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The purpose of this paper is to analyze e-procurement in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and its relationship with top management support, IT obstacles and strategic purchasing and the effect of e-procurement on performance (procurement performance and business performance).

The hypotheses were tested using a sample of 199 managers from SMEs in manufacturing.

The results indicated a significant relationship between e-procurement in SMEs and top management support, IT obstacles and strategic purchasing. Similarly, the authors found a positive relationship between e-procurement and procurement process performance and business performance.

The findings stress to SME managers, the need to pay attention to top management support, IT obstacles and strategic purchasing when implementing e-procurement. Similarly, it provides evidence of the benefits of e-procurement on procurement process performance and business performance.

This study fills a gap in the literature regarding e-procurement in SMEs and its impact on performance. SMEs constitute a significant part of today’s economies and e-procurement can significantly impact the performance of these organizations.

To date, few universities have been involved in the Government‐funded drive to expand higher apprenticeships across England. Universities have a track record of expertise and innovation in professional and work‐based learning that can significantly contribute to the higher‐level skills agenda and could have a pivotal role in the rapidly growing initiative to develop higher apprenticeship programmes. The purpose of this paper is to outline the potential contribution universities could make to higher apprenticeship and the potential barriers to university engagement.

The paper provides an analysis of skills and higher education policy, initiatives and related research in England as the context for university involvement in higher apprenticeship. A case study is used to illustrate the benefits of and barriers to university involvement, including an uneven funding policy playing field for universities and misconceptions regarding professional competence and practice‐based higher‐level learning.

The paper illustrates the potential benefits university involvement in higher apprenticeship could deliver for employers and learners by supporting individual career progression and social mobility, and by providing employers and employees with clear and cost effective work‐based pathways to management roles. It concludes that the current barriers to university involvement may result in a missed opportunity to maximise value from public investment in the workforce development expertise of universities, redeployed to realise higher apprenticeship innovation.

The authors believe this paper is the only academic analysis of the value of and barriers to university involvement in the current Westminster Government flagship Higher Apprenticeship programme. The case study included has not featured in any other academic journal.

Supply chain management is an increasingly important organizational concern, and proper management of supplier relationships constitutes one essential element of supply chain success. However, there is little empirical research that has tested the effect of supplier development on performance. The main objective is to analyze the effect of supplier development practices with different levels of implementation complexity on the firm's purchasing performance.

Three supplier development constructs were defined: basic supplier development, moderate supplier development, and advanced supplier development. Three structural models were hypothesized and tested using structural equation modeling through field research on a sample of 306 manufacturing companies in Spain.

Identified important interrelationships among the various supplier development practices, basic, moderate, and advanced. Also indicated that the implementation of supplier development practices significantly contributes to the prediction of purchasing performance.

The use of a single key informant could be seen as a potential limitation of the study. The study was a cross‐sectional and descriptive sample of the manufacturing industry at a given point in time. A more stringent test of the relationships between the different levels of supplier development and performance requires a longitudinal study, or field experiment.

This study focused on supplier development practices and revealed how involving suppliers in supplier development activities is important and may help buyers to increase their purchasing performance. The findings from the structural analysis should provide practicing managers with insights on how these practices and their benefits are related in terms of purchasing performance, thus affecting their ability to make better sourcing decisions.

Fills an important gap in the purchasing literature with respect to the area of supplier development. While there is much written about supplier development based on conceptual and case study research, this study is unique in that it is the first attempt to empirically model the relationships between different levels of supplier development and their impact on purchasing performance using a comprehensive set of practices.

Many studies claim that the implementation of quality management practices and specific information systems can help organizations to improve performance. The objective of this article is to provide insights into current quality management and information systems theory and practice in the purchasing function and their impact on purchasing performance.

Hypotheses derived from the key features of quality management practices in purchasing (QMPP) and related information systems (IS) practices presented by previous authors are tested using Structural Equation Modelling through field research on a sample of 306 manufacturing companies in Spain.

Findings from this study indicate that there is significant evidence to support the hypothesized model in which QMPP has a direct impact on related IS practices and purchasing performance, as well as an indirect impact on purchasing performance mediated through IS.

