Narratives in supplier negotiations—The interplay of narrative design elements, structural power, and outcomes

Abstract

In buyer–supplier negotiations, both parties shape the relational and contractual dimensions of their collaboration. Being able to influence the other party during negotiations is therefore vital to improve performance outcomes. This research takes a configurational approach to investigate how buyers can use narratives in different power situations to influence suppliers and improve their relational and economic negotiation results. In our first study, we conduct narrative writing workshops to identify typical design elements of such narratives. In our second study, we employ fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis to determine how different configurations of these design elements influence narratives' effectiveness in different power situations. Our theoretical contributions are twofold. First, we expand narrative transportation theory, showing that narratives consist of interlinked design elements and that narrative effectiveness is a causally complex phenomenon. Second, for the field of supply chain management, we develop theory by introducing narratives as an additional means of influence in buyer–supplier negotiations and by examining the interplay between narrative design elements, structural power, and negotiation outcomes that are specific to the buyer–supplier relationship. Based on the configurations of narratives that we found were effective and ineffective in different power situations, we derive propositions to advance theory on buyer–supplier negotiations.