that 3PL research is empirical‐descriptive in nature and that it generally lacks a theoretical foundation. Survey research is the dominant method employed, reflecting the positivist research tradition within logistics. It identifies certain knowledge gaps and develops five propositions for future research. It suggests that focus should be directed towards more normative, theory‐driven and qualitative method‐based studies. It also argues that further empiric...

Service, services and products: rethinking operations strategy

Purpose – This paper proposes a new approach to operations and supply strategy in the light of recent developments in the analysis of the respective roles of products and services in delivering benefits to customers.Design/methodology/approach – Reviews and synthesises concepts from operations management (OM), marketing, economics and related areas. Examples of product and service combinations are considered, drawing attention to the ways in which services may be distinguished from products. An institutional basis for defining services is favoured over IHIP. A corollary of this is how services are made tradable: the modularity theory of the firm is used to do this. The paper then outlines, considers and compares various approaches to the combination of products and services: “service‐dominant logic”, support services, product‐service systems, systems integration, performance‐based logistics, bundling and, finally, the notion of “the offering”.Findings – It is found that the notion of the business model is...

Product customisation and manufacturing strategy

Reviews literature from manufacturing strategy, flexibility, agile manufacturing, and aspects of industrial marketing and highlights fragmented and inadequate treatment of fundamental issues relating to product customisation. Through synthesis of the literature and the analysis of four case studies – in the manufacture of fork‐lift trucks, electro‐mechanical devices, small telecommunications systems and stationery products respectively – presents a novel model of the customisation process. Identifies typologies of customisation problem‐solving situations and custom‐build option types. Demonstrates the importance of the relationship between the degree of design activity and volume of manufacture, and of the distinction between products that are custom‐built from options, and those that involve some custom‐designed elements. Proposes a range of potential roles for customised products to support management decision making in the selection of appropriate business activities.

Supply chain flexibility: an inter‐firm empirical study

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to present an empirical study of supply chain flexibility, asking: what specific inter‐firm practices are used to achieve increased flexibility in buyer‐supplier pairs and in the wider supply chain or network, and how do these practices and effects interact?Design/methodology/approach – The approach taken is a qualitative study of a network of 16 inter‐related manufacturing companies. Semi‐structured face‐to‐face interviews with senior representatives from each company.Findings – A wide range of supply chain flexibility practices are identified, some confirming existing research, some additional. These are grouped into ten categories, and two over‐arching themes are found. First, firms use various forms of outsourcing and subcontracting to reduce their own need for internal flexibility. The second related insight is that, having externalised the need for flexibility, firms improve flexibility of the whole chain by engaging in committed relationships with counterparts...

“One more time: how do you win orders?”: a critical reappraisal of the Hill manufacturing strategy framework

Examines the manufacturing strategy framework developed by Hill and its development, comparing it to work in manufacturing strategy and other related fields. Discusses Hill’s distinctive concepts of order‐winning criteria and order‐qualifying criteria. Also raises issues relating to manufacturing strategy more generally. Concludes that strategy is now about the very ability to change, not just about choosing the “right” change to make.

New product design and development: a generic model

This paper describes a generic model of the new product design and development (NPDD) process. The model has been derived from best practice observed in fieldwork carried out in a range of situations. The model helps to identify and put the company’s NPDD activities into the context of the overall NPDD process. It has been found to be a useful means of organising data on firms’ NPDD activities without imposing an overly‐prescriptive “how to” model of NPDD. The framework which underpins the model will help to promote a discussion of the approaches undertaken within a company’s NPDD process, thereby promoting understanding and improvement of the process.

JIT purchasing in the Spanish auto components industry: implementation patterns and perceived benefits

This paper reports empirical evidence of the implementation patterns of JIT purchasing developed by the Spanish auto components industry. An analytical framework distinguishing between operational practices, inherent in JIT environments, and complementary practices, characteristic of partnership sourcing arrangements, is proposed and used to guide the study of a sample of 150 manufacturers. Three stages of implementation are identified and the analysis of companies at each stage reveals that size and international presence are key factors. Furthermore, there seem to exist important synergies between JIT purchasing practices which make a holistic implementation more beneficial than the isolated introduction of selected practices.

Complementarities between JIT purchasing practices: an economic analysis based on transaction costs

The objective of this paper is to analyse the complementarities and interrelationships between the different JIT purchasing practices which have extended in industrial markets in recent years. The incorporation of trust as an explicative element in a framework based on Transaction Costs Economics leads us to propose that the success of logistics-related JIT purchasing practices, which fundamentally transform the physical exchange process, depends on the implementation of additional practices which transform the way of governing and controlling the relationships and which support and rely on a co-operation climate. Empirical tests carried out over a sample of 148 Spanish auto components suppliers confirm this reasoning.

Flexibility versus robust networks: the case of the Brazilian automotive sector

The “robust networks” concept of Ferdows is examined and related to other key theories from the manufacturing strategy literature, resource‐based and other conceptualisations of the organisation of innovation in international networks, and the international business debates on “operational flexibility”. The cases of seven international automotive assemblers with operations in Brazil are then considered in the light of Ferdows’ framework and the external factors bearing on the country and the sector within it. It is evident that, among the global assemblers, the “world” car strategy is dominant, leading to a concentration on the “source” and “lead” roles for individual plants, often combined with radical logistical arrangements. This seems in turn to support the argument for “robustness” rather than “operational flexibility”. Suggestions are made for further work to study the luxury car assemblers and other sectors where economies of scale are less important and where there is a greater degree of global dispersion of production facilities.