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Taking its outset in operations management (OM) contingency research, this paper aims to investigate how firm size, as one of the most powerful explanatory factors, influences the implementation and performance impact of four key manufacturing practices.

Three large-scale surveys from three different points in time, with a total of 1880 observations from varied geographical regions, are used to offer generalizable evidence on how firm size influences the implementation and performance outcome of technology, lean, quality and human resource practices.

The four manufacturing practices positively enhance performance: quality and lean practices produce the most consistent effects, while technology and human resource practices turn more beneficial in the latest sample. Furthermore, the authors offer robust support for the selection and mediation models (larger firms generally invest more in the four practices and, through that, achieve higher performance), while finding no evidence for the moderation model (smaller firms can equally benefit if they possess the resources to invest in these practices).

As manufacturing practices are continuously evolving, their performance impact cannot be guaranteed in any context. Size is a frequently used contingency variable in OM studies, but results are contradictory in terms of its impact on the implementation and performance outcomes of manufacturing practices. This study manages to ease these contradictions.

The main objective of this paper is to show how fuzzy logic and multiple regression analysis (MRA) techniques can be used by construction companies for determining the size of contingency that will be included in bid prices for international construction projects in a more systematic way and to compare their modelling performances.

The steps followed in the execution of this study mainly consists of: conducting a literature review on international construction in order to identify the factors that may affect contingency amounts that will be included in bid prices for international construction projects; developing the general framework of the proposed contingency estimation model; designing a questionnaire based on the information gathered from the literature review, delivering these questionnaires to construction experts, and obtaining the actual data of 36 international construction projects; developing a fuzzy logic model based on expert judgments and three multiple regression analysis models (MRAM) using the collected data; and comparing the performances of these approaches.

In this study, a fuzzy logic model and three MRAM were developed. Their modelling performances were compared using actual data obtained from 36 international construction projects that had been completed by 20 large-scale Turkish construction companies in 14 different countries. It is found that the developed fuzzy logic model outperforms the MRAM built for the studied projects.

This study shows that fuzzy logic and MRA techniques can be successfully used by construction companies, which predominantly do business in foreign countries, for estimating the size of cost contingency that will be included in bid prices for international construction projects. The modelling performances of fuzzy logic and MRAM are also compared.

This systematic literature review analyzes the academic literature to understand SC risk and resilience across different organizational sizes and industries. The academic literature has well discussed the causes of supply chain (SC) risk events, the impact of SC disruptions, and associated plans for SC resilience. However, the literature remains fragmented on the role of two fundamental elements in achieving SC resilience: the firm's size and the firm's industry as firms' contingent factors. Therefore, it is important to investigate and highlight SC resilience differences by size and industry type to establish more resilient firms.

Building upon the contingent resource-based view of the firm, the authors posit that organizational factors such as size and industry sector have important roles in developing organizational resilience capabilities. This systematic literature review and analysis is based on the structural and systematic analysis of high-ranked peer-reviewed journal papers from January 2000 to June 2021 collected through three global scientific databases (i.e. ProQuest, ScienceDirect, and Google Scholar) using relevant keywords.

This systematic literature review of 230 high-quality articles shows that SC risk events can be categorized into demand, supply, organizational, operational, environmental, and network/control risk events. This study suggests that the SC resilience plans developed by startups, small and mdium-sized enterprises (SMEs), and large organizations are not necessarily the same as those of large enterprises. While collaboration and networking and risk management are the most crucial resilience capabilities for all firms, applying lean and quality management principles and utilizing information technology are more crucial for SMEs. For large firms, knowledge management and contingency planning are more important.

This study provides a comprehensive review of the literature on SC resilience plans across different organizational sizes and industries, offering new insights into the nature and dynamics of startups', SMEs', and large enterprises' SC resilience in different industries. The study highlights the need for further investigation of SC risk and resilience for startups, SMEs, and different industries on a more detailed level using empirical data. This study’s findings have important implications for researchers and practitioners and guide the development of effective SC resilience strategies for different types of firms.

Using data collected from 132 manufacturing companies in Australia and New Zealand, this paper assesses the differences between firms in terms of advanced manufacturing technology (AMT) investment planning and implementation based on firm size and ownership. The analysis presented shows a number of differences. This is an exploratory study with the purpose of providing background data to guide future research in building up a contingency framework for AMT management. It is argued that variables such as firm size and principal ownership are useful additions to the contingency framework in addition to the infrastructure variables such as worker empowerment, quality leadership, soft integration, etc. It is concluded that organisational variables influence adoption of AMT and, hence, future research should focus on examining the relationships between the organisational context and the planning and infrastructure variables, and then relate these to the adoption process and the overall performance of AMT.

By contrasting a contingency with a universal approach to business excellence models (BEMs), the purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of size on the use of the European Foundation for Quality Management (EFQM) model by organizations that were officially “Recognized for Excellence” in Spain. It considers the potential differences between large organizations and SMEs on the level of adoption of EFQM criteria and on the impact that enablers-criteria may have on key performance measures.

This study uses actual sub-criteria and criteria scores attained by organizations in their assessment for EFQM recognition. Scores of a population of 216 organizations are analyzed via analysis of variance, factor and structural equations models.

Although there are some criteria in the EFQM model that appear to be universally adopted irrespective of size, the empirical analyses indicate that size may shape the adoption of other criteria and the impact that enablers can have on results, thus supporting a contingency perspective. Moreover, the findings call for the revision of the relationships embedded in the EFQM model.

In contrast to most previous research, which relied on surveys of managers’ perceptions, this study uses the actual scores achieved by organizations in their assessment for EFQM recognition. It addresses the effect of size on the whole model, which so far has been neglected in the literature. All in all this study contributes to the literature on contingency approaches to best practices, and more specifically to BEMs. To the practitioner, it provides guidelines for addressing perceived performance gaps in their pursuit of recognition for excellence.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the use of budget targets for performance evaluation in small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) from a contingency perspective.

This paper is based on a survey conducted among small- and medium-sized Danish production companies. It takes a contingency approach and applies structural equation modeling to analyze the data.

The authors find that budget emphasis is related to size, decentralization and interdependence. Furthermore, the authors hypothesize and find that the degree of budget emphasis is positively related to performance.

The usual limitations associated with survey-based research should be considered before drawing conclusions from the findings. In that regard, replications of the study could be useful.

The practical implication of this paper is that emphasis on the budget target in performance evaluation is of relevance for small- and medium-sized production companies.

This paper contributes by providing insights into management accounting in SMEs. More specifically, this paper contributes to the debate in the SME literature regarding the value of planning and budgeting in SMEs as the paper focuses on the use of budgets for performance evaluation.

This study aims to investigate the determinant factors as barriers and facilitators of the B2B degree of digital use and customer–brand engagement in travel services by applying technology and behavioral theories.

A face-to-face survey was administered to retail travel agencies offering offline and online services (N = 301). Structural equation modeling using the partial least square method was conducted using Smart PLS 3.0 software to examine the proposed hypotheses in the research model.

The results revealed that the integrated composite model significantly predicts the B2B degree of digital use and brand engagement. The study established that facilitators had positive effects, and barriers negatively impacted the degree of digital use, which positively impacted brand engagement. However, the facilitator perceived cost and barrier lack of critical mass showed the opposite influence. The effects of facilitator customer pressure and barriers, information and communication technology infrastructure problems and security risks were insignificant. The results also established that the buyer firm size moderated the relationships between barriers and facilitators with the degree of digital use.

This study combined technology and behavioral theories to explain the buyer–seller relationship. The expanded framework contributed to understanding B2B digital usages and brand engagement in the seller–intermediary relationship. This study conceptualized firm size as a contingency variable and established its moderating effect. The study defined cost as a formative construct and an organizational factor. The study suggested practical implications for travel agencies and online travel service sellers.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between exploration and exploitation innovation, and business performance in small and medium enterprise (SME) service firms. Furthermore, the paper also examines the interaction between the two innovation orientations in predicting business performance, and the influence of size in the effectiveness of each of them in enhancing business performance.

Using empirical data drawn from 180 managers in Australian service organisations, this study also compares the effect of ambidextrous innovation on business performance within these SMEs.

The findings show that, controlled for size, neither of the innovation orientations show significant, direct relationships with firms' performance. However, ambidextrous innovation was positively associated with business performance, indicating a synergy between exploration and exploitation. Further examination indicates the relationship between exploration/exploitation innovation and performance is moderated by size within the authors' sample of small firms.

Taken together, the results point to an interesting and complex relationship within SMEs relating to innovation orientation, size, and performance. This relationship suggests that service SMEs are best served by the simultaneous pursuit of both exploitive and exploratory innovation.

This research is original in that it deliberately focuses on innovation in service SMEs, an area that has not seen significant research previously. As such, the authors' insights into the relationship between ambidextrous innovation and performance suggest the need for creating balance and synergy between the two innovation types.

With a view to contributing to a better understanding of the interactions between design dimensions, the authors aim to present a formal model that analyzes the internal fit relationship between centralization and formalization, taking into account organizational technology and the “systems approach”.

Based on the study by Zeffane, the authors develop an alternative, formal model that introduces organizational technology and assumes that greater structural control does not necessarily lead to better organizational integration. The model equally considers the possibilities of underfit and overfit.

The proposed formal model provides a sound rationale on how organizational technology determines the contribution of centralization and formalization to the achievement of integration. The complementary interactions between design dimensions result in very clear patterns, with all the complementary choice variables tending to be done together at a comparable level. Also, it evidences that only a finite of feasible set of intermediate choices exists.

In the interests of simplicity, the model does not include other contingency factors, such as environment and strategy, nor does it address the question of non‐concavity of the objective function that allows equifinality. Questions such as whether the consequences of underfit are different from those produced by overfit should be addressed in further research and model developments.

This paper develops a rationale for better understanding the interactions between design dimensions, such as centralization and formalization and helps to fill the research gap related to the absence of analytical models that allow a rigorous analysis of the internal relationships between different organizational design dimensions.

This study aims to demonstrate the positive effect of human capital disclosure on firm performance, and to specify the boundary conditions of the relationship.

The study applies the signaling and stakeholder perspectives and uses a one‐year lag design to avoid reverse causality in exploring the human capital disclosure and performance link. Content analysis of annual reports and hierarchical regression are applied.

Human capital disclosure positively impacts on organizational performance such as market‐to‐book ratio and ROA. Organizational size negatively moderates the relationship between disclosure of human capital information and firm performance. Knowledge intensity has curvilinear positive moderation effect between the relationship above.

Human capital disclosure can help communicate to various stakeholders. Organizational performance can thus be enhanced through the communication process. Disclosure in the context of higher knowledge intensity is more beneficial.

The paper theoretically and empirically links up human capital disclosure and organizational performance. It also identifies both the diminishing return and increasing return moderation effects by organizational size and knowledge intensity between the human capital disclosure and performance link.