From Supply Chains to Supply Ecosystems: Implications for Strategic Sourcing Research and Practice

• Author: David J. Ketchen,T. Russell Crook,Christopher W. Craighead
• Published date: 01 September 2014
• Date: 01 September 2014
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/jbl.12057

Editorial

From Supply Chains to Supply Ecosystems: Implications for

Strategic Sourcing Research and Practice

David J. Ketchen, Jr.

1

, T. Russell Crook

2

, and Christopher W. Craighead

3

1

Auburn University

2

University of Tennessee

3

The Pennsylvania State University

Traditionally, sourcing decisions such as what to buy and from whom to buy it were viewed as clerical in nature. Today, however, many

executives view sourcing decisions as strategic and these decisions are being made from more prominent positions within firms. Indeed,

over time more companies are embracing the concept of strategic sourcing—making acquisition decisions with the intent of creating value and

achieving a competitive advantage. In this article, we introduce the Special Topic Forum articles on strategic sourcing and performance. Each

offers important implications for strategic sourcing research and practice. An overall implication is that some traditional supply chains appear to

be giving way to supply ecosystems, which represent a set of interdependent and coordinated organizations that share common adaptive chal-

lenges and that collectively shape the creation and nurturing of a sourcing base that contributes to competitive advantage and superior perfor-

mance. We offer several theoretical perspectives that hold promise for explaining supply ecosystem functioning and outcomes. In terms of

practice, firms need to adapt their strategic sourcing to this evolution or run the risk of being weakened.

Keywords: performance; strategic sourcing; supply chain; supply ecosystem

When we pursued the idea for the Special Topic Forum (STF)

on “Strategic Sourcing and Performance,”our overarching objec-

tive was to attract high caliber research that provides new

insights into the role of sourcing in shaping organizational out-

comes. Sourcing is a key supply management function; it refers

to identifying suitable suppliers, negotiating terms and condi-

tions, and working with the supply base to create value via

improvements such as cost reduction, risk reduction, and

increased sales. Although sourcing has been written about for

more than 180 years (e.g., Babbage 1832), the idea that sourcing

can be “strategic”is much more recent in its origins.

Historically, sourcing was viewed as clerical in nature. The

sourcing process typically involved people merely buying what-

ever inputs they were directed by higher-ups to purchase. From

top management’s standpoint, there was little belief that sourcing

could add value to the firm. Over time, sourcing’s perceived

importance grew and it became viewed as a tactical area. More

specifically, sourcing staffers became regarded as informed deci-

sion makers and sourcing played an increasingly valuable role

for the firm, primarily by reducing costs and ensuring the avail-

ability of inputs.

In recent years, the notion of strategic sourcing has attracted

attention from firms and researchers alike. Strategic sourcing

refers to making supply management decisions with the intent to

create distinctive value and to achieve a competitive advantage.

A view of sourcing as strategic recognizes that sourcing can help

firms create value not only by managing costs and availability,

but also by collaborating with other supply chain members to

reduce risk, improve customer responsiveness, develop innova-

tive products and processes, and market innovations more effec-

tively (Welch and Nayak 1992; Craighead et al. 2009).

Although the evolution in sourcing from clerical to tactical to

strategic has been accompanied by a large body of research, we

proposed this STF because we believed that new insights could

build on past research accomplishments and could thereby help

the concept of strategic sourcing reach its full potential. To this

end, we believe that the STF articles offer novel and important

insights into strategic sourcing research and practice. In the

remainder of this editors’introduction, we preview the STF arti-

cles and then develop some potentially important implications

for research and practice that center on the notion of supply eco-

systems. Before doing so, we would like to note that creating an

STF depends on the efforts of many. We are grateful to all of

the authors who submitted their work, to the reviewers, and to

the Journal of Business Logistics co editors—Stanley E. Fawcett

and Matthew A. Waller—for providing us with the opportunity

to develop the STF.

PREVIEW OF THE SPECIAL TOPIC FORUM ARTICLES

The first STF article, by Schoenherr et al. (2014), takes a nuanced

and compelling look at strategic environmental sourcing (SES),

which refers to firms developing collaborative working relation-

ships with suppliers that are geared toward protecting nature. The

authors leverage insights from institutional and resource-based the-

ories to examine the complex interplay among institutional pres-

sures (e.g., government regulations), resources (i.e., managerial

engagement on environmental issues), and SES. They also exam-

ine how this complex interplay shapes performance. The authors

Corresponding author:

Christopher W. Craighead, Department of Supply Chain & Informa-

tion Systems, Smeal College of Business, