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JIT manufacturing is a philosophy by which an organization seeks continually to improve its products and processes by eliminating waste. Organizations wanting to use the JIT approach to manufacturing must have several building blocks in place. The building blocks include: company‐wide commitment, proper materials at the right time, supplier relationships, quality, and personnel. The JIT system runs smoothly with no peaks or valleys. The typical inventory system, on the other hand, is fraught with peaks and valleys that represent costs to the organization in the form of inventory holding costs, back order and stock‐out costs, overtime and idle time labor costs, and waste of materials and space.

The purpose of this paper is to clarify the prerequisites for performance measurement supporting purchaser-supplier relationships and value co-creation. It also explains the causes for the limited use of collaborative measurement.

Four case companies representing different contextual settings are studied. The primary source of empirical material is an interview study addressed to 24 interviewees. The empirical data are analyzed according to the constructs created as a result of the literature review.

The results reveal that prevailing performance measurement practices represent a more transactional than relationship-oriented approach to purchaser-supplier collaboration. The technical prerequisites for collaborative performance measurement are mostly not fulfilled, inhibiting the use of performance measurement in a collaborative manner. It is proposed that the differentiation between project and process production types has implications on the importance of collaborative performance measurement.

The paper illustrates the desirable characteristics of performance measurement supporting collaboration. It also presents an application of collaborative performance measurement in a single case context. The research reveals the need to develop non-financial performance measures further in order to facilitate the more proactive use of performance measurement supporting true value co-creation between purchaser and supplier companies.

The empirical research on the topic of performance measurement in purchasing and supply management (PSM) is often limited to intra-organizational measurement and highlights transactional approach to collaboration between parties, although PSM research has otherwise acknowledged the importance of value creation and relationships between organizations.

The purpose of this paper is to scrutinise the characteristics of the relationship between large purchasing organisations (LPOs) and ethnic minority suppliers (EMSs) engaging with supplier diversity programmes and provide an assessment and developmental framework for such organisations.

Having considered an array of purchaser‐supplier relationship frameworks in relevant streams of literature, the paper draws on Lamming et al.'s framework to advance a tool for assessing and developing the relationship between LPOs and EMSs.

The submitted relationship assessment and development framework brings in sharp focus the characteristics of the relationship between LPO and EMS, providing a systematic way to examine the inter‐organisational context within which EMS development takes place.

The framework submitted could signpost future research in this field, which should take a longitudinal, processual approach. This is necessary to provide opportunities to examine the dynamics underlying the development of potent LPO‐EMS relationships in a variety of settings, including negative instances.

The paper has implications for corporate policy making and practice in this arena. Assessing the potency of LPOs‐EMSs relationships by applying the proffered tool can help both parties engage with supplier diversity, to develop fruitful relationships that enhance their competitiveness.

The latter can have social implications, as EMSs often operate in and employ people from disadvantaged communities.

The framework advanced in this article constitutes a novel tool that highlights the areas in which LPOs and EMSs should channel their efforts, in order to develop a potent relationship between them, which underpins the development of EMSs’ supply capabilities.

This paper aims to assess the risks and challenges of corporate social responsibility (CSR) management in the Indian-mandated CSR ecosystem from a service purchaser–supplier dualistic perspective and the role management control systems (MCS) and social capital play in managing such risks and challenges.

This study undertook a qualitative approach that involved in-depth interviews of 22 CSR directors, managers or chief executive officers from 13 central public sector enterprises (CPSEs) that had purchased CSR services and nine managers of non-government organisations (NGOs) serving as CSR suppliers. Data analysis was founded on the principal–agent and social capital theoretical perspectives.

A highly bureaucratic, time-pressured mandated environment poses several goal congruence and adverse selection threats to outsourced CSR project arrangements. A mix of formal and informal control mechanisms is critical for enhancing trust or bonding between service purchasers and service providers and enriching bridging capital or access to resources derived from interpersonal connections between NGOs and communities.

NGOs and CPSEs may benefit from understanding each other’s goals and culture and using appropriate formal and informal MCS for managing CSR expectations and outcomes.

Drawing on a unique mandatory CSR regime, this study offers principal–agent and social capital perspectives on CSR programme delivery, highlighting the importance of various formal and informal MCS in lowering agency costs in outsourced CSR relationships.

