Search results

Inconsistent research output makes critical literature reviews crucial tools for assessing and developing the knowledge base within a research field. Literature reviews in the field of supply chain management (SCM) are often considerably less stringently presented than other empirical research. Replicability of the research and traceability of the arguments and conclusions call for more transparent and systematic procedures. The purpose of this paper is to elaborate on the importance of literature reviews in SCM.

Literature reviews are defined as primarily qualitative synthesis. Content analysis is introduced and applied for reviewing 22 literature reviews of seven sub‐fields of SCM, published in English‐speaking peer‐reviewed journals between 2000 and 2009. A descriptive evaluation of the literature body is followed by a content analysis on the basis of a specific pattern of analytic categories derived from a typical research process.

Each paper was assessed for the aim of research, the method of data gathering, the method of data analysis, and quality measures. While some papers provide information on all of these categories, many fail to provide all the information. This questions the quality of the literature review process and the findings presented in respective papers.

While 22 literature reviews are taken into account in this paper as the basis of the empirical analysis, this allows for assessing the range of procedures applied in previous literature reviews and for pointing to their strengths and shortcomings.

The findings and subsequent methodological discussions aim at providing practical guidance for SCM researchers on how to use content analysis for conducting literature reviews.

Content analysis is a methodology that has been used in many academic disciplines as a means to extract quantitative measures from textual information. The purpose of this paper is to document the use of content analysis in the supply chain literature. The authors also discuss opportunities for future research.

The authors conduct a literature review of 13 leading supply chain journals to assess the state of the content analysis-based literature and identify opportunities for future research. Additionally, the authors provide a general schema for and illustration of the use of content analysis.

The findings suggest that content analysis for quantitative studies and hypothesis testing purposes has rarely been used in the supply chain discipline. The research also suggests that in order to fully realize the potential of content analysis, future content analysis research should conduct more hypothesis testing, employ diverse data sets, utilize state-of-the-art content analysis software programs, and leverage multi-method research designs.

The current research synthesizes the use of content analysis methods in the supply chain domain and promotes the need to capitalize on the advantages offered by this research methodology. The paper also presents several topics for future research that can benefit from the content analysis method.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate trends in the use of research methodologies and publications in manufacturing strategy (MS) literature across geographical regions and suggests possible future research opportunities.

This literature review is based on a sample of 512 subject-relevant journal articles and uses content analysis as the primary method for data analysis. The paper investigates developments in the use of research methodologies – in terms of research design, data collection methods, country of data collection, sample size, respondent type, statistical techniques used and time horizon of studies; and publication trends in terms of authorship type, authorship collaboration, most prolific authors, top journals, most prolific universities, and citation analysis.

Research in MS has substantially changed from conceptual quantitative to empirical quantitative designs. NA and Europe show a declining research interest. However, other regions of the world are consistently showing higher interest. Significant opportunities and synergies exist for collaborative research among regions.

Though the literature review is limited in its selection of articles and journals it sketches a picture that may surrogate the whole research community in MS.

Trends in publications and use of research methodologies provide directions for designing research projects relevant to various geographical regions. This will help develop a holistic understanding of MS that is meaningful for managers of today’s organizations.

This paper provides broader and deeper review of the MS literature. Complex patterns in data are revealed using cross-tabulations and advanced cross-tabulations that have not been performed in previous content-analysis–based literature reviews in MS. These patterns will help position future research studies.

The purpose of this paper is to propose a conceptual framework of experience co-creation that captures the multi-dimensionality of this construct, as well as a research process for defining of the antecedents of experience co-creation.

The framework of experience co-creation was conceptualized by means of a literature review. Subsequently, this framework was used as the conceptual basis for a qualitative content analysis of 66 empirical papers investigating alternative consumption models (ACMs), such as renting, remanufacturing, and second-hand models.

The qualitative content analysis resulted in 12 categories related to the consumer and 9 related to the ACM offerings that represent the antecedents of experience co-creation. These categories provide evidence that, to a large extent, the developed conceptual framework allows one to capture the multi-dimensionality of the experience co-creation construct.

