The Role of social agency in supply chain management decision-making

Global supply chains have expanded in both their size and embeddedness in the markets. The formation and development of relationships with suppliers and buyers has become key to sustaining competitiveness, whereas firms within the chains face increasing needs and demands from both internal and external stakeholders. Accordingly, decision-making within supply chains is expected to meet various objectives regarding, for example, organizational sustainability and performance. To answer the challenges related to the decision-making, researchers in the field of supply chain management have recently been concerned especially with the theme of human behavior. Processes of individual decision-making in the context are often found to be irrational with relation to organizational aims and unexpected in their consequences on the level of supply chains. Yet, explanations with reference to individual psychology and social mechanisms relevant to the phenomena have received little attention, leaving the decision-making inefficient in practice. This doctoral thesis addresses the gap in previous research by considering the interaction between the psychology of the individual decision-maker and the social environment of the supply chain. In this regard, the thesis contributes to the research paradigm of behavioral supply chain management by elaborating on what the interaction means for supply chain management decision-making. A social cognitive lens is adopted to describe how supply chain management decisions may be linked to various psychological characteristics of decision-makers and to put forward practical proposals on how to enhance decision-making in the context. The compilation thesis builds on four original publications with a diverse background of theories on individual decision-making and organizational behavior. Literature relevant to supply chain management decision-making in general—and the topics of logistics outsourcing, organizational performance, and supply relationships in particular—is subjected to conceptual analysis for the development of propositions and hypotheses to be tested. To test the hypotheses, the research then employs empirical survey data from the Finnish State of Logistics Surveys 2014 and 2018, the European Social Survey 2016, and financial reporting data from the Voitto+ and Eikon databases. One of the individual studies is conceptual by nature, whereas three follow a nomothetic approach where the data is analyzed using quantitative methods. The results show how logistics outsourcing decisions are likely to be driven by attitudes, norms, and competence; the environmental and financial performance of companies may be linked to their respective institutional environments and ambidextrous business processes; and supply relationships should be managed with consideration to individual identity and leader rhetoric. The findings further support a view of the individual decision-maker as an intentional and subjectively rational social agent that lays the foundations to behavior on multiple levels of analysis from organizations to supply chains and markets. Supply chain management decision-making could then be enhanced with behavior change techniques related to, for instance, increasing knowledge and setting goals that may be enforced from within or outside the supply chain. Hence, the results benefit business practitioners and policymakers across the boundaries of individual firms with ideas on how to acknowledge the human decision-maker in decision models vastly applied in the field

Revisiting the relationship between environmental and financial performance: The moderating role of ambidexterity in logistics

Research has shown the need for business organizations to be ambidextrous, which means they should possess the ability to simultaneously exploit existing competencies and explore novel opportunities for improved organizational performance. Past evidence suggests that corporate environmental and financial performance may benefit from well-organized logistics operations. Meanwhile, the causality between the performances has been continuously debated, and the role of ambidexterity in the relationship is largely unexplored. We argue that ambidexterity in logistics operations enhances the link between environmental and financial performance. Using longitudinal data from Finnish manufacturing and trading firms, we applied regression analysis to test a theory-driven moderation model. Our findings indicate that ambidexterity in logistics operations affects the strength of the virtuous cycle between environmental and financial performance. Notably, the stronger the explorative orientation in logistics in a firm, the more enhanced the link between their environmental and financial performances. Overall, firms may find it challenging for their available resources to be employed for environmental and financial sustainability unless they are ambidextrous. Financial resources and environmental investments are necessary conditions but not sufficient for performance improvements in themselves; they need to be coupled with a desire to seek new, innovative solutions rather than just exploit existing practices. Combining exploitative and explorative orientations in logistics helps businesses meet divergent stakeholder expectations and translate their resources into performance. To this end, logistics operations should be organized to support organizational performance through an active search for new solutions as well as investments to develop both existing and new logistics practices.</p

Studying the Behavioral Antecedents of Logistics Outsourcing Intentions : Evidence from Finnish Trading and Manufacturing Companies

