A Critical Analysis of Supply Chain Management

Content in Empirical Research

Gunjan Soni
Lecturer
Mechanical Engineering Group
Birla Institute of Technology and Science (BITS)
Pilani, Rajasthan - 333031, India
Email: gunjan_s@bits-pilani.ac.in
Phone No. : +91-1596-245073, Extn.204

Prof. Rambabu Kodali

Professor and Group Leader
Mechanical Engineering Group
Birla Institute of Technology and Science (BITS)
Pilani, Rajasthan - 333031, India
Email: proframbabukodali@gmail.com
Phone No. : +91-1596-245073, Extn.223

Corresponding author

Structured Abstract:
Purpose: A critical assessment of empirical research content in SCM is carried out in this
article. It involves assessment of 569 empirical research articles published in 21 selected
journals between 1994 and 2008.
Design/methodology/approach: The methodology of critical assessment involved
selection and classification of 569 empirical research articles in SCM. A systematic
classification and a critical analysis is carried out so as to identify research gaps in
content of SCM in empirical research as well as to recommend directions for future
research.
Findings: Critical analysis of selected articles led to conclusion that SCM content in
empirical research is very much based on analysis of focal firms and most of the authors
prefer to perform empirical studies for combination of various entities of analysis
considering possible elements of exchange. Performance measurement is on the rise and
will continue to be but should be used at higher levels of analysis as well. The principal
component bodies of SCM need further development to stage SCM at maturity level.
Overall, it is highlighted that there is still a need of better frameworks that can overcome
the shortcomings in extant empirical research literature of SCM.
Originality/value: Many literature reviews that aim at critical examination of SCM
literature are reported but none of them focused exclusively on content of empirical
research in SCM. Another unique feature of this article is that the sample size of articles
with respect to number of papers (569 papers) as well as number of journals (21 journals)
is larger then ever considered for literature review in SCM. The article spans a longer
time span of 15 years (1994-2008) as well.

Key words: supply chain management, content, classification, empirical research,

assessment, literature review
Type: Literature review

A Critical Analysis of Supply Chain Management

Content in Empirical Research
1. Introduction
Over the past 25 years, supply chain management (SCM) has been evolving as concept
and gradually managers have accepted that their firm is just one entity in the chain of
firms whose purpose is to satisfy the customer. In order to develop such thinking a lot of
support is provided by researchers from academia, industry and consultants. A sufficient
amount of research in SCM is performed using empirical studies. Minor et al. (1994)
defined empirical studies as those involving the gathering and analysis of data, and
subsequent reporting of findings and conclusions. The importance of empirical studies in
applied business research has been highlighted by many authors (such as Ebert, 1990;
Hayes and Clark, 1985; Flynn et al., 1990 etc). Since SCM is also an applied business
philosophy, there is a need to examine the empirical research aspect of SCM as well.
Thus an attempt is made in this paper to investigate the SCM content in empirical
research and suggest directions for future research in SCM.
The objective of the paper is to provide a critical analysis of empirical research content in
SCM. Section 2 critically examines various literature reviews published in SCM
literature. Section 3 elaborates the methodology adopted for the purpose of providing a
comprehensive and critical literature review of SCM content in empirical research. This
is followed by classification and analysis of SCM content in empirical research in Section
4. Finally the identification of gaps in present research, and significant findings are
reported in Section 5. The implications to future are discussed in Section 6 and finally,
the paper is concluded in Section 7.
1

2. Literature reviews in SCM

The huge literature body of SCM has led to numerous literature reviews in past 15 years.
A list of literature reviews in SCM is given in Table 1.
Take in Table 1
It is evident from Table 1 that none of the literature reviews had a focus on reviewing
content of SCM in empirical research. The literature review of Croom et al. (2000)
focused on categorization of literature linked to SCM. The paper provided guidelines to
review SCM research but did not carry out the review of literature. It mainly contributed
to a critical theory debate through the presentation and use of a framework for the
categorization of literature linked to SCM. Ho et al. (2002) analysed articles of empirical
research in SCM with reference to state of constructs used in SCM research, which
highlights some major weaknesses of the extant literature with respect to the
conceptualization, operationalisation, and modeling of SCM. But it did not present any
classification scheme to categorize and analyse extant empirical studies on SCM, and
neither had it aimed on the chronology of publications in empirical research. Authors like
Gammelgaard (2004) and Halldorson and Arlbjorn(2006) classified and reviewed the
literature on the basis of various schools of thought but their work is not at all related
with reviewing the present state of content of SCM in empirical research. It is also
observed that remaining literature reviews are mostly concerned with types of research
designs, types of data analysis techniques used and constructs of SCM, but none of them
has any focus towards content of SCM in empirical research. The time horizon of
literature review is another issue where most of the literature reviews considered papers

published in recent years. Among the list of reviews in Table 1 only two comprehensive
literature reviews spanned a period of more than 10 years. In first literature review by
Carter and Ellram (2003), articles published only in Journal of Supply Chain
Management (JSCM) were reviewed that were spread over a span of 34 years. But since
it is biased towards only one journal it cannot be considered for tracing the direction of
growth of SCM content in empirical research. Another comprehensive review by Wolf
(2008) also reviewed SCM literature covering a period of sixteen years in 282 papers,
which primarily focused on characterizing the processes of knowledge creation in SCM
and its evolution over time, but this review is short of specifically focusing on the content
of SCM in empirical research. The review by Fabbe-Costes and Jahre (2008) revealed the
link between supply chain integration and performance by systematically analyzing 38
research papers and came up with evidence that emphasized a requirement for a deeper
empirical investigation of linkage between supply chain integration and performance of
supply chain. However their work is also not focused on empirical literature alone.
Lastly, Giuinepero et al. (2008) examined SCM literature on the basis of SCM
definitions, subject categories in SCM, empirical vs. non-empirical literature, level of
analysis, primary research methods, and data analysis techniques. One of the major
shortcomings of the paper with respect to empirical research content is that the analysis is
limited to level of analysis and subject categories in SCM only. Secondly, the period
before 1997 is not considered in the review. Further, the aim of paper is anyway not
focused on in-depth analysis of empirical research literature rather it is two pronged and
divided between empirical and non-empirical literature. Hence it can be said that it
becomes inevitable to have an effort directed solely towards reviewing content of SCM in
empirical research.

3. Methodology
This section of paper elaborates the methodology adopted for the purpose of providing a
comprehensive and critical literature review of empirical research in SCM. The issues of
time horizon of review, journal selection, article selection, article classification and
analysis of articles will be discussed under literature review methodology. A schematic
representation of literature review methodology adopted in the paper is given in Figure 1.
Take in Figure 1
Step 1: The assessment period of articles is between 1982 and 2008, a 26 year time
horizon. The year 1982 is considered as the starting point of data collection because term
Supply Chain Management first appeared in 1982 (Oliver and Webber, 1982). The year
2008 is chosen as the terminating point of data collection for providing a landmark to end
data collection.
Step 2: The articles were collected from four major management science publishers viz.
Science Direct, Taylor and Francis, Emerald Online and Wiley Interscience (earlier
Blackwell Synergy) as majority of well referred journals of industrial management are
found in these databases.
Step 3: Exact phrase supply chain was searched in article title of all four databases.
Burgess et al. (2006) also adopted similar approach for selection of articles. Articles
which were available online but not published in any volume by the end of year 2008
were also considered.
In order to increase relevancy of selected journals with respect to SCM, journals which
published approximately 75 percentage of the total number of articles were selected. The
List of selected journals along with number of articles is given in Table 2.

