From a rugged to a smooth supply chain performance landscape: a complementarity perspective

Abstract

We draw on complementarity and performance landscape perspectives to reason why and how supply chains should shift from a rugged to a smooth performance landscape. We analysed the organisation of supply chain-oriented firms by conceptualising them as a set of interdependent elements whose complementarity interaction generates desirable performance outcomes. We collected perceptual data from 139 firms. After establishing the psychometric properties of the measures, we employed two econometric methods that enabled us to examine the complementary interaction using performance differences among five SCM practices. Overall, we find empirical evidence for complementarity among the SCM practices. We also find interesting results from the two econometric approaches allowing us to articulate the distinction between practice contextuality and interaction contextuality. Our study offers empirical evidence for supply chain managers to find a promising position in the rugged supply chain performance landscape. In addition, we offer noteworthy managerial insights on managing the supply chain towards a smoother supply chain performance landscape.