Use of a single key informant is a possible limitation as opposed to information directly obtained from actual suppliers and internal customers. Also a more stringent test of the relationship between QMPP, IS and purchasing performance requires a more protracted time‐span rather than a singlular point in time. Finally, future research could include SRM, ERP, MRP, etc. in the purchasing department

A survey of QMPP and IS practices in manufacturing suggests how firms and other organisations should focus their investments to improve purchasing performance.

While many researchers have studied information systems and total quality management operations strategies individually, the relationship between the adoption of quality management practices in purchasing and purchasing‐related information systems and QMPP's effect on purchasing performance has not yet been analyzed.

Standardization of materials (i.e. replacement of several materials/components by a single component that has all the functionalities of the materials/components it replaces) is one important purchasing department decision. The primary objective of this study is to examine empirically the impact of standardization of materials and purchasing procedures (standardization in purchasing) on purchasing and business performance.

To address our research problem, a survey instrument was developed and a structural model was hypothesized and tested using structural equation modeling. Data were collected from a field research on a sample of 306 manufacturing companies in Spain.

The results of this research indicate that standardization in purchasing has a significant positive effect on both purchasing and business performance. Thus, standardizing materials and purchasing procedures is important and may help firms to meet their materials expenditure targets, and increase the quality of materials, on‐time delivery from suppliers, inventory performance, as well as business performance.

One of the limitations of the study is that the use of a single key informant could be seen as a potential limitation of the study. The study was a cross‐sectional and descriptive sample of the manufacturing industry at a given point in time. A more stringent test of the relationships between standardization in purchasing and performance requires a longitudinal study, or field experiment.

The empirically validated positive relation of standardization in purchasing to firms' performance, such as that documented in this study, can be very useful for the managers who take the initiative in standardization to promote and obtain the resources needed for the adoption of standardization of materials and purchasing procedures. Standardization in purchasing has, as this study shows, much to offer firms that wish to improve their performance.

Because there is a lack of empirical evidence about the impact of standardization of materials and purchasing procedures (standardization in purchasing) on purchasing and business performance, this paper filled an important gap in the purchasing literature.

The purpose of this paper is to contribute to knowledge and theory on innovation in small and medium-sized organisations (SMEs) by exploring the role of size and age on organisational engagement with position and paradigm innovation.

Data on organisational characteristics, including age and size, and engagement with position and paradigm innovation was collected as part of a questionnaire based survey of food sector SMEs in the UK. Structural equation modelling was used to identify the existence of any significant relationships between engagement with position and paradigm innovation and organisational age and size.

Findings suggest that organisational engagement with position and paradigm innovation is not affected by either age or size.

Prior research, based primarily on process and product innovation, has generated contradictory results regarding whether size or age effect innovation. This study contributes by focusing on the previously unexplored concepts of position and paradigm innovation.

The public’s awareness of noise and vibration forms a significant barrier to further development of railways. This chapter begins with a short introduction to the main fundamental aspects of acoustics, including decibels, frequency analysis, the propagation of sound with distance and common measurement quantities. The main sources of railway noise are discussed, including rolling noise, impact noise, curve squeal and aerodynamic noise. Simple calculation procedures are described that can be used to assess the impact of railway noise and to compare it with legal limits. The final section is devoted to ground vibration, which is a related form of environmental disturbance.

The vibration of the rails is a significant source of railway rolling noise, often forming the dominant component of noise in the important frequency region between 400 and 2000 Hz. The purpose of the paper is to investigate the influence of the ground profile and the presence of the train body on the sound radiation from the rail.

Two-dimensional boundary element calculations are used, in which the rail vibration is the source. The ground profile and various different shapes of train body are introduced in the model, and results are observed in terms of sound power and sound pressure. Comparisons are also made with vibro-acoustic measurements performed with and without a train present.

The sound radiated by the rail in the absence of the train body is strongly attenuated by shielding due to the ballast shoulder. When the train body is present, the sound from the vertical rail motion is reflected back down toward the track where it is partly absorbed by the ballast. Nevertheless, the sound pressure at the trackside is increased by typically 0–5 dB. For the lateral vibration of the rail, the effects are much smaller. Once the sound power is known, the sound pressure with the train present can be approximated reasonably well with simple line source directivities.

Numerical models used to predict the sound radiation from railway rails have generally neglected the influence of the ground profile and reflections from the underside of the train body on the sound power and directivity of the rail. These effects are studied in a systematic way including comparisons with measurements.