Step 4: Flynn et al. (1990) explained that any empirical research article can have one or
more of the following empirical research designs viz. single case study, multiple case
study, panel study, focus group and survey. We selected empirical research articles from
the selected population of journals on the similar lines.
Step 5: All the selected research articles are classified under following nine classes:

Empirical research growth in SCM: The growth on empirical research articles in

SCM literature is traced using frequency analysis of articles published each year.
Such classification gives the researcher an idea about the growth in the number of
articles of empirical research in SCM.

Purpose of empirical research: Empirical research can have one of the two
purposes either on the basis of empirical data one can propose ones own theory
(called theory building) or one can verify an already existing or newly proposed
theory on the basis of empirical data (called theory verification). The
classification of selected articles on this basis permits a researcher to find out the
inclination of researchers is towards theory building or theory verification.

Principal component bodies and related issues in SCM: There have been several
attempts earlier also to identify the principal component bodies (PCBs) or
constructs or areas of focal research in SCM and issues that fall under each.
Cooper et al. (1997) recognized planning and control, work structure,
organization structure, product flow facility structure, information flow facility
structure, product structure, management methods, power and leadership
structure, risk and reward structure, and culture and attitude as ten major SCM
components.

Burgess et al. (2006) identified seven major constructs namely

leadership, intra-organizational relationships, inter-organizational relationships,

logistics, process improvement orientation, information systems, business results

and outcomes. Ho et al. (2000) emphasized on three key constructs to SCM. The
constructs were value creation, integration of key business process and
collaboration. All these three papers did not mentioned or enumerated the issues
of SCM that fall under each construct or PCB. Van der Vaart and van Donk
(2008) enumerated more than fifty issues of SCM addressed by various articles.
But they did not group the issues under constructs or PCBs of SCM. In the
framework presented by Croom et al. (2000) for reviewing the SCM literature,
they mentioned six PCBs of SCM that are strategic management, logistics,
marketing, relationships/partnerships, best practices and organization behavior
along with issues falling under each PCB. They also clarified that those issues
which are duplicated under multiple principal component bodies have multiple
perspectives surrounding the problem process. These PCBs identified by Croom
et al. (2008) were chosen for classification of selected articles as they seemed to
cover almost every issue in the selected population of articles.

Entity of analysis: It represents the focal entity under analysis in a given article.
For example supplier, manufacturer, distributor, retailer, 3PL etcb The term
supplier here means an entity that exists on inbound side of supply chain and
supplies raw material or semi-finished product to manufacturer. While
manufacturer is final finished product supplier to any one of distributor,
retailer, third party logistic (3PL), fourth party logistic (4PL) provider or
consumer . All entities including distributor, retailer, 3PL or 4PL lie on
outbound side of supply chain and are involved in distribution of final finished
product. The identification of entity of analysis in the article is done by simply

finding out whether article is focusing on only one of these entities or otherwise it
considers multiple entities. For multiple entities, the word combination is used
in classification. The significance of using this class is that it reveals the practical
aspect of empirical research, which gives an idea to the researcher about entities
that received inadequate attention and hence more thought should be given to
these entities.

Level of analysis: This class is adopted from an analytical framework for critical
literature review given by Croom et al. (2000). Same class is also used by Gubi et
al. (2003), Halldorsson and Arlbjrn (2005), Sachan and Datta (2005) and
Giuinepero et al. (2008). Although Croom et al. (2000) suggested only three
levels i.e. dyadic, chain and network but Halldorsson and Arlbjrn (2005) have
addressed the fourth level is also denoted by firm. Also a similar class was
proposed by Fabbe-Costes and Jahre (2008) where they used multi echelon, single
echelon: manufacturers, Single echelon: 1st tier suppliers and single echelon.
However in this review the class proposed by Gubi et al. (2003) is adopted that
includes four levels of analysis.

Element of exchange: It is work of Hakansson (1989) that emphasized networks

as composed of actors, resources and activities involving exchange, later Croom
et al. (2000) utilized the same work and proposed element of exchange as one of
the dimensions for classifying the SCM literature. They described that this class is
about what is exchanged in the supply chain (material assets, financial assets,
human resource assets, technological assets, information, and knowledge) and
how relationships between actors are conducted and managed.

Country of Sample Industry: Research in SCM is performed in almost every part

of the world. But there are places where it is dominant compared to other parts in
the world. It is thus imperative to find out the countries/regions dominating
empirical research in SCM. This class therefore helps in identifying regions
around the globe where the requirement of empirical investigation in SCM is
needed to a larger degree.

Sample industry: Supply chain management research is not restricted to any

particular industry. It is thus important to find out the range of industries from
which data is collected. This classification criterion will thus help in identifying
possible sectors of SCM research as well as highlight sectors that received
inadequate attention of researchers.

Performance measurement: A performance measurement system plays an

important role in managing a business as it provides the information necessary for
decision-making and actions (Gunasekaran and Kobu, 2006). As per Kaplan
(1990), No measures, no improvement, it is thus essential to measure the right
things at the right time in a supply chain and virtual enterprise environments so
that timely action can be taken. For the same reason performance measurementthe most referred issue in the selected SCM literature (see Table 5 in Section 4.3)
will be further analysed for capturing greater insights into the literature. Also
Performance measurement spans majority of other issues hence it is take as a
separate class for analysis.

Step 6: Since the objective of this paper is dominantly descriptive in nature. Thus is not
suitable for applying statistical methodologies for deducing or for any inferential purpose
using hypothesis testing. In this step all the efforts are directed towards critically

analyzing the classified articles so as to identify research gaps in content of SCM in

empirical research as well as to present significant findings from the existing literature.
The results will be presented using tables and charts.
4. Analysis of SCM content in empirical research
4.1 Empirical research growth in SCM
The frequency of empirical research articles in SCM published since 1994 (rather than
1982 as first empirical research article in the selected literature appeared in EJPSM in
1994 by Bessant et al. (1994)) is tabulated in Table 2.
Take in Table 2
It can be very well observed from Table 2, that rise in empirical research articles in SCM
since 1994 is very much evident, as the total number of empirical research articles
published since 1982 was 30.1% of total articles (569 out of 1807 articles) in the selected
journals . Although this finding does not exactly match with findings of review by
Sachan and Datta (2005), where number of empirical research articles was 24.8% from a
sample 442 papers, but these percentages are not contradicting also. This could be
attributed to difference in sample size (569 in present case) and the rise in number of
empirical research publications in SCM in later period of 2000s.

It can be seen that

maximum number of articles is published in IJPE (256 articles), although only 77 (i.e.
30%) of articles of them are in empirical research. On the other hand, EJPSM dominantly
published 96.7% of articles in empirical research (32 out of 33 articles). A histogram of
percentage of articles published in empirical research for each journal is given in Figure
2.
Take in Figure 2
The year wise distribution of empirical research articles in SCM is also given in Figure 3.

Take in Figure 3
Figure 3 clarifies that the empirical research articles in SCM have shown substantial rise
in number of articles published, with most prominent rise in number of articles in 2002
and 2004.
4.2 Purpose of empirical research
Flynn et al. (1990) definition on theory building and theory verification was taken as a
guideline for placing the article under theory building or verification. If the article
involved proposing a new theory on the basis of some hypothesis or statistical findings
then it was placed under the category of theory building. It also includes those articles
which propose and then verify the proposed theory as well. In other case if the theory is
borrowed from some other article and used in another situation to check its validity then
it is said to be a theory verification article. It was found out that there were 496 articles
on theory building and 73 on theory verification. This fact is also validated by the fact
that supply chain management is a rather young field of research, the need for further
conceptual and theory building research is frequently highlighted (e.g. Croom et al.,
2000; Mller et al., 2003) as a means to continue to shape the boundaries of supply chain
management (Mouritsen et al., 2003). Out of 73 articles on theory verification, highest
were published in IJOPM (12 articles) while SCMIJ published maximum number on
theory building (39 articles).
4.3 Principal component bodies and related issues in SCM
First the focal issue of each article is identified and then that article is placed under
appropriate PCB. In order to identify the focal issue, a list of possible issues that the
article contains is laid down using title of the article and abstract. Then the issue whose
phrase is repeated maximum number of times in the article is selected to be the focal

10

issue of the article. The scheme of subjects given by Croom et al. (2000) is used to find
out the PCB under which the focal issue lies. Some focal issues which lie out of this
scheme are then placed under respective PCBs in consultation with the subject experts.
Principal component body and related issues in SCM is given in Table 3.
Take in Table 3
It can be easily apprehended from Table 3 that SCM encompasses plethora of issues
spanning various PCBs. The most frequently visited issue is of performance
measurement (44 articles), followed by supply chain integration (36 articles) and
assessment of status of SCM in a field or industry or nation using empirical research
design comes third (28 articles). It is interesting to relate the work of Fabbe-Costes and
Jahre (2008) with these findings as well. They explored the relationship of supply chain
performance with supply chain integration. Emphasis of authors on such study very well
reflects the importance given to these focal areas of research in SCM. It is also found that
only 16 issues out of 115 issues cover more than 50 percent of total articles. These
highlighted issues in literature are performance measurement, supply chain integration,
status of SCM in a field or industry or nation, relationship management, information
sharing and commitment,

collaboration,

strategy

formulation,

information

technology, green supply, quality, supply chain practices, incentives, identification of

barriers for SCM, critical success factors, design of supply chain and selection of type of
supply chain. It will be worthwhile to find out the most stressed PCB in selected SCM
literature and also number of issues falling under each PCB. Frequency of principal
component bodies in selected SCM literature is given in Table 4.
Take in Table 4

11

From Table 5, it seems that best practices covers maximum number of issues (30
issues) addressed in SCM but same trend is not observed in number of articles published,
as the highest frequency (153) of papers are published in strategic management.
Giunipero et al. (2008) also reported maximum number of articles in supply chain
management strategy in their review of 405 articles. Another observation can be made in
others category that even though it covers only two issues viz. status of SCM in a field
or industry or nation and academic debate, the relative number of articles is pretty high
compared to marketing and organization behavior.

4.4 Entity of analysis

The entity of analysis is found out by tracing out which member of supply chain is under
investigation. If more than one entity is under consideration then article is placed under
combination category. Some articles considered multiple entity of analysis hence such
articles have been placed under the category of combination. It was revealed that
majority of articles involved combination of multiple entity of analysis (340 articles)
while articles with manufacturer as main entity of analysis were second highest (154
articles). Also articles including suppliers were 17, retailer with 10, 3PL with 4,
consumer with 4, distributor with 3 and 4PL with 1 article. Unlike Halldorsson and
Arlbjrn (2005) this study considers combination of various entity of analysis along with
3PL, 4PL, customer and supplier also. It can be seen clearly from Table 7 that
combination of various entities is most prominent research approach covering almost
60% of total articles selected for review. If research focus on single entity is considered,
then issues related to manufacturer are most visited by researchers in their articles
(29.07%) which is in congruence with the findings of Halldorsson and Arlbjrn (2005)
(28.1%) . Out of 229 articles on single entity, 68.5% of articles (157 articles) belong to
12

the manufacturer alone. While only five articles are addressed to 3PL and 4PL
together. Also total of supplier, retailer, consumer and distributor entities makes
total number of articles up to 16% only. In order to present the frequency distribution of
entity of analysis over the analysis period, Table 5 represents year-wise distribution of
entity of analysis.
Take in Table 5
From Table 5, it is quite evident that majority of researchers are considering
combination of various entities in the empirical research and it is increasing at a steady
rate with the increase in number of publications per year. Another important observation
is that empirical literature on supplier as an entity is increasing per year but similar
trend is not visible in other entities like retailer , 3PL, consumer, distributor and
4PL.
4.5 Level of analysis
In the literature various terminologies for level of analysis can be found out like level
(Narasimhan and Kim, 2002; Kim, 2006b), stage (Kim, 2006a), degree (Frohlich and
Westbrook, 2002), arc (Frohlich and Westbrook, 2001), type (Swink et al., 2007) and
supply chain structure (Stock et al., 2000). Thus in order to avoid confusion as to find out
which level of analysis is considered in the article a simple guideline was followed
according to which if the analysis or focus of the paper was on inter-function, intracompany then it was listed under the category of firm. Further the level of analysis was
dyad if paper addresses at inter-organizational level and includes immediate upstream
or downstream member of supply chain into analysis. The level of analysis is chain
when more than two members are included in the analysis and network when analysis is
subjected to multiple members at each echelon. Examination of data reveals that 65%

13

(370 articles) of articles are based on analysis level that is confined within the firm itself,
which in fact contradicts the findings of Halldorsson and Arlbjrn (2005) (4.22% of 71
articles), while it is much nearer to the findings of Fabbe-Costes and Jahre (2008) (
47.2% of 38 articles addressing single echelon), Giuinipero et al. (2008) (37%) and
Sachan and Datta (2005) (56% of 442 articles). Only 24.8% (177 articles) of articles
serves the purpose of inter-organizational dialogue in supply chain (combining articles on
levels of dyad, network and chain). This figure is also close to 30% in the study of
Sachan and Datta (2005). Such a trend is noteworthy and unlikely as theory of SCM
itself focuses on integration throughout the value chain. This shows that although supply
chain is defined by keeping system thinking in mind, but researches are more focusing on
one part of the system (Sachan and Datta, 2005). Table 6 gives year-wise distribution of
level of analysis.
Table 6 clearly shows that relative rate at which papers on level of analysis at the firm
level are being published is still very high, while on the contrary ( ideally) the rate of
publishing should be more at network and chain level.
4.6 Element of exchange
The underlying theory or model is closely examined to find out what types of elements
are being exchanged between different levels of supply chain in the analysis. The
guidelines of Croom et al. (2000) are used to find the type of element of exchange in an
article. If more than one element of exchange is under consideration then it is referred as
combination. It was found that research articles predominantly use combination of
various elements of exchange in analysis. While if single element is considered
information is most commonly referred element of exchange in empirical research.
Various issues addressed by considering information for analysis are like electronic