From the 1990s onwards, outsourcing business functions has undergone a shift from tactical decision to a strategic one, and although today some companies are already withdrawing their outsourced functions back in-house, studies show that outsourcing still remains an attractive alternative for enhancing competitiveness. The strategic angle has meant a stronger focus on the quality of relationship between involved parties, yet the early stages of the outsourcing process where it is considered whether to outsource or not have lacked attention. Although theories like transaction cost economics and core competency approach have been proposed to aid in the decision-making, these have proven to be difficult to be implemented into practice. In this thesis, the problem is approached by finding out what drivers form the base of intentions to outsource logistics functions from an individual’s point of view. By conducting a literary survey logistics and its outsourcing were outlined in terms of a company’s overall business goals, and psychological factors related to strategic decision-making were assessed. Based on the literature, five constructs were identified to predict the intention to increase logistics outsourcing: attitudes, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control, importance of logistics, and logistics asset specificity. These were included in a conceptual framework, which further presents a connection between the intention and the previous level of logistics outsourcing. Web-based questionnaire survey data gathered as a part of Finland State of Logistics 2018 survey was analyzed with covariance based structural equation modeling, and the data was found to support the effect of attitudes and subjective norms on intention, as well as the relationship between intention and previous level of outsourcing. On the contrary, the influence of importance of logistics and logistics asset specificity on intentions could not be confirmed. The results suggest that individuals do not necessarily deliberate the aspects suggested by normative theories on whether to outsource or not. Instead they may rely on psychological factors such as attitudes and norms prior to forming an intention to consent to a strategic decision such as increasing the outsourcing of logistics functions. This offers an implication for what to take into account when designing future theoretical frameworks and processes regarding logistics outsourcing in practice

Identifioituako vai ei identifioitua – tutkielma identiteetin roolista suhteessa riskiin ja sitoutumiseen toimittajasuhteissa

Research has shown how individual identity may be either a burden or a supporting factor to group behavior. The issue is of relevance to business research where especially the field of supply chain management has been concerned with how relationships between supplier and buyer organizations may be facilitated. Yet, the interorganizational context has remained relatively less studied compared to the intraorganizational in terms of identity, whereas supply chain management studies have often disregarded behavioral factors. This study contributes to these shortcomings by examining how the identity types of organizational identity, collective identity and intergroup relational identity relate to commitment to supply relationships through the interaction of perceived supply disruption risk and individual risk attitude. Particularly, it is argued that individuals exhibit identity-protective cognitions and may, thus, assess risks threatening their identities as lower than others. A moderated mediation model with the constructs identity type, perceived supply disruption risk, individual risk attitude, and commitment to supply relationship was tested by collecting data from (N=)42 business students with a scenario-based role-playing experiment. The respondents were primed with an identity and consequently surveyed with items regarding the studied constructs. The data was then analyzed with exploratory factor analysis and moderated regression analysis. The results indicate that identity type is related to perceived supply disruption risk so that when an identity among the organization or supply chain relevant to an individual decision-maker exists, they tend to perceive the risks lower. However, the type of identity was of no significance to the strength of this effect. Likewise, the assumed mechanisms of mediation and moderation were not supported by the data. The findings show how the activation of organizational and interorganizational identities are essential in terms of organizational behavior and interorganizational relationships. On the one hand, identity may influence individual perceptions regarding other organizations. On the other hand, the identity or the perceptions do not always lead to congruent behavior. In this vein, it is possible that commitment to a relationship is more about what one commits to, than to whom. Future research could account for this and extend the presented model with more observations and concepts for better explanatory power

Revisiting the relationship between environmental and financial performance

Publisher Copyright: © 2022 The AuthorsResearch has shown the need for business organizations to be ambidextrous, which means they should possess the ability to simultaneously exploit existing competencies and explore novel opportunities for improved organizational performance. Past evidence suggests that corporate environmental and financial performance may benefit from well-organized logistics operations. Meanwhile, the causality between the performances has been continuously debated, and the role of ambidexterity in the relationship is largely unexplored. We argue that ambidexterity in logistics operations enhances the link between environmental and financial performance. Using longitudinal data from Finnish manufacturing and trading firms, we applied regression analysis to test a theory-driven moderation model. Our findings indicate that ambidexterity in logistics operations affects the strength of the virtuous cycle between environmental and financial performance. Notably, the stronger the explorative orientation in logistics in a firm, the more enhanced the link between their environmental and financial performances. Overall, firms may find it challenging for their available resources to be employed for environmental and financial sustainability unless they are ambidextrous. Financial resources and environmental investments are necessary conditions but not sufficient for performance improvements in themselves; they need to be coupled with a desire to seek new, innovative solutions rather than just exploit existing practices. Combining exploitative and explorative orientations in logistics helps businesses meet divergent stakeholder expectations and translate their resources into performance. To this end, logistics operations should be organized to support organizational performance through an active search for new solutions as well as investments to develop both existing and new logistics practices.Peer reviewe