This study underscores the understanding of experience co-creation as a function of the characteristics of the offering – which are, in turn, a function of the consumers’ motives as determined by their lifeworlds – as well as to service design as an iterative approach to finding, creating and refining service offerings.

The investigation of the antecedents of experience co-creation can enable service providers to determine significant consumer market conditions for forecasting the suitability and viability of their offerings and to adjust their service designs accordingly.

This paper provides a step toward the operationalization of the dimension-related experience co-creation construct and presents an approach to defining the antecedents of experience co-creation by considering different research perspectives that can enhance service design research.

This chapter discusses the use of qualitative content analysis in the field of hospitality and tourism. The primary objective of this chapter is to draw attention to the use of a content analysis approach for the treatment of data. As a further objective, the chapter contributes to current knowledge by underscoring a qualitative content analysis approach that would be of benefit to hospitality and tourism scholars. Overall, the chapter serves to inform hospitality and tourism scholars of how to increase the trustworthiness of qualitative content analysis approaches, which is seen as one of the most crucial impediments to its use.

Access to high-quality data is a challenge for humanitarian logistics researchers. However, humanitarian organizations publish large quantities of documents for various stakeholders. Researchers can use these as secondary data, but interpreting big volumes of text is time consuming. The purpose of this paper is to present an automated quantitative content analysis (AQCA) approach that allows researchers to analyze such documents quickly and reliably.

Content analysis is a method to facilitate a systematic description of documents. This paper builds on an existing content analysis method, to which it adds automated steps for processing large quantities of documents. It also presents different measures for quantifying the content of documents.

The AQCA approach has been applied successfully in four papers. For example, it can identify the main theme in a document, categorize documents along different dimensions, or compare the use of a theme in different documents. This paper also identifies several limitations of content analysis in the field of humanitarian logistics research and suggests ways to mitigate them.

The AQCA approach does not provide an exhaustive qualitative analysis of documents. Instead, it aims to analyze documents quickly and reliably to extract the contents’ quantifiable aspects.

Although content analysis has been used in humanitarian logistics research before, no paper has yet proposed an automated, step-by-step approach that researchers can use. It also is the first study to discuss specific limitations of content analysis in the context of humanitarian logistics.

This paper aims to assess the links among these supply chain constructs by conducting a full-scale systematic review of all supply chain management (SCM) literature reviews published in ten leading logistics, SCM and operations management journals from 1989 to 2012. Collaboration and integration are as central to SCM as risk and performance management.

The authors apply content analysis to execute the systematic literature review on the sample of 103 articles, supplemented by contingency analysis. These approaches guarantee a replicable, rigorous and transparent research process and minimize researcher bias. The analytical categories required for the content analysis are defined along the constructs of collaboration/integration and risk/performance.

As can be expected, the review highlights the key role of the two constructs in SCM. In this light, the research claims to provide statistical evidence of a link between the constructs of collaboration/integration and risk/performance, most notably between collaboration and performance, information sharing and rewards sharing, as well as integration and supply chain performance.

The study assesses the link between the constructs of collaboration/integration and risk/performance through research embedded in literature reviews, pinpointing research gaps and potential future research directions in the field. Contributing to SCM theory building, a thorough review provides statistical proof of the link between collaboration/integration and risk/performance.

Although numerous literature reviews have been conducted in the past on the SCM constructs of collaboration/integration and risk/performance, no full review of literature reviews aiming to test a theoretical link in the here presented form has yet been undertaken to the authors’ knowledge.

The interrelationship between organizational learning (OL) and organizational culture (OC) is often assumed at an abstract theoretical level, but there is yet no systematization of scholarly knowledge allowing to conceptualize and understand its precise nature. In this article, we therefore ask “How can we, based on the insights from the dispersed research studying OC and OL, conceptualize the interrelationship between the two concepts?” Our purpose is to create an overview on the past development path and the current status of research interrelating OL and OC, to use it as basis for the conceptualization of this interrelationship and to identify avenues for future research.