14

media including electronic data interchange (EDI), e-commerce, bar codes, point of sales
data capturing technology etc. Another element of exchange i.e. assets is also widely
used in literature for analysis (36 articles). Some of the issues related to assets are like
where to position the inventories along the supply chain, in which physical form, how
much to stock at each point, how many warehouses to use, to eliminate local inventory
stocking points and to centralize inventories, to relocate consolidation/de-consolidation
points, to add regional warehouses or to use warehouses for specific customers etc.
(Croom et al., 2000). Relationship is also used in an equivalent manner for analysis in
extant literature (35 articles). Without a foundation of effective supply chain
organizational relationships, any effort to manage the flow of information or materials
across the supply chain is likely to be unsuccessful (Handfield and Nichols, 1999).
Several important issues that are tackled by considering relationship into analysis are
like sourcing strategy, attitude and commitment to collaborative programs, positioning of
focal firm etc. The year-wise distribution of element of exchange is given in Table 6.
Table 6 depicts that there has been an overall increase in analysis of element of exchange.
It can be said because the increase in number of articles addressing assets, information,
relationship, and combination of various elements of exchange is more or less uniform.
4.7 Country or region of sample industry
The country of analysis can be simply found out by looking at the demographic
description of the empirical study given by the author in the paper. If it is not specified by
the author then the article is placed under N/A. Table 6 shows frequency of empirical
research studies in SCM in various parts of the world.
Take in Table 6

15

Table 6 depicts that empirical data is collected by highest amount in USA (16.53%) while
24.25% of papers did not tell anything about the country or region from where data has
been collected. Sachan and Datta (2005) also had similar findings with maximum studies
in USA followed by Europe. Asian countries contribute nearly 10% of studies which is
little higher than the findings of Sachan and Datta (2005) (6.1%). Majority of the
countries in the list are developed countries. Only India, Hong Kong and China seems to
be representing a substantial population of developing countries. However there are many
countries also in Others category like Austria, Alaska, Argentina, Brazil, Denmark,
Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Indonesia, Ireland, Japan, Malaysia, New
Zealand, Poland, Singapore, Spain, Switzerland, Kazakhstan and Thailand. Such
countries are not included in Table 13 as number of research papers addressing them is
very less. The most revealing fact for this analysis is is that very few articles involve
empirical investigation in developing countries like India and China, which are global
outsourcing hubs for many industry sectors like automobile, textile etc.
4.8 Sample industry
The sample industry is found out by looking at the demographic description of the
empirical study given by the author in the paper. If it is not specified by the author then
the article is placed under N/A. Table 7 represents the frequency of articles for the
industries of data collection.
Take in Table 7
In Table 7, manufacturing industry tops the chart (15.11 %) while food and agriculture is
at second position (7.91%). Industries on which number of articles was less then ten are
placed in the category of others. It includes industries such as 4PL, banking, ecommerce, hotel, jewellery, life support system, music, oil, consumer product, education,

16

packaging, defense, FMCG, furniture, paper industry and health service. When data was
collected from multiple industries, then the paper is listed under the category of
multiple. It can be derived from the Table 8 that a significant percentage of authors in
empirical research prefer to take data from multiple industries. Similar results were
obtained by Fabbe-Costes and Jahre (2008, p. 134) where they specified that the majority
of articles have a mixed-industry empirical base whilst others focus on a specific industry
or sector (including construction, jewellery, automotive, textiles and fashion, consumer
goods, wood, package printing, industrial equipment and discrete and assembled
products) .
4.9 Performance measurement
The phrase performance is searched in each article. In this way 376 articles were found,
but among them only 87 articles discussed and included performance measurement in
their analysis while rest of 478 articles did not have focused efforts towards performance
measurement. It was thus observed that only 15.9% of papers addressed performance
measurement. The figure is small considering the fact that performance measurement is
an integral part of SCM. In order to enquire more into the performance measurement
practices of SCM researchers involved in empirical research, a frequency distribution of
performance measurement articles with reference to entity of analysis, level of analysis
and element of exchange is given in Table 8.
Take in Table 8
From Table 8 it can be inferred that inclusion of performance measurement aspect is on
growth in SCM literature. This fact is very much reflected by the statistic that only 36
articles (i.e. 41.3%) of articles are published in a span of nine years (1996-2004) while
rest of 58.7% of articles are published in a period of four years (i.e. 2005-2008). Another
17

interesting aspect of empirical research is revealed from Table 16 is that 67 articles (77%
articles) targeted combination of various entity of analysis. But if single entity is taken
into consideration performance measures for manufacturer are formulated most of the
time. Also performance measurement is carried out at only firm level in 67 articles
(77% articles). A similar trend is observed by Fabbe-Costes and Jahre (2008) where 48%
of articles measured performance at limited dyadic scope and concluded that there is no
consensus regarding how performance is to be measured. They also highlighted that it is
striking that very few papers include performance of other members of the supply chain
in addition to the focal firm. Such fact is an eye-opener for researchers as ideally
performance measurement must be carried out so as to reflect the performance of supply
chain as whole and not of a single firm. Although few articles does show intent of
measuring performance at network level as well (13 articles). Now regarding element
of exchange, researchers seemingly prefer to include various elements of exchange
together in their metrics or measures of performance. The statement is supported by the
figure of 64 articles in the class of combination. This number truly supports the
philosophy of SCM that stresses on backward and forward movement of information and
assets in an optimal manner by managing relationships at each echelon.
5. Discussion
This paper, through a systematic and critical review of SCM in empirical research
literature, provides insights into the growth of empirical research in SCM, purpose of
empirical research, principal component bodies and related issues in SCM, entity of
analysis, level of analysis, element of exchange, country of sample industry, sample
industry and performance measurement. The review enables to succinctly present status
of SCM content in existing literature and chart an agenda for future research. The gaps

18

that were identified and the significant findings of the review will be discussed in the
subsequent part of this section.
5.1 Significant findings

Empirical research in SCM is growing and shows highest growth during period of
2000-2004. Theory building is most popular among SCM researchers while
theory verification is also on the rise but percentage wise the rise is very slow and
gradual. Wallenburg and Weber (2005) pointed out that despite debate in the field
of logistics and supply chain management, research on methodology and theory
development still lacks the focus. They also advocated that theory development
(or theory building) will advance, as shown in the field of marketing research,
through a rigorous empirical research approach.

In the review, 115 issues were identified out of which performance measurement,
supply chain integration, status of SCM in a field or industry or nation,
relationship management, information sharing and commitment,

collaboration,

strategy formulation, information technology, green supply, quality, supply chain

practices, incentives, identification of barriers for SCM, critical success factors,
design of supply chain and selection of type of supply chain were most visited
issues by researchers. Many researchers have even tried to analyse these often
visited focal issues in their literature reviews. Vaart and Donk (2008) performed a
review on survey based methodologies on supply chain integration, similarly
Fabbe-Costes and Jahre (2008) analysed the relationship between performance of
supply chain and supply chain integration. Issues like status of SCM in a field,
industry or nation also gained appreciable attention in articles by Arlbjrn et al.
(2008) (status of Nordic research in logistics and SCM), Bales et al. (2004)

19

(development of supply chain in aerospace sector), Brun et al. (2008) (logistics

and SCM in luxury fashion retail), Mangan and Christopher (2005) (supply chain
manager of future), McMullan (1996) (SCM practice in Asia-Pacific) and last but
not least Sahay et al. (2003) ( architecture of Indian supply chains). Also
relationship management was widely researched in SCM by various authors like
Benton, W.C. and Maloni, M. (2005) (power driven buyer seller relationship),
Boger et al. (2001) (supply chain relationships in Polish pork sector), Kwon and
Suh (2004) (factors affecting trust and commitment in supply chain relationships),
Parry et al. (2006) (to core competence posed by developing closer supply chain
relationships) etc.

Out of six principal component bodies (PCBs) in SCM, best practices and
strategic management are most dominant ones. These two PCBs cover almost half
of the issues identified in the paper. Harland (1996) distinguishes four main uses
of the term supply chain management: (1) internal supply that integrates
business functions involved in the flow of materials and information from the
inbound to the outbound end of the business; (2) SCM as the management of
supply relationships; (3) SCM as the management of inter-business chains; and
(4) SCM as strategic management of inter-business networks. Among these four
uses strategic management as a major function supply chain management is
apparent. Macbeth and Ferguson (1991), Cavinato (1999) and Bechtel and
Jayaram (1997) had devoted their study explaining strategic nature of SCM and
concluded that majority of functions in SCM are performed at strategic level. On
the other hand the underexplored area of organizational behavior can also bring
stronger theories in SCM as emphasized by the works of various authors such as

20

Ellram (1991) (Industrial organization), Co and Barro (2009) (stakeholders

theory) , Knoppen and Christiaanse (2007) ( supply chain partnering) and Wilding
and Humphries(2006) (supply chain relationships through the application of
Williamson organizational failure framework). According to Ketchen and
Giunipero, (2004) the idea of a supply chain organization has been presented but
this has yet to be systematically investigated (Giunipero et al, 2008).

Regarding level of analysis at network level, out of 80 records only nine were
found to be before year 2000. This trend implies growing awareness among
researchers about considering network level for analysis to get optimum benefit in
supply chain.

Researchers seemed to prefer combination of various entities of analysis for

empirical research over single entities. Similar trend is observed in identifying
most frequently used element of exchange in SCM and it was traced that
researchers preferred combination of elements of exchange instead of focusing
on single element of exchange.

A significant proportion of articles addressed use of performance measurement in

their research. Majority of authors employed performance analysis for measuring
performance of

combination of various entities of analysis at firm level

considering combination of elements of exchange in their analysis.

It is noteworthy that only 6 articles out of 87 articles, published before year 2000
considered performance measurement in their theory or framework. Such trend
also gives an indication about more and more researchers advocating use of
performance measurement in supply chain management.

21

5.2 Gaps identified

There exists a huge gap between theory building and theory verification. The rate
at which theory building is progressing is far ahead of theory verification. A
discipline can only reach maturity stage if rate of theory building and verification
is same. Since SCM is growing discipline there is not much evidence available in
supply chain literature that highlights the importance of theory verification in
SCM but it can be argued that at some stage in life cycle of a discipline, theory
verification should mark the maturity of that discipline.

Among plethora of issues to be addressed in SCM, 115 issues to be specific, only

16 issues spanned more than 50% of articles. Such a trend reflects deficiency in
treatment of SCM paradigm. Many issues to name a few like distribution
requirement planning, power balance, risk management, supply chain security,
conflict management, strategic alignment, visibility, virtual supply chain etc. have
not received sufficient attention in the empirical research. The possible reason for
such a scenario could be overemphasis of SCM researchers on core issues like
performance measurement, integration, collaboration, relationship management
etc. Such core issues are majorly broader in nature with respect to all the levels of
management. While issues like distribution requirement planning and visibility
are confined to tactical and operational level. On the other hand issues like power
balance, risk management, supply chain security, conflict management etc. are
new to SCM discipline and are catching up with other issues, but slowly.
Surprisingly issue like strategic alignment (which means aligning the supply
chain strategy with competitive strategy of the focal firm) has received very

22

scanty attention considering its importance in SCM. Only Quesada (2008) had
attempted an empirical investigation into strategic alignment.

Principal component bodies of marketing and organization behavior in SCM

seems to lagging behind in research compared to strategic management, best
practices, relationships/ partnerships and logistics. Parente at. al (2008)
discovered that the interdisciplinary approach among researchers of SCM and
marketing is highly divergent although they share common issues of IT, logistics
and operations but still the holistic approach is lacking in two research
communities. They also revealed in their investigation of marketing SCM
research that there are a number of topics that are being researched in two areas.
However, a review of the authors involved leads us to believe that collaboration is
limited. It is possible but we see little evidence of multiple authors working in
different fields collaborating on the same topic (p. 526).

While carrying out the investigation for entity of analysis it was found that
supplier, retailer, consumer and distributor are highly neglected in comparison to
manufacturers. A similar finding was made by Fabbe-Costes and Jahre (2008)
where in reviewing literature on supply chain integration they found majority of
articles that considered single focal entity of analysis as manufacturer only
(excluding multi-echelon cases). It makes an impression that research is highly
biased towards using manufacturer as the focal entity of analysis in various SCM
research scenarios. Such a state of biased treatment can create a general feeling
among future researchers that SCM paradigm is governed by manufacturers alone
and hence supply chains must be designed keeping manufacturers point of view

23

into consideration. The implications of such design can be harmful at times for
other entities and can lead to disruptions in smooth functioning of supply chains.

Ideally level of analysis in every SCM research must be inter-organizational in

nature as it goes along with the basic philosophy of SCM. According to Stevens
(1989), inter-organisational integration is considered to be the final stage of
SCM thus performance must also be measured that level. Later Fabbe-Costes and
Jahre (2008) added that differentiated approach of supply chain integration is of
interest and can help companies to identify and focus on a limited number of key
integration elements. Thus on the similar line of differential approach to supply
chain integration can give rise to critical performance measures at interorganizational level as well. That way the redundant process performance
measures can also eliminated from the management system. It can thus be said
that performance measurement must be done at inter-organizational level but on
the contrary, the review of empirical literature in SCM reflects that maximum
number of articles considered level of analysis at focal firm level only.

Empirical research in SCM is predominantly performed in the developed

countries of Northern America and Europe while merely 5% of the research is
performed for developing countries. Countries like India and China are
outsourcing hubs for global supply chains of apparel, automobile and electronic
consumer goods. Hence there is higher need of developing and examining the
supply chain frameworks for such countries. One of the reasons for lack in
empirical research in these countries may be difficulty in carrying out survey and
action research or it may be lack of knowledge in SCM. However, these reasons
need proper examination and factual support before they can be established.

24

The existence of performance measures for retailers and distributors in supply

chain are almost negligible. This is very much evident from Table 11, where it is
observed that only 1 article measuring performance of retailer and 3 articles for
same are published for supplier. The same comment is applicable to performance
measures devised for various levels of analysis as very few articles displayed any
picture of measurement at dyad (2 articles), chain (5 articles) or network (13
articles) level.

6. Implications for future research

This paper offers new avenues of further research in SCM. The findings of the paper and
the gaps identified leads to following implications for future research. They are discussed
as follows:

Researchers must focus on verifying already existing theories in SCM as a huge

amount of literature on theory building is accumulated and must get verified. It is
also emphasized that large body of SCM needs more standardized terminology
and constructs. According to Chen and Paulraj (2004), the existence of clear
definitional constructs on which to base SCM research is still lacking. This causes
a fragmented research field that is open to the danger of a lack of generalization.
Here it is worthwhile to add prescription of Fabbe-Costes and Jahre (2008) that in
order to contribute to theory-building we need to stabilize the vocabulary, to agree
on formal conceptual definitions, and to define their properties clearly before
measuring anything (p. 143).

Traditionally, SCM has been a melting pot of various disciplines, with influences
from logistics and transportation, operations management and materials and
distribution management, marketing, as well as purchasing and information

25

technology (IT) (Giunipero et al, 2008). It thus addresses plethora of issues and
among them some are often visited by empirical researchers while several other
not frequently addressed issues like distribution requirement planning, efficiency
of supply chain, power balance, risk management, supply chain security, conflict
management, strategic alignment, visibility, virtual supply chain etc. must be
given more attention by performing empirical studies on them and hence help in
promotion of their importance in SCM paradigm.

Underdeveloped structure of principal component bodies of SCM literature in

empirical research must be stronger by more involvement of organizational
behavior and marketing in empirical research.

Future empirical studies must target inter-organizational level more than intrafirm and intra-functional scope at firm level only. Such studies must at least
address dyad level with inter-organizational scope and if possible the complete
network must be under scanner for analysis. The advantage associated with
mutli-level analysis is that it gives integrated solutions. Simatupang and
Sridharan (2008) highlighted that the chain members realize that integrated
solutions result in economy of scale that eventually lower costs and enhance
revenues (Bowersox, 1990; Buzzell and Ortmeyer, 1995). They also pointed
that supply chain collaboration with the design of interorganisational process
improvements coupled with information systems is simply not sufficient
enough. Rather, one has to design supply chain collaboration so as to
incorporate dynamics of collaborative efforts.

Ideally every practical framework based on empirical study or any other relevant
empirical study must involve an element of performance measurement of

26

respective entity of analysis at network level considering all the possible

elements of exchange at various echelons of supply chain. Presently such
approach is lacking in empirical research thus future research efforts in this
direction must take aforementioned aspect of performance measurement into
consideration. According to Charan et al. (2008) there is a emerging
requirement to focus on the performance of the SC or network in which
company is a partner. Such system can facilitate inter-understanding and
integration among the SC members. It is worthwhile to add essential
characteristics of performance measurement system given by Morgan (2004)
that performance measures must be linked with the strategy of an
organization, be part of an integrated control system, have internal validity
and enable proactive management; and secondly, the performance
measurement system must be dynamic, intra-connectable, focused and
usable.

Sachan and Datta (2005) pointed out in their review that most of the MNCs are
targeting developing and underdeveloped countries either as new market for their
products or for sourcing the raw material due to low cost. It would be better if
researchers focus on these countries also. In our review too same fact is
highlighted that very less empirical studies in SCM are published for developing
and underdeveloped countries. It is high time for the researchers to start focusing
on these avenues of cost reduction and profit making.

7. Conclusions
The paper reviewed 569 articles on empirical research in SCM, with primary focus of
research on content of SCM in articles. The paper started with identifying empirical

27

research articles out of 1807 research articles, and found 569 empirical research articles,
followed by classification of each of the selected articles into 9 classes. The paper
highlights the growth of empirical research in SCM. Findings of paper also initiate a
debate of theory building vs. theory verification in SCM as it was found that there are
more articles on theory building in compared to theory verification.

Review also

revealed important and frequently visited issues in SCM and also brought inadequately
addressed issues into limelight. Classification of articles on basis of entity of analysis,
level of analysis and element of exchange is found to be very instrumental in measuring
length and breadth of empirical research in SCM. It was found out that more and more
authors are using combination of entity of analysis. But still focus is on firm level rather
than network level. In this another encouraging fact is that most of the authors prefer to
consider combination of various elements of exchange in their analysis. It was also
found out that SCM research is still very much confined in developed countries of
America and Europe, which is a discouraging. Also, performance measurement in a
supply chain seems to be an area of more exploration, especially, measuring performance
at network or chain level.
The potential limitation of the study is that it does not attempt to trace out trend using
regression techniques neither it endeavors to test the hypothesis so as to establish a
grounded theory, that could lay down a perfect platform for future research. It however
succeeds in revealing the descriptive statistics behind various classes that addresses
content of SCM in empirical research. The extension of this study could be statistically
testing the figures observed in this paper and lay down a grounded theory approach for
future research in SCM.

28

It is believed that this article will encourage the research community to make endeavors
in less explored areas of SCM and also remove the highlighted deficiencies in approach
towards empirical research in SCM.
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pp. 171-186.
Wilding, R. and Andrew S. Humphries, A.S. (2006), Understanding collaborative
supply chain relationships through the application of the Williamson
organisational failure framework, International Journal of Physical Distribution
& Logistics Management, Vol.36 No. 4, pp. 309 329.
Wolf, J. (2008), The Nature of Research in Supply Chain Management. Germany:
Gabler Edition, Wissenschaft.
Wong, C.Y., Arlbjorn, J.S. and Johansen, J. (2005), Supply chain management
33

practices in toy supply chains, Supply Chain Management: An International

Journal, Vol. 10, No. 5, pp. 367-376.

Table 1: List of literature reviews in SCM

Adapted: Wolf (2008)
S.No

Author

Year of
publication

Period

Reviewed Journals*

1.

Dunn et al.

1994

1986-1990

N/A

2.

Croom et al.

2000

Not restricted

Not restricted

3.

Ho et al.

2002

N/A

4.

Carter and
Ellram

2003

5.

Gammelgaard

6.

Sample
size
N/A

Area of Research
Types of research in SCM

84

Suggests
the
way
of
reviewing literature critically

N/A

N/A

State of empirical research in

SCM

1965-1999

JSCM

774

Types
of
research,
methodologies used and data
analysis techniques in JSCM

2004

1998-2003

IJPDLM, IJOPM,
JBL, JOM, IJLM

N/A

Frankel et al.

2005

1999-2004

JBL

108

Types of research approaches

7.

Sachan and
Dutta

2005

1999-2003

IJPDLM, JBL,
SCMIJ

442

Types
of
research,
methodologies used and data
analysis techniques

8.

