Thomas J. Kull

Arizona State University | ASU · Department of Supply Chain Management

Despite the benefits of supplier integration (SI), research suggests such collaborative initiatives are inhibited by behavioral constraints. While studies tend to advance technical reasons that hinder SI, we draw from socio-technical system (STS) theory to suggest that the interaction among social, technical, and environmental features can give ris...

Buyers often make supplier selection decisions under conditions of uncertainty. Although the analytical aspects of supplier selection are well developed, the psychological aspects are less so. This article uses supply chain management and behavioral decision theories to propose that attributes of the purchasing situation (category difficulty, categ...

Globalization forces managers to utilize manufacturing capabilities from countries with different cultures than their own, particularly from Asia. Yet quality problems in China have raised concerns among managers and researchers as to how to assure product quality from Asian facilities. Implementing quality management practices may accomplish this,...

As organizations decrease inventory, the potential impact of a supply disruption increases. However, due to supply chain structural changes, the likelihood of a disruption may be less. Additionally independent supply chain actors may react to policy changes, changing supply chain configurations and perhaps reducing loss magnitudes. If risk is a pro...

Risk management in supply chains is receiving increasing attention in both academia and industry. Firms are recognizing the importance of considering supply risk in evaluating and selecting suppliers for strategic partnerships. One of the critical issues faced by purchasing managers is in effectively defining, operationalizing, and incorporating su...

Climate change is a major global risk and a key driver for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reduction. Yet, firms’ internal emissions reduction may create a leakage leading to higher emissions in the supply chain. The related literature suggests that the pollution haven hypothesis explains such emissions leakage. In contrast, we explore an alternativ...

The supply management literature assumes that supplier selection is devoid of emotions and unaffected by the history and experience associated with a previously-selected supplier. In this paper, we relax these assumptions. Specifically, we consider the following sourcing opportunity: a sourcing professional had (alternatively, had not) recommended...

The study comprised over 100 hours of interviews conducted by the academic research team with state procurement staff, suppliers, and other state officials. The approach was a qualitative research effort consisting of open conversations directed by the research team and covering topics that demonstrated both successes and areas of potential improve...

While many firms aspire to develop a mass customization capability (MCC) and much is known about the antecedents of MCC, the structural links between different levels of operational capabilities and MCC are under-examined. From a capability hierarchy perspective, we propose a three-order capability hierarchy in which engineering and processing capa...

Firms increasingly use human crowds to solve their innovation related needs. Innovation sourcing managers who sponsor innovation contests seek to maximize crowd size to increase the chance of creative outcomes. One strategy they use is to set an award size. Although many studies have examined the influence of award size on crowd size in innovation...

The General Services Administration is poised to award contracts to commercial companies that host “electronic marketplaces” online (at sites such as Amazon.com and Walmart.com). This “commercial platforms” initiative could radically reshape Government procurement in goods and services, as federal users will be able to make direct “micropurchases”...

While research has extensively explored the potential benefits companies gain with integrated supply chains, the topic of why some companies are better at pursuing supply chain integration (SCI) is relatively under-examined. We take the perspective that SCI is associated with preferred forms of leadership using leadership preference derived from pa...

Purpose-The purpose of this paper is to investigate the behavioral tendencies of supply managers when they are faced with uncertainty in making multi-tier sourcing decisions. Design/methodology/approach-This paper uses the literature on multi-tier supply chains and behavioral decision-making to develop a theoretical framework for examining factors...

The dynamics of inventory record inaccuracy (IRI) remain under-explored in a multi-channel distribution center (MCDC) setting. Additionally, how employees interact with the rest of an MCDC's inventory system to impact IRI is yet to be explored. To address these issues, our research adopts a multi-method exploratory approach to understand the nature...

A process network is a complex system of linked unit processes that constitute the life cycle of a product. In this paper, we consider how the structural and functional characteristics of a product’s process network impact the network’s collective greenhouse gas emissions. At a unit process level, greenhouse gas emissions are primarily related to p...

Deciding on the number of respondents in a data collection instrument is a key design consideration requiring supply chain researchers to balance multiple competing factors. The debate on this respondent design question may unintentionally disregard over 95% of enterprises engaged in supply chains: small and medium enterprises (SMEs). We present ar...

Purpose Studies show the benefits of supplier integration, yet negative attitudes toward supplier integration exist that research fails to explain. This paper investigates managerial attitudes toward supplier integration and how intra-firm processes and culture affect the formation of such attitudes. In particular, we aim to examine the differing...

The U.S. government recommends that hospitals adopt Computerized Provider Order Entry (CPOE) systems to improve the quality problems that plague U.S. hospitals. However, CPOE studies show mixed results. We hypothesize that CPOE effectiveness depends on the prevalence of patient safety culture within a hospital. Using organizational information proc...

