رهبری یکپارچه برای اجرای زنجیره تامین موثر : مطالعه تجربی از شرکت های کره ای

In spite of the plentiful literature on the role of leadership in general, the role of integrative leadership as a critical implementation mechanism for supply chain has been rarely explored. Based on the literature review, this study presents a research model that defines integrative leadership grounded in goal congruence theory. Integrative leadership indicates that the extent to which three senior leaderships – Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Chief Information Officer (CIO) and Supply Chain Officer (SCO) – are congruent with the common goal of supply chain will lead to better supply chain implementation outcomes. Specifically, effective supply chain implementation outcomes are achieved through synergistic information flows enabled by integrative leadership. Structural Equation Model (SmartPLS) is used to test the hypothesized relationships through the use of empirical data of Korean 142 firms. The empirical results provide managerial insight on the impact of integrative leadership on intangible, value-based, and qualitative supply chain management performance goals. Future research issues are discussed as well.

Increasingly, firms garner their attention to develop appropriate supply chain strategies for effective supply chain outcomes (Walters and Lancaster, 2000 and Cousins, 2005). In spite of such great endeavor, supply chain strategic initiatives often do not succeed. The primary reasons behind this failure are derived from lack of a cohesive and inclusive mechanism for shared goal as well as integration of diverse roles of senior executive leadership for effective supply chain implementation. Prior literature has examined implementation mechanisms for the successful supply chain outcomes in terms of responsiveness (Koste and Malhotra, 1999), socialization (Cousins and Menguc, 2006), flexibility (Sawhney, 2006) and motivation (Linderman et al., 2006). Performance measurement impacts on leadership (Elenkov, 2002 and Ukko et al., 2007), performance through leaders' profiles or goal orientation (Kulmala et al., 2009), dimension of strategic leadership, leadership efficiency and leader effectiveness (Hinterhuber and Friedrich, 2002 and Byrne and Bradley, 2007) discuss essential roles of leadership on organizational performance outcomes. However, the role of integrative leadership as a critical implementation mechanism for supply chain management has rarely been explored. This paper discusses how leadership that is congruent with the shared goal among senior executives is essential for enabling members to share strategic information-level information and in turn operational-level information, which lead to supply chain effectiveness. We call such leadership as integrative leadership. This integrative leadership involves highly collaborative and dynamic interactions among the key senior executives toward implementation of strategic initiative such as supply chain implementation in their organization. This paper explores a primary research question, “What is the effective integrative leadership mechanism for supply chain effectiveness”? Specifically, this article examines integrative leadership that involves the Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Chief Information Officer (CIO) and Supply Chain Officer (SCO). Because of their different positions in the organization, each executive has diverse perspectives and preferences. Thus, the integrative leadership mechanism requires shared motivation of these executives which enable them to work toward implementing effective processes and supply chain performance outcomes. Based on the literature review, this study presents a research model that highlights the focus of this research. An empirical validation is done through the survey data of 142 Korean firms. This paper is organized as follows. In the next section this study provides a literature review that presents theoretical rationale for the conceptual framework. For the hypotheses development specific research model is presented and the variables are defined. Each hypothesis defines and explains the nature of causal relationships between variables based on previous literature support or essential interactive characteristics of related variables. In the subsequent section this study discusses the research methods, analysis and results. The final section presents implications of this research and concluding remarks with a summary of limitations and future research issues.