Kovacs and
Spens

2005

1998-2002

IJLM, IJPDLM, JBL

N/A

Types of research approaches

9.

Halldorson and
Arlbjorn

2006

1997-2004

IJLM, IJPDLM, JBL

71

Analysis of references to the

literature on philosophy of
science

10.

Reichhart and
Holweg

2006

2004

JOM, IJOPM, MS,

IJPR, JBL, IJPDLM

89

Analysis of methodologies
applied in different subfields
of SCM

11.

Spens and
Kovacs

2006

1998-2002

IJLM, IJPDLM, JBL

378

Analysis of types of research

12.

Burgess et al.

2006

No restriction
July 2003

No restriction

100

Analysis of object of study

and methods applied

13.

Van der Vaart

and van Donk

2008

Not restricted

IJOPM, IJPDLM,
IJLM, IJPR, IJPE,
Interfaces, JBL,
JOM, MS

36

Survey research in supply

chain integration

14.

Wolf

2008

1990-2006

IJLM, IJPDLM,
IJPE, IJPR, JBL,
JOM, PPC

282

Analysis of the nature of

SCM research

15.

Fabbe-Costes

2008

2000-2006

IJLM, IJLRA,

38

Studies the link between

34

Prevailing schools of thought

S.No

Author

Year of
publication

Period

Reviewed Journals*

and Jahre

16.

Giunipero et al.

Sample
size

IJOPM, IJPDLM,
JBL, JOM, SCMIJ,
Transportation
Journal,
Transportation
Research- Part E

2008

JSCM, IJPDLM,
JOM, IJLM, JBL,
IJOPM, IMM,
Management
Science, Decision
Sciences

1997-2006

* See Table 2 for full name of journals

35

Area of Research
supply chain integration and
performance

405

Carried out review of 405

articles
focusing
on
categories covered within the
SCM literature, various levels
of the chain examined and
sample
populations
and
industries studied as well as
research methods employed

Table 2: Frequency of empirical research articles in SCM

1994

1995

1996

1997

1998

1999

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

No. of
articles

Empirical research
articles

BPMJ

28

11

CCE

43

CIE

55

EJOR

169

13

EJPSM

33

32

IJLM

204

36

IJLRA

53

21

IJOPM

69

37

IJPDLM

118

52

IJPE

11

16

25

256

77

IJPR

147

29

IMDS

44

16

IMM

38

21

JMTM

28

JOM

20

83

50

JSCM

79

16

LIM

36

OMEGA

28

11

PPC

66

13

SCMIJ

10

16

15

16

189

101

TR

41

14

15

21

26

29

45

41

62

65

67

92

77

1807

569

Journal name*

Total

*BPMJ: Business Process Management Journal, CCE: Computers and Chemical Engineering; CIE:
Computers and Industrial Engineering; EJOR: European Journal of Operational Research, EJPSM:
European Journal of Purchasing and Supply Management; IJLM: The International Journal of Logistics
Management; IJLRA: International Journal of Logistics Research and Applications; IJOPM: International
Journal of Operations and Production Management; IJPDLM: International Journal of Physical
Distribution & Logistics Management; IJPE: International Journal of Production Economics; IJPR:
International Journal of Production Research; IMDS: Industrial Management & Data Systems; IMM:
Industrial Marketing Management; JMTM: Journal of Manufacturing Technology Management; JOM:
Journal of Operations Management; JSCM: The Journal of Supply Chain Management; LIM: Logistics
Information Management ; PPC: Production Planning and Control; SCMIJ: Supply Chain Management: An
International Journal; TR: Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation

36

Table 3: Principal component body and related issues in SCM

SCM issue

PCB

Frequency

Performance measurement

BST

44

Supply chain integration

STM

36

Others

28

Relationship management

REP

23

Information sharing and commitment

LOG

21

Collaboration

REP

16

Strategy formulation

STM

15

Information technology

MKT

14

Green supply

ORB

13

Quality

REP

12

Supply chain practices

BST

12

Incentives

LOG

11

Identification of Barriers for SCM

STM

10

Critical success factors

BST

10

Design of supply chain

STM

10

Type of supply chain

BST

10

Environmental change or influencing factors

LOG

Returns management

LOG

Agile supply chain management

BST

Supply chain co-ordination

STM

Integration technology

ORB

Supply chain modeling

STM

Total quality management

BST

Benchmarking supply chain practices

BST

Closed loop supply chain

STM

Customer satisfaction

MKT

Product development

STM

Status of SCM in a field or industry or nation

37

SCM issue

PCB

Frequency

Reverse supply chain

BST

Supply chain diagnostics

BST

Supply chain variability

STM

Business process reengineering

STM

Decision support system

STM

Supplier management

REP

Collaborative planning, forecasting and replenishment

REP

Consumer behavior

ORB

Competitive Strategy, advantages etc.

STM

Customer service

MKT

Efficient consumer response

MKT

Just in Time

REP

Outsourcing

REP

Purchasing

REP

Supply chain optimization

STM

Supply chain implementation

STM

Skills and supply chain partnerships

REP

Selection of Techniques and tools

BST

Vendor managed inventory

LOG

Demand management

LOG

Disruptions in the supply chain

LOG

Electronic commerce

MKT

Electronic data interchange

BST

Flexibility

STM

Forecasting

STM

Inventory management

LOG

Lean production

STM

Ordering policies

LOG

38

SCM issue

PCB

Frequency

Sustainable supply chain development

BST

Value chain analysis

BST

Academic debate

Others

Alignment theory

STM

Business process analysis

STM

Buyer focus

REP

Cross functional teams

REP

Cost reduction

STM

DRP ( distribution requirement planning)

LOG

Economic cluster theory

STM

Efficiency of supply chain

REP

Inventory-production-distribution planning

REP

Marketing

MKT

Modularization

LOG

Material requirement planning

BST

Modern technology applied to SCM

BST

Power balance

REP

Phase of product life cycle

STM

Product range management

STM

Postponement

LOG

Responsiveness in supply chain

BST

Risk management

STM

Supplier evaluation

REP

Supply chain security

ORB

Social responsibility

ORB

Streamlining

BST

Synchronized supply chain management

BST

Supply chain tools

BST

39

SCM issue

PCB

Frequency

System thinking

BST

Time performance of chains

BST

Trust development

REP

Concurrent engineering

BST

Cash flow analysis

STM

Conflict in supply chain

ORB

Continuous improvement

BST

Communication strategies

ORB

Enterprise resource planning

MKT

Ethics in supply chain management

BST

Facilities network design

LOG

Frameworks

BST

Human resource management

ORB

Integrated enterprise modeling

MKT

Inertia in supply chain

LOG

Joint-ventures

ORB

Knowledge base

LOG

Logistic design

STM

Negotiation

REP

Operations scheduling

LOG

Organizational behavior

ORB

Quality of relationship

REP

Radio frequency identification

BST

Strategic alignment

STM

Six sigma

BST

SWOT analysis

BST

Transaction cost

BST

Transportation optimization

LOG

40

SCM issue

PCB

Frequency

Visibility

LOG

Virtual supply chain

MKT

Waste management

BST

Warehouse network redesign

LOG

Legend - STM: Strategic management; BST: Best practices; ORB: Organization behavior; REP:
Relationships and partnerships; LOG: Logistics; MKT: Marketing

