Trust-related dynamics in the supply chain relationship

• Conventionally, different company-supplier relationship areas have been illustrated by distinguishing five different relationship categories between the supplier or subcontractor and the buyer company, namely adversarial leverage, preferred supplier, single sourcing, network sourcing partnership, and strategic supplier alliance. This implies that the supplier’s importance to the buyer company also changes and vice versa. One delaying element which retards the evolution of a supply relationship is a lack of trust. This element manifests itself as poor information flows, restricted knowledge sharing, and suspicion between stakeholders. Therefore trust is one of the most important elements in improving dyadic relationships. Trust is becoming an ever more essential managing element between companies when they integrate their activities, form and maintain their dyadic relationship, and create control systems.In the paper is discussed personal trust and system-based trust affecting supplier relationships in the supply chain context. Empirical material was collected by means of a survey and interviews. The managers of the case company estimated how they trust and trusted their suppliers and how reliable their suppliers actually are or were. The case company is involved with complicated projects that include several hundred suppliers.We introduce some results from the survey study (sample n=392 persons) and from the interviews with the focus group, in order to explore how the company’s defined company-supplier relationshipis related to the expected level of trust and how the expected trust varies in different supplier relationships. The results indicate that different aspects and expectation of trust in the case company has led to the situation where the supplier categorization is unclear in the company’s organization,which can lead to confusion in supply management. This in turn implies that organization’s own attitudes and changes in trust may be a source of dynamics that impedes efficient and effective supply network management.

Ämnesord

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Ekonomi och näringsliv -- Företagsekonomi (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Economics and Business -- Business Administration (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

Trust

supplier relationship

supply chain management

Publikations- och innehållstyp

ref (ämneskategori)

kon (ämneskategori)