REPUTATION RESEARCH

Corporate Reputation and the Supply Chain: Disclosed Provenance and Traceability (DTP). Steve New, University Lecturer in Operations Management

Research question Why do some organisations disclose the provenance of goods and services, and others not? What are the consequences of these choices for the management of corporate reputation? How is this affected by advances in technology? Background It is tempting to think of 'corporate reputation' as something that is principally determined within the confines of a single organisation. Increasingly, however, firms' reputations are dependent on a complex bundle of issues that arise in and from the supply chain: examples include the working conditions in suppliers' factories, the safety and authenticity of the components and ingredients that are used in the production process, and the political issues raised by sourcing from questionable regimes. These issues are about ethics, the environment, politics, safety and quality - and how organisations respond to them has implications for a wide range of business functions. These are not, in the main, challenges that can be fully addressed by public relations and corporate communication alone: reputational issues in the supply chain have consequences for operations, marketing and strategy. There is an increasing body of work that addresses these issues, and already extensive literatures exist which seek to marry practical concerns with a wide range of theoretical frameworks. However, much of this work has failed to address an important prior question: in order to evaluate supply chain responsibilities, one must have an idea what the supply chain is. In other words, the extent to which consumers can hold firms accountable for the supply chain depends on how visible the provenance of goods and services is. But it is not just the transparency for consumers that matters: firms themselves may not fully understand the provenance of that which they procure, especially if the supply chains are complex and fluid. Finally, questions of provenance are also of interest to regulators and certifying bodies. So before one can make much progress in evaluating the reputational dynamics of supply chain practice, one has to explore the extent to which firms know and reveal the provenance of goods. The research described in this proposal seeks to explore some fundamental questions about the dynamics of how firms know and reveal the provenance of
Oxford University Centre for Corporate Reputation Reputation Research 1 November 2008

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goods. Through a series of case studies, the study will examine how and why a sample of contrasting organizations approach these matters, and will attempt to draw out appropriate comparisons.

Research Plan The research will use a case study approach to generate descriptive models of the approaches adopted by firms in contrasting industries. Case Selection The four main case study organisations that will be studied will be chosen to provide contrasting settings. Two main dimensions will be used to frame the sample: organisations operating in consumer versus industrial markets, and, organisations at different stages of the supply chain. These dimensions form the grid shown as below:

Place in Chain Retailer/Distributor Manufacturer Industrial Markets Industrial distributor Food ingredient supplier or Building products supplier Mobile phone manufacturer/ Sports equipment manufacturer

Consumer Markets

Major retailer:

The choice of firms in this framework will also be driven by the following criteria: The organisations/industry in question must have some record of product recall issues; The organisations must be of sufficient scale (i.e. to be large enough to have dedicated procurement and supply chain functions); The organisations must deal in products of a minimum degree of complexity (i.e. multiple products, many suppliers).

Data Collection and Analysis The analysis of each case will take account of the following issues: Scale and stability of product range;
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Oxford University Centre for Corporate Reputation Reputation Research

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Structure and fluidity of supply chains; Branding and extent of inbranding; Relevant ethical, environmental, political, safety and quality issues; Industry norms and organisational practice in regard to confidentiality.

Data collection will be by: Interviews with managers from the organisation, its suppliers and customers; Secondary data analysis; Documentary analysis; Where possible, non-participant observation; Where appropriate, small-scale surveys.

Conceptual and Analytical Framework As the cases are exploratory, it is premature to identify the exact conceptual framework that will be used in the study. However, three main approaches suggest themselves: transaction cost economics; institutional theory; and, social network analysis. Each of these has been applied to supply chain research, and may provide a basis for interpretation of the harvested data. Dissemination The research will be lead to the preparation of papers targeted at leading journals. This will be complemented by: Presentation of the findings to practitioner and academic conferences; Brief White Papers, for dissemination via the Centre for Corporate Reputation; Teaching case studies; Articles in practitioner-oriented publications;

The material could contribute towards the preparation of a planned book to be co-authored with Dr Dana Brown, Provenance: The Politics of Origin. This research is being supported by the Oxford University Centre for Corporate Reputation. www.sbs.ox.ac.uk/reputation

Oxford University Centre for Corporate Reputation Reputation Research

November 2008