41

Table 4: Frequency of principal component bodies in selected SCM literature

Principal component body
(PCB)
Best practices
Strategic management
Logistics
Relationships and partnerships
Marketing
Organizational behavior
Others
Total

No. of issues
in each PCB
30
28
19
18
9
9
2
115

42

Frequency
of articles
147
153
79
92
36
32
30
569

Total % of articles
25.8
26.9
13.9
16.2
6.3
5.6
5.3
100

14

14

32

20

34

47

42

61

38

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

1997

1996

13

1995

1999

1994

1998

Combination

Year

28

24

18

12

19

11

11

Manufacturer

N/A

Supplier

Retailer

3PL

Entity of analysis

Consumer

Distributor

4PL

43

51

69

39

42

40

29

31

19

12

13

10

Firm

11

12

Network

11

10

Chain

Dyad

Level of analysis

N/A

Assets

10

Information

Others

64

74

50

50

46

39

37

22

15

18

11

12

Combination

Element of exchange

Table 5: Year-wise distribution of entity of analysis, level of analysis and element of exchange

Relationship

77

92

67

65

62

41

45

29

26

21

15

14

Total

Table 6: Frequency of empirical research studies in SCM in various parts of the world
Country/
Region

Nos

Asia Pacific*
North America*
South East Asia*
UAE*
South Korea
Turkey
Korea*
Canada
Netherlands
Taiwan
India
Scandinavia*
Sweden
Australia
Hong Kong
Italy
China
Europe*
UK
USA
Others
Not mentioned
Total

1
1
1
1
2
5
6
7
10
10
14
11
11
12
12
15
18
25
66
94
112
136
569

0.18
0.18
0.18
0.18
0.35
0.88
1.05
1.23
1.76
1.76
2.46
1.93
1.93
2.11
2.11
2.64
3.16
4.39
11.60
16.52
19.68
23.73

* Indicates region or continent

44

Table 7: Frequency of articles for the industries of data collection

Industry

Nos

Aerospace
Retail
Chemical
IT
Apparel
Construction
3PL
Electronics
Automobile
Food and Agriculture
Manufacturing
Not mentioned
Others
Multiple
Total

10
11
13
14
20
21
22
29
31
45
86
104
55
108
569

1.76
1.93
2.28
2.46
3.51
3.69
3.87
5.10
5.45
7.91
15.11
18.28
9.67
18.98

45

Table 8: Frequency distribution of performance measurement articles with reference to

entity of analysis, level of analysis and element of exchange
Year
1996
Articles
2
Entity of analysis
3PL
0
4PL
0
Combination
2
Consumer
0
Distributor
0
Manufacturer
0
N/A
0
Retailer
0
Supplier
0
Level of analysis
Chain
0
Dyad
0
Firm
0
N/A
0
Network
2
Element of exchange
0
Assets
Information
0
Combination
1
Others
0
Relationship
1

1997

1998

1999

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

Total

11

15

17

87

0
0
1
0
0
0
0
0
0

1
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0

0
0
2
0
0
0
0
0
0

0
0
2
0
0
0
0
0
0

0
0
3
0
0
1
0
1
0

0
0
9
0
0
0
0
0
0

0
0
5
0
0
0
0
0
1

0
0
6
0
1
0
0
0
1

0
0
10
0
0
1
0
0
0

0
0
9
0
0
6
0
0
0

1
0
12
0
0
4
0
0
0

0
0
6
0
0
0
1
0
1

2
0
67
0
1
12
1
1
3

0
0
1
0
0

0
0
1
0
0

0
0
2
0
0

0
1
0
0
1

2
0
2
0
1

0
0
9
0
0

0
0
5
0
1

1
0
6
0
1

0
0
9
0
2

0
1
11
0
3

2
0
13
0
2

0
0
8
0
0

5
2
67
0
13

0
0
1
0
0

0
0
1
0
0

0
0
2
0
0

1
0
1
0
0

0
1
3
0
1

0
1
8
0
0

1
0
5
0
0

2
0
5
0
1

1
1
8
1
0

3
1
9
1
1

1
3
13
0
0

0
1
7
0
0

9
8
64
2
4

46

Outcome 2: Significant findings

Analysis after classification of articles

Outcome 3: Future directions

> Purpose of empirical research

> Entity of analysis
> Element of exchange
> Sample industry

Figure 1: Literature review methodology adopted in the paper

Outcome 1: Gaps identified

> Empirical research growth in SCM

>PCBs and related issues in SCM
> Level of analysis
> Country of sample industry
> Performance measurement

Step 6

Step 5

Step 4

Empirical research article selection:

Select articles that use one or more of following research designs:
> Survey
> Case study (single or multiple)
> Panel study
>Focus group

Classes under which every research article will be classified

Step 3

Step 2

Step 1

Journal selection:
Search supply chain in article title and
select journals that contain 75% of these articles

Research article
sample preparation
for review

Selection of database:
>Emerald > Taylor and Francis
> Science direct > Wiley inter-science

Time Horizon for selection of papers:

From year 1980 till end of year 2008

Figures

TR

IJ

PP

LI M
EG

SC

M
CM

JO
JS

OM

M
TM

IM
JM

R
DS

I JP

M
I JP

DL

PM

IM

I JP

RM

I JL

I JO

OR

CI

PS

I JL

EJ

EJ

MJ

CC

BP

% o f p a p e rs in e m p ir ic a l
re s e a r c h
1
0.9
0.8
0.7
0.6
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0

Name of journal

Figure 2: Percentage of articles published in empirical research for each journal

No. of empirical research papers

100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
1994 1995

1996

1997 1998

1999 2000

2001 2002

2004

2005 2006

2007 2008

Year of publication

Figure 3: Year wise distribution of empirical research articles in SCM

Biographical Notes

Rambabu Kodali is currently serving as a Professor and Group Leader of the

Mechanical Engineering Group and Engineering Technology Group at Birla Institute of
Technology & Science (BITS), Pilani, India. He has published a number of papers in
various national and international journals and has participated in a number of
conferences, where he presented technical papers. His research interests are in the areas
of Flexible Manufacturing Systems (FMS), Supply Chain Management (SCM),
Computer Integrated Manufacturing Systems (CIMS), lean manufacturing systems,
manufacturing excellence/World-class Manufacturing (WCM), innovative product design
and development and world-class maintenance systems. He has completed several
research projects in FMS, CIMS and WCM. He has developed 18 the curriculum of 18
first degree, higher degree, work-integrated and collaborative programmes apart from
developing and establishing the centre for FMS at BITS, Pilani.

Gunjan Soni did his B.E. from University of Rajasthan and M.Tech from IIT, Delhi. He
is presently pursuing PhD form BIITS-Pilani and working as a Lecturer with Mechanical
Engineering Group, BITS, Pilani. He has over 4 years teaching experience at under
graduate and graduate levels. His areas of research interest are supply chain management,
manufacturing management, operations research and optimization.