The Private Finance Initiative (PFI) is designed to introduce new resources into the national infrastructure. It introduces the idea that the public sector can provide services by purchasing them from the private sector rather than by direct provision. There have been considerable disagreements about how to account for these transactions. Key in this has been differences of view as to whether PFI transactions involve purchase of assets and thus whether the transaction should appear on the balance‐sheets of the public sector. This seemingly technical question has generated considerable debate and disagreements between the UK government and the Accounting Standards Board (ASB). Closer investigation into this disagreement demonstrates a range of alternative views and tensions. Describes and analyses these different views and the inter‐ and intra‐relationships and tensions between these parties using an interests‐based, political framework for this contextual analysis. Demonstrates how accounting standard setting, in cases such as accounting for PFI, if only analysed at the technical level, misses a range of social dynamics that are central to understanding the role of accounting in the development of society.

This study aims to examine the effects of strategic sourcing (SS) on lean supply chain (LSC) and agile supply chain (ASC) strategies and investigate the role of these concepts on development of competitive performance.

A proposed research model and hypotheses are tested by using cross-sectional e-mail survey data collected from the manufacturing firms operating in Turkey. SS is conceptualized as a second-order factor. Structural equation modeling is used to test the proposed hypotheses.

This study reached the conclusion that SS affects LSC and ASC strategies positively. Additionally, it is seen that these concepts are effective in improvement of competitive performance.

The results are important in terms of emphasizing the significance of SS in improvement of the lean and agile nature of the supply chain.

This study contributes to the literature by providing empirical evidence regarding the relationships among SS, supply chain strategies and competitive performance.

This study was carried out on the plant level where one person from each organization responded to the survey.

Examines the new concept of total care management (TCM). Argues that customers are choosing companies not simply on the quality of their products but on the integrity of their behaviour, and that this fusion of quality and ethics is transforming total quality management (TQM) into TCM. Defines total care management and the various meanings of care in the service industries. Offers some examples of TCM companies and their management values. Recommends ways in which organizations can facilitate TCM, notably by following principles of tough care and shared care.

This article aims to take a further step forward in examining those important business factors that will shape the future of best practice in the quality management of internal and external strategic alliances.

The article presents a speculative scenario on the future of strategic alliances in education, training, development and business, inspired learning by applying information and data from well‐established professional alliance management sources as the underpinning context for its guidelines.

Many different attempts have been and still are being made by business and academic institutions to set up working relationships that are intended to work well for both parties. These relationships travel under various titles, with the term “partnership” being the most common. Problems of sustainability and/or quality of outcomes are prevalent as a result of the alliance management perspective being taken on a limited understanding of the total relationship dynamics for success; too narrow a perspective on what dynamics have to be managed. Models for success are, however, readily available.

In the broader context there is a wealth of research, best practice and practical experience in the field of strategic alliance management. iPCo's current research is therefore focused on how this professional resource and experience can be adopted to provide a quality framework of management practice that will enable business management to ensure that they make the right choices in the selection and construction of their strategic learning relationships both internally and externally.

The need for major innovations in the management of lifelong training and learning is now well established. Trying to achieve the successful implementation of these developments on a piecemeal basis has, however, proved to be an unrewarding process for many managers. The inertia of large institutional bodies and the “not invented here” syndrome have been proved to slow down or sideline major innovations. Knowing the size of the problem in each situation and how to deal with it effectively and efficiently at the right level is now one of the main strategic imperatives for corporate university managers.

The purpose of this paper is to consider how different governance mechanisms affect the level of franchisees' compliance with their franchisor's directives. The research objectives are threefold: to investigate how franchisors can use explicit contracts and develop relational norms as governance mechanisms to prevent their franchisees from deviating from the franchise system directives; to show how information systems allow to control franchisees at a distance; and to throw light on the ways in which these three control mechanisms can play alternatively or simultaneously in the management of franchise relationships.

The paper takes the form of a multiple regression analysis with interaction effects of survey data collected from franchisees of various French franchise systems.

Overall, the results support an emphasis on contract and information systems in the management of the risks of “free riding” behaviour in franchise systems. The results indicate that formal control mechanisms are more efficient in the management of franchise systems whereas relational norms are less so. The results do not reveal that all combinations of control mechanisms are more efficient in disciplining agents. Recommendations will be used by franchisors to implement an effective control strategy.

Future research should focus on replicating the findings using a contingency perspective. Cross‐cultural studies should also be carried out.

This paper applies to the governance of franchise relationships a research framework that validates the role of explicit contracts and information systems in the management of franchise systems.

Purchasing management has been recently focused by public organisations aiming to maximise its contribution to operations. Such an aspect has been emphasised by the impacts of on going commercialisation process in the network public service sector. This paper provides evidence of changes in purchasing management behaviour in public firms in the water supply sector. In particular, in Italy the firms, after a first phase of increasing attention to purchasing management and suppliers selection, slowly has come back to a clerical approach, maintaining an “arms-length” relationship with suppliers. A model for describing the oscillation of purchasing management within the firms is presented and an explanation of such an oscillation is suggested in terms of flow of power between technical management and political managers.