Several limitations of this study are mentioned here before discussing research implications. A single-respondent (e.g., president, information technology director or purchasing manager) from each firm participated in the survey. Thus, this study shares the limitation of survey methods based on single respondents (Boyer and McDermott, 1999). Our research results report the individual perceptions on the nature of integrative leadership and performance impacts in his/her firm. Thus, it might not entirely accurate in assessing the real situation. Our additional inquiries included whether such responses are in fact reliable. Although we have not checked all participants with multiple responses, our selected follow-ups suggest fairly adequate descriptions of the organizational reality that they report. Our follow-up interviews suggest that these participants are in fact key informants in that these respondents occupy responsible positions with adequate understanding of the information sharing practices of the firm (Kumar et al., 1993). Future research which replicates our results using multiple respondents or methods will be desirable. This study has not actually measured the underlying constructs of integrative leadership, either. This study does not focus on the rich dimensions of integrative leadership. Rather, the focus of our study is the rich dynamics of integrative leadership in terms of their engagements through information sharing from which we derive useful managerial implications. First, this article contributes to the understanding of integrative leadership, which extends into the supply chain context. Many firms integrate their strategic- and operational-level information for the broad level of participation for organizational goals in a sustainable manner. A high level of inter-executive relationship among the CEO, CIO, and SCO is essential in providing vital information and knowledge culture in an organization for the important strategic initiatives such as implementation of supply chain. Particularly, this integrative leadership with shared goals facilitates organizations to achieve effective information flows across the organization. In Korean contexts, many SMEs accept dominant roles of executive leadership. With rapidly changing market environment and complex customer requirements, collaborative leadership is increasingly emphasized and yet rarely studied. Thus, this research sheds light on the nature of collaborative leadership in Korean SMEs contexts, in the form of information sharing capabilities of key functional roles and its impact on integration of strategic and operational information which further impact the performance outcomes in supply chain. Thus, key functional roles (executive, technical/informational and sourcing aspects) and the extent of vital scope of information integration (i.e., strategic and operational) are examined. Second, besides relatively small size and resource constraints, highly disciplinary and conformance-driven business culture, executive leadership tends to be strong and forceful in Korean contexts. At the same time, rapidly changing market conditions, expansion of Korean businesses in global market and increasing complexity of customer requirements dictate many Korean firms to adopt more open-information sharing and collaborative practices. This study suggests that for high level of supply chain performance outcomes, key managerial functions are working together to enhance their information capabilities. This suggests that vital information sharing and collaborative interactions among key manorial positions in the form of CEO (executive leadership), CIO (informational leadership) and CSO (sourcing leadership) in fact improves the quality of decision making process in supply chain level. Third, effective supply chain implementation requires the synergistic information flows in the increasingly information and knowledge intensive work environment. Integrative leadership needs specific focus—particularly synergistic information flows (i.e., strategic- and operational-information integration) with supply chain partners. Gradual supply chain breakdowns too often occur with the lack of integrative leadership followed by steady deterioration of information flows in critical decision making in all levels. As firms extend their value chain network contexts further up- and down-streams, senior management need to collaboratively, deliberately, and periodically examine the quality of intra- and inter-organizational information mechanisms and determine whether these information flows are used as the basis of sound decision making for a critical set of performance goals. Fourth, for the successful implementation of supply chain, not only tangible-based outcomes (profitability and cost reduction), but also intangible and value-based outcome measures are essential. Firms may use a periodic check-up system of the intangible and qualitative aspects of supply chain outcomes to ensure tangible supply chain outcomes (market and financial performance). Furthermore, understanding these complex performance outcomes (customer-based performance outcomes and financial performance results) would be useful in goal setting in the front end of strategy planning. At the same time evaluation of these complex performance outcomes would provide useful feedback mechanism to the business processes as well as integrative leadership to learn the lessons and move on with clarity of business targets and collaborative leadership commitment. Since this study did not examine the essential nature of integrative leadership, it would be useful to explore cognitive, behavioral and social dimensions of integrative leadership. This study also has not examined the competitive or market contexts. It is worthy to examine how different external contexts influence in multiple aspects of integrative leadership dimensions. Besides integrative leadership, it would be interesting to learn more about how strategy and structure interacts in the contexts of SMEs as they expand their product ranges and market scope. Future studies may also examine the expanded nature of integrative leadership that includes other functional executives (e.g., R & D, marketing, and engineering). The different patterns of integrative leadership may impact other critical operational practices beyond information sharing for effective supply chain outcomes. Subsequent studies may examine how an effective information flow impacts key business processes such as product development, manufacturing flows, customer relationship management, and sustainability practices. Supply chain performance outcomes may be extended to include other operational, market and financial outcomes. Furthermore, this research model and the expanded models may be tested in the context of other industries and different countries.