This article utilized a systematic literature review methodology by combining bibliometric and content analysis using relevant articles identified from the Scopus database. A two-stage literature review research approach was employed: (1) Bibliometric analysis was used to identify 416 relevant contributions and to present a comprehensive contextual picture of the interrelations between OL and OC research by analyzing the 162 most relevant articles. (2) A subsequent qualitative content analysis of the 45 most relevant academic contributions detailed and solidified the insights.

We identify four weakly linked thematic clusters on the interrelationship of OC and OL. Based on that, our analysis confirms the theorized bidirectional relationship between OC and OL: OC acts as antecedent, driver and result of OL processes, and OL processes are constrained by and alter OC. We moreover develop three propositions that put knowledge at the center of scholarly attention for understanding this interrelationship in more depth and develop avenues for future research.

Our research has important implications for managers as it shows that mastering leadership challenges is central for the success of OL processes and OC change. We moreover specify the leadership challenges that relate to particular types of OL processes. Managers need to take this interrelationship into account when setting out for OL or OC change processes, and carefully reflect on whether or not the decided OL measures fit the given OC, and the other way round.

Our contribution to existing research is threefold: It first lies in analytically mapping out the research field, second in conceptualizing the interrelationship between OC and OL and third in identifying open research questions and topics.

This study provides a systematic review of the literature within the manufacturing strategy (MS) domain focusing on the congruence aspect of different strategic functions to determine the state-of-the-art research progression and the trend of publications.

We have adopted a five-stage review methodology consisting - 1) Article Identification; 2) Inclusion/Exclusion; 3) Review of the Articles; 4) Literature Analysis; 5) Future research directions. 121 articles focusing on congruence aspects and specific to the MS domain are identified and reviewed. Bibliometric analysis comprising keyword co-occurrence using a VOSviewer© software, and citation analysis is performed. Further, content analysis is carried out to categorize articles based on the type of research methodology, type of tool/method used, and aspects considered for congruence study.

Based on the research gaps identified in the existing literature on the congruence aspect within the MS domain, this study offers future research directions. Majorly, the work found is an empirical survey. Literature scants to develop a framework that helps to quantify the congruence between two strategic functions.

This study facilitates researchers and practitioners to understand the congruence between different strategic aspects studied in the literature and the level of fit between them. Further, the identified research directions can encourage researchers and practitioners to conceive novel approaches to conduct future works on congruence theme.

The unicity of the current review lies in its theme, i.e. congruence aspect within MS. To the best of author's knowledge, no comparable study is observed to review the congruence aspect in any other domain.

Advance the state-of-the-art on how frugal innovation links to sustainability outcomes and based on content analysis of empirical publications in the field of frugal innovation, analyzing when and how FI is connected with social, environmental and economic outcomes.

Quantitative content analysis on empirical papers published on frugal innovation, using data visualization techniques to disclose relationships among the constructs adopted. Materials were collected following a step-wise methodology. In total, 130 articles were identified, read in depth and coded according to five main categories: context; development; implementation, adoption, diffusion; characteristics; and impacts.

The potential of frugal innovation to drive sustainability outcomes is influenced by the type of actors developing the innovation, regarding their organizational form (large firms, small firms, non-firm actors), their geographical origin (foreign or local) or motivations (mostly profit-motivated or socially-oriented). Collaboration plays a key role along the various stages of the frugal innovation cycle and is thus relevant for its potential to drive sustainability outcomes. The results reaffirm the need for greater attention to where and when sustainability-enhancing outcomes of frugal innovation are more likely to occur.

This study provides a qualitative study based on content analysis of empirical studies to explore the associations between frugal innovations and improved economic, environmental and social sustainability outcomes. The key novelty of this study lies in the systematic coding of each paper regarding the features of the innovation, the innovators, and the outcomes achieved. This allows taking stock of the evidence emerging in such a scattered literature, quantifying the extent to which insights take place in the empirical literature, looking for correlations, and highlight research gaps to understand to what extent frugal innovation can contribute to sustainable development.