Accounts Payable (AP) Automation promises significant cost reductions for an adopting firm by automating many manual and repetitive tasks. However, AP automation may also enhance supplier satisfaction by enabling faster payments, greater transparency, and more consistent communication, ultimately contributing to stronger buyer-supplier relationships (BSRs). The literature lacks a rigorous assessment of the claimed benefits of this technology for adopters and for their suppliers. Using financial data from 135 publicly listed U.S. companies and employing a difference-in-differences (DiD) approach, this study quantifies the effects of AP automation on both technology adopters and suppliers for which they are a major customer. The results show improved liquidity and decreasing Days Payable Outstanding (DPO) for adopters in comparison to otherwise similar firms. These effects are moderated by industry characteristics. However, there is no consistent evidence of cost reduction or improved profitability. Suppliers of adopting firms benefit from a decline in doubtful receivables and reduced reliance on short-term debt, suggesting reduced uncertainty from the buyers and potential enhancement in supplier satisfaction. These benefits are moderated by the degree of buyer-supplier interdependence. While providing evidence of working capital efficiencies for AP automation adopters, our findings also highlight AP automation’s relational value in enhancing supplier satisfaction through prompter payments, improved operational execution, and reduced uncertainty.
This study introduces the concept of buyer-supplier resilience fit—the degree of alignment between a buyer's and its key supplier's supply chain resilience—and examines its effect on buyer financial performance. Grounded in strategic fit theory, buyer-supplier resilience fit is conceptualized as a dyadic alignment mechanism whose performance value depends on commensurate resilience levels across interdependent partners. The hypotheses are tested using survey data collected from multiple senior managers across 160 buyer-supplier dyads. After calculating the resilience fit, the analysis applies data scaling and logarithmic transformations and uses seven machine-learning regression models to compare alternative specifications before estimating the final ordinary least squares model. The results show that buyer-supplier resilience fit is positively associated with buyer financial performance. The moderating effect of buyer relational capability on this relationship is negative and marginal, whereas that of buyer product complexity is not statistically significant. Our study extends prior research by examining resilience from both buyer and supplier perspectives and introducing the concept of buyer-supplier resilience fit.
This study examines how firms balance supply chain resilience and working capital management by integrating operational and financial perspectives. While the relationship between financial flows and resilience has been increasingly recognised, cross-functional tensions between finance and operations remain underexplored. We draw on two focus group sessions conducted in 2022 and 2024, involving 29 managers from diverse industries and firm sizes, and apply the Gioia method for inductive analysis. The findings show that cross-functional alignment between purchasing, supply chain, and finance is a critical antecedent of coherent resilience and working capital practices. When alignment is weak, firms implement conflicting practices that undermine both liquidity and resilience. When alignment is strong, perceived asymmetries in power and trust in partners’ resilience shape prioritisation of resilience and working capital. Firms with favourable power positions tend to shift working capital burdens to supply chain partners, whereas firms facing unfavourable power conditions prioritise resilience. When perceived power is unfavourable and trust is low, adaptation measures are prioritised over more common persistence measures. We further show that improvements in internal financial processes, most notably order-to-cash and purchase-to-pay, can enhance both resilience and working capital performance. The study contributes to supply chain resilience literature by foregrounding the role of finance and resilience for purchasing and supply managers to align with financial colleagues, and by reframing the resilience–working capital interface as an organisational coordination problem rather than an optimisation trade-off.
Organisations often struggle to move purchasing and supply management (PSM) beyond a transactional role to a function with recognised strategic standing. This article examines how PSM develops and becomes accepted and embedded within a complex organisation over time. We integrate institutional theory with a processual perspective and study a five-year longitudinal case in the pharmaceutical industry, drawing on interviews and an extensive document corpus and analysing the material abductively. Our analysis traces three phases. In the first, senior authorisation grants a formal mandate, but structural roll-out stalls because PSM's savings and compliance claims lack alignment with core organisational values. In the second, contestation deepens as functional departments reproduce delegitimising narratives, while procurement protects footholds through relationship-led work. In the third, a strategic reframing of efficiency as innovation funding opens space for hybrid arrangements in which routines, roles and interfaces become part of everyday work in selected domains. We theorise selective institutionalisation as a processual outcome of PSM development in pluralistic organisations. This outcome is produced through a legitimacy sequence in which moral alignment enables pragmatic demonstration and cognitive routinisation, and through three hybridisation mechanisms: reframing, selective standardisation and relational embedding. Rather than treating uneven embedding as incomplete progress, we show how PSM can gain strategic standing through deep involvement in domains where interdependence, feasible value levers and senior salience align, while accepting lighter coupling elsewhere. The study reframes PSM success as the acceptance-building and meaning-making through which strategic standing is earned and sustained, rather than as spend coverage or structural elevation alone.
Digitalization and sustainability have fundamentally reshaped the purchasing and supply management (PSM) landscape. The nexus of these two topics defines a research frontier requiring new methodological, theoretical, and empirical development. This editorial provides an overview of the three papers in the special issue and explains how they fit within and contribute to a research landscape composed of five interconnected themes. These themes reflect continuing challenges and tensions for digital and sustainable PSM. The themes include Circular and Sustainable Business Models; Strategic Integration and Supply Chain Transformation; Platforms, Collaboration and Governance; Measurement, Transparency and Accountability; and Performance Implications for Sustainability. We reflect on ongoing methodological challenges and identify ways to advance established PSM methodologies. Our goal is to highlight insights from the special issue articles and identify topics that provide avenues for further research. We present a framework that invites the research community to engage with these themes, their tensions, and relevant theoretical perspectives. Such investigation can help the field understand and guide the implications of this nexus for ecological sustainability, social justice, and economic value creation within and beyond PSM.
This study examines the dynamic interplay of cooperation and competition in inter-firm relationships within supply chain management (SCM). While coopetition has been commonly studied in strategy and general management, its implications for purchasing and SCM remain underexplored. To address this gap, we first reconceptualize inter-firm coopetition as a dynamic relationship in which firms strategically adjust the balance between cooperative and competitive forces through upward and downward mechanisms to achieve a balanced state of coopetition. We then propose a general conceptual framework of balanced coopetition. To assess its empirical grounding and identify research gaps, we conduct a systematic literature review (SLR) of 48 quantitative empirical studies on inter-firm coopetition. The deductive-informed SLR approach enables a structured synthesis of existing findings and supports the development of a theory that integrates motivations, adjustment mechanisms, and performance outcomes. The review reveals that while upward mechanisms and individual outcomes are frequently examined, downward mechanisms and joint performance outcomes remain underexplored. We also identify several promising research avenues including sustainability, digital transformation, downward mechanisms, joint performance, and adaptive learning. These themes inform our agenda for future research, including the development of a Balanced Coopetition Score and the need for context-sensitive, dynamic models. Together, our framework and reconceptualization, along with the proposed agenda, provide a structured foundation for future coopetition research as well as new managerial insights, thus contributing to the theory and practice in coopetition-based supply chain relationships in general.
The integration of sustainability into purchasing and supply chain management (PSCM) increasingly demands a shift in the norms and assumptions governing these domains (i.e. institutions). Despite the growing application of institutional theory in sustainable PSCM, the literature remains fragmented. Specifically, there remains a lack of systematic theoretical articulation regarding how different elements of institutional change contribute to the development of sustainable PSCM. Adopting an institutional change perspective, this review systematically analyses 93 peer-reviewed articles to advance understanding of sustainable PSCM. The literature reveals four key areas through which institutional change unfolds: triggers that initiate change; mechanisms and processes through which change is enacted; the outcomes that emerge; and enablers that support or shape these developments. The findings indicate a predominance of exogenous pressures, while also highlighting a growing focus on endogenous drivers. Change mechanisms are synthesised using a means-based institutional work lens, identifying relational, symbolic and material forms of work. The review further reveals varied outcomes and identifies key moderating factors at both firm and supply chain levels. These insights are consolidated into an integrative framework of the institutional change that highlights key gaps and outlines future research directions, offering theoretical and practical insights to support transformative change in PSCM.
While literature reviews are now well established in purchasing and supply chain management, there is ongoing debate about how they contribute to theory, which is the core aim of this special issue. In this editorial, building on the methods and content of the articles included in the special issue, we reflect on this along two dimensions: (1) the theoretical stance taken shows that different tools can be applied in systematic literature reviews. This is particularly true in data analysis, which can be positioned along an inductive-to-deductive dimension. We reflect on how the papers in this special issue apply different logics of theory development, modification, refinement or extension. Almost obviously, there is no one best way to organize related arguments. (2) Turning to a content-based approach, the accepted papers are linked to the wider field that is in scope for the Journal of Purchasing and Supply Management. Here, four related clusters are present: (1) Individual Learning, Knowledge, and Behavior, (2) Power and Dependence, (3) Corporate Sustainability and Supply Chain Due Diligence, (4) Information and Signaling Mechanisms. The contributions include reflections on both established and emerging topics in the field, which serve as a foundation for reflections on missing topics and suggestions for future research directions.
Signalling theory offers a powerful lens for understanding how supply-chain actors reduce information asymmetry through observable, meaningful, and costly signals. However, Operations and Supply Chain Management (OSCM) research using signalling theory remains dispersed across contexts. This paper provides a systematic literature review of signalling theory in OSCM, synthesising 133 peer-reviewed papers from 25 leading OSCM journals. Using an abductive, theory-modification approach, we extend the traditional five-element model (signaller, signal, receiver, feedback, environment) to a seven-element framework by adding signalling process: how signals are generated and conveyed, and signalling outcome: what signalling ultimately produces. We show that OSCM studies broaden receivers to cover various stakeholders such as buyers, suppliers, retailers, customers, shareholders, and employees, while surfacing OSCM-specific signaller attributes such as supply chain position and power. We also synthesise how digital technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI), Internet of Things (IoT), and blockchain, reshape what counts as a signal and how credibility is built via traceability and verifiability. Building on industry priorities around digitalisation and sustainability, we propose a future research agenda, including technology-enabled signals, public feedback, penalty costs, and shifting signalling environments (e.g., geopolitical turbulence). Finally, we offer three tests as a foundational checklist for theory development using signalling theory.
This paper presents a secondary data analysis on how power dynamics in the supply base, measured in terms of financial dependence, affect the focal firm environmental performance. Our hypotheses are grounded in the Resource Dependence Theory (RDT). We distinguish between supplier financial dependence on the focal firm and focal firm financial dependence on suppliers. We expect these two dependence directions to influence the focal firm environmental performance. We also consider the influence of two moderating factors reflecting the orientation of the buyer within the broader institutional environment: the stringency of environmental regulations affecting the focal firm and its reputation. We tested our hypotheses on 109 US-based manufacturers and their supply base. While powerful buyers might be expected to enjoy certain advantages, our results show that the greater a focal firm’s clout over its supply base (i.e., higher supplier financial dependence on the focal firm), the weaker its environmental performance tends to be. Focal firm financial dependence on suppliers has instead no significant role. We found significant effects for reputation and, only partially, for the stringency of environmental regulation. Reflecting on the channels linking environmental performance and resource dependence, and acknowledging institutional factors, we argue that buyer environmental performance is shaped by its pursuit of legitimacy through alignment with prevailing institutional logics. These logics are primarily determined by regulatory requirements and are also influenced by corporate reputation. This study contributes to the academic discourse by extending and empirically testing the explanatory power of RDT in the context of environmental performance. It also highlights the crucial role of supply chain relationships in sustainability for both managers and policymakers.
Since the 1980s, scholars emphasise the importance of customer-driven management, as ultimately external customers determine organisational competitiveness. This study critically examines the relationship between external customers and Purchasing and Supply Management (PSM) through a systematic literature review. It explores whether PSM adopts an ambilateral focus, addressing not only upstream supplier relationships but also downstream customers. Drawing on 105 empirical journal articles, the study holistically investigates how external customers and PSM interact. Key findings reveal that while external customer considerations are definitely present, they are often fragmented, incidental, and predominantly confined to industrial customer relationships in B2B contexts. End customers, their preferences, and qualitative insights are notably underrepresented. Moreover, most studies address customer concepts with limited adoption of advanced digitalisation technologies, which hold potential for richer customer engagement. Bidirectional relationships between PSM activities and customer outcomes were identified, suggesting that customer demands influence procurement decisions, and PSM activities, in turn, impact customer satisfaction and value perception. However, this dynamic remains underexplored, limiting PSM’s ability to position itself as a driver of external value creation. Thus, this review argues that by embracing an ambilateral perspective, PSM can not only increase the efficiency and effectiveness of its activities but also strengthen its strategic significance for the focal organisation’s competitive position. Avenues for future research and theoretical development lie therefore in (1) reconceptualising the PSM-customer relationship, (2) integrating end customers into core PSM considerations, (3) incorporating advanced digitalisation technologies as novel instruments for PSM-customer interaction, and (4) contemplating PSM’s role in value creation for external customers.