We test if the effectiveness of Computerized Provider Order Entry (CPOE) systems depends on the prevalence of patient safety culture within a hospital and find that CPOE complements some aspects of patient safety culture and substitutes for others.

Recently, supplier satisfaction has gained more attention both in practice and in academic research. However, the knowledge accumulation process is still in an embryonic and explorative phase. Likewise, supplier satisfaction measuring in practice may still benefit from an impetus from academia to be more widely used. This paper aims at considerably...

Operations managers clearly play a critical role in targeting plant-level investments toward environment and safety practices. In principle, a “rational” response would be to align this investment with senior management's competitive goals for operational performance. However, operations managers also are influenced by contingent factors, such as t...

The rise of outsourcing has heightened interest in the role of logistics managers in coping with dependence in buyer-supplier relations. Buying firm dependence on a supplier potentially reduces supplier performance to expectations because the buying firm cannot leverage power to capture value in the relationship. Drawing from interorganizational le...

Operations managers clearly play a critical role in targeting plant-level investments toward environment and safety practices. In principle, a “rational” response would be to align this investment with senior management’s competitive goals for operational performance. However, operations managers also are influenced by contingent factors, such as t...

Firm-specific and path dependent resources and capabilities can fuel innovation. In this study, we posit and examine the unique contribution of several core capabilities toward operational innovation in manufacturing plants. We find that engineering capability, technical capability, and proprietary resources have strong impact on both process and p...

Studies show the benefits of supplier integration, yet negative attitudes toward supplier integration may exist that constrain the initiative. The source of these negative attitudes is unclear, however. While literature tends to treat inter-firm management issues, e.g. supplier integration, separately from intra-firm management issues, we posit tha...

The successful use of lean manufacturing (LM) practices requires more than the use of tools. Although manufacturing facilities worldwide use LM practices, dimensions of a nation’s culture may moderate LM’s effect on operating performance. Based on operational and organizational behavior literature, we develop moderation hypotheses based on the cong...

Collaborating with a supplier in a buying firm’s new product development (NPD) project is commonly advocated and adopted, but does not always improve project performance. Some pre-existing collaboration contexts, such as buyer-supplier NPD projects, are especially exposed to supplier opportunism due to the uncertain nature of the collaboration proc...

Mitigating supply chain risk is a critical component of a company's overall risk management strategy. Drawing upon Contingency Theory, we posit that the appropriateness and effectiveness of risk mitigation strategies are contingent on the internal and external environments and that there is no one-size-fits-all strategy. While literature on risk ma...

Inventory record inaccuracy (IRI) challenges multichannel retailers in fulfilling both brick‐and‐mortar and direct channel demands from their distribution centers. The nature and damaging effects of IRI largely go unnoticed because retailers assume daily IRI remains stable over time within the replenishment cycle. While research shows that a high l...

Examining Lean processes in the context of the authors academic research in-progress, People, Process, … Culture: Lean Manufacturing in the Real World illustrates the impact of culture on the implementation of Lean Manufacturing (LM) across various geographic and cultural areas. It identifies cultural values, as examined against Lean manufacturing...

Although research has shown that organizational cultural values influence the success of quality initiatives, how and when cultural values are influential is unclear. This longitudinal study asserts that quality management should be viewed from a dynamic perspective to better understand the role of cooperative cultural values in a quality initiativ...

Purpose Globalization and accelerating product life cycles require use of time‐based manufacturing practices (TBMP) accompanied by organizational integration. Evidence has suggested that cultural integrative beliefs (IB) influence the presence of TBMP but research has not investigated two alternative theory‐based views: TBMP influences the formatio...

The practice of target pricing has been a key factor in the success of Japanese manufacturers. In the more commonly known demand-side approach, the target price for the supplier equals the manufacturer's market price less a percent margin for the manufacturer but no cost-improvement expenses are shared. In the supply-side approach, cost-improvement...

Unsuccessful quality initiatives often are attributed to an organizational culture that does not recognize the importance of the cooperative values that underlie “soft” quality management practices, like customer focus and empowerment. Yet, the literature remains unclear as to how quality management and cooperative values interrelate by failing to...

Purpose As companies extend supply chains via direct delivery to consumers, supply chain efficiency depends upon the usability of the online ordering system. The purpose of this paper is to focus on customer order cycle efficiency gains through the “learnability” of web sites. Design/methodology/approach The paper analyzes empirical data using non...

Although purchasing and supply management (PSM) is a business function that is critical to supply chain management, a direct examination of the academic journals representing leading PSM research outlets has not been available. Further, most prior studies that compare journals have relied on single-item measures of such evaluation dimensions as qua...

This paper examines the effects of inventory record inaccuracy upon the performance of different inventory control (IC) logic. All IC techniques depend upon quantity of material on hand for computing lot sizes and holding costs. Frequently, actual on-hand balance and recorded on-hand balance don't match to a certain degree. The primary purpose of t...

Developing effective purchasing / supply management (PSM) strategiesrequire adequate