Buying firms adopt and utilize various strategies in response to criticism from stakeholders following supply chain sustainability-related disruptions; however, responses to supplier incidents may only be temporary, and over time, incidents tend to re-occur ('resurgence'). The resurgence of similar supplier sustainability incidents (SSIs), even after perceived attention from various stakeholders, has received limited prior attention. Using a mixed methods approach, we first analyzed global media incident reports from 2007 to 2016 for the top ten most scrutinized corporations in terms of SSIs. We identified thematic patterns across incident severity and institutional distance as a basis for the drivers of resurgent SSIs amongst suppliers. Following this, we developed a framework through which factors that shape sustainability-related supply chain decision making by firms could be tested via factorial designed experiments. The results suggest that firms are less likely to hold suppliers responsible for SSIs when the severity is lower, distance is greater, or the incident has not previously occurred (i. e., not resurgent). Furthermore, these incidents tend to be taken more seriously contingent upon the firm's relationship with their supplier, particularly when environmental incidents occur.
This study explores how social sustainability is enabled and constrained within Circular Digitalized Supply Chains (CDSCs), mobilizing paradox theory as a theoretical lens. Through a qualitative analysis of interviews with 22 supply chain (SC), operations, logistics, and procurement managers, the research identifies key paradoxes that emerge when pursuing social goals alongside circular and digital transformations. The study finds that pursuing CDSCs' goals alongside social sustainability objectives creates paradoxical tensions, such as conflicts between efficiency and fair labor practices, data privacy concerns, and the potential for power concentration within digital platforms. These tensions highlight the complexities of balancing competing objectives within CDSC operations. Moreover, the different managerial perspectives, such as SC, operational, logistics, and procurement, may prioritize different aspects of sustainability, leading to potential tensions. These tensions were categorized into four paradoxes: the paradox of progress, the paradox of efficiency, the paradox of control, and the paradox of governance. To manage these paradoxes, the findings highlight the importance of dynamic management, stakeholder engagement, transparency, innovation, and continuous learning. This should also be supported by holistic integration, which involves a unified, comprehensive approach to managing paradoxes in CDSCs, transitioning from separate functional strategies to a cohesive solution. This study contributes to understanding the complexities of social sustainability in CDSCs. It offers insights for practitioners and policymakers seeking to promote more responsible and sustainable SC practices.
The Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence (CSDD) Directive, effective in the EU from 2027, mandates businesses to conduct extensive human rights due diligence in their supply chains, particularly concerning labour issues. This paper examines the relationship between CSDD and Sustainable Supply Chain Management (SSCM) Practices, and in doing so, explains how CSDD can be understood as a process within SSCM. A systematic, content-analysis-based review of 70 peer-reviewed articles, using contingency analysis, highlights the association between CSDD and SSCM practices. Key findings include a reliance on codes of conduct and auditing as the main drivers for ensuring supplier compliance with working condition standards. However, over-reliance on auditing to identify and track the management of labour abuses in focal firm supply chains is problematic, given widely documented issues with the reliability of audit reports in global supply chains. Through the lens of institutional theory, decoupling was identified at the supplier level in the form of mock compliance, and at the focal firm level through the deployment of strategic ambiguity in reporting practices. To enhance supplier compliance with social standards, the study recommends partner development programs and engaging in joint problem-solving to address the root causes of the violations. The findings of this study highlight significant gaps in the literature, emphasising the need for further research on human rights in the supply chain management field.
Given the significance of ethical procurement systems in the contemporary business landscape, a critical yet under-explored question in the literature on supplier cost performance is whether AI-driven ethical procurement systems influence the circular supply chain orientation of purchasing firms. Additionally, it is important to investigate the potential connections between circular supply chain orientation and both contractual and relational governance in relation to supplier cost performance. The data used was collected using a survey approach, and the model was further tested via structural equation modeling. It is confirmed that AI-driven ethical procurement systems positively influence the circular supply chain orientation of buying firms. However, firms' contractual governance has no significant influence on supplier cost performance in a circular economy (CE) context. The novelty of this research is based in its empirical demonstration of the positive influence of AI-driven ethical procurement systems on enhancing the circular supply chain orientation of buying firms. Additionally, this study offers fresh insights by exploring the distinct functions of relational and contractual governance in CE, showing that relational governance nurtures better supplier cost performance, while contractual governance does not. This suggests that relational mechanisms, such as trust and cooperation, are more adaptable to the evolving needs of CE than rigid contractual governance. The key lesson is that trust-based relationships are crucial for aligning procurement and governance practices with circularity goals in a firm's supply chain network.
Purchasing and supply decisions face new challenges due to resource scarcity and the urgent need for solutions. While circular business models—which focus on closing, slowing, narrowing, and intensifying resource loops to keep resources in use longer, minimize waste, maximize value, and reduce virgin material consumption—offer essential solutions, little is currently known about supply decisions within such models. This qualitative exploratory study investigates supply decisions and their associated criteria for circular business models. We focus on clothing libraries, a novel circular business model where members borrow curated garments. Drawing on insights from six clothing libraries and 10 suppliers, we developed a framework for supply decisions for circular business models. This framework shows four selection decisions as key decisions for circular business models: 1) supplier, 2) product, 3) material, and 4) supply channel. The results also distinguish between criteria for the upstream and downstream aspects of the supply chain. This highlights the importance of understanding the entire lifecycle of products and materials. While our study identifies a wide range of criteria for supply decisions for circular business models, it does not propose a fixed order for their consideration. Instead, these decisions rely on multiple sets of criteria across different levels (supplier, product, material, channel). The sequence and weighting of these criteria vary, depending on expert knowledge applied case-by-case. This approach allows supply decisions to effectively support circular business models in facilitating more sustainable resource use. As a contribution to purchasing and supply management, our study elaborates on circular sourcing and supplier selection by expanding the scope of circularity criteria and deepening the understanding of individual criteria, but also challenging the conventional approach of identifying and weighting criteria.
This study explores how contagion effects within supply chains are shaped by specific relational and reputational factors, focusing on how buyers influence their suppliers’ environmental stewardship. Contagion effects refer to the phenomenon where certain behaviors, reflected through observable practices, spread through buyer-supplier networks, in this case, environmental behaviors from buyers to their suppliers. Drawing upon Social Contagion Theory, we examine both positive and negative contagion effects, driven by a buyer’s environmental performance and ESG-related reputational risk, respectively. The study finds that a buyer’s strong environmental performance does not directly lead to improved supplier stewardship. However, when suppliers are more relatively dependent on the buyer, the positive contagion effect is more likely to emerge, enhancing suppliers’ observable environmental stewardship behaviors. Conversely, a buyer’s ESG-related reputational risk does not inherently result in poor supplier environmental stewardship, though the positive contagion effect may be weakened when the buyer faces higher ESG risks. The study employs a Tobit regression model, analyzing data from 678 buyer-supplier dyads within the manufacturing sector. These findings contribute to the literature by highlighting the conditional nature of contagion effects in supply chains and providing managerial insights into how buyers can effectively promote supplier environmental stewardship.
To better prepare higher education graduates for the early stages of their careers, universities aim to bridge the gap between classroom teaching and the skills demanded by industry, particularly in the field of procurement. Today, procurement professionals increasingly require specialised skill sets, rather than generalist education, to effectively fulfil their role-specific responsibilities. This study integrates experiential learning theory with game-based learning by presenting a synthesised model that unites both perspectives. Building on this model, a purchasing-specific game is employed to compare traditional lecture-based teaching with experiential game-based learning, focusing on purchasing skills as well as cognitive and affective learning outcomes. The effectiveness of the game-based approach is examined through a group comparison experiment, contrasting students who played the game (N = 202) with those who attended conventional lectures (N = 135). The findings indicate that the game effectively develops purchasing and supply management (PSM) skills relevant to professional practice. Moreover, students evaluated the game as a highly positive learning experience, and it outperformed traditional lecturing in most skill-related, cognitive, and affective outcomes, ultimately leading to improved examination performance. For educators, the study highlights the design and implementation of the serious game, its pedagogical implications, and directions for future research in procurement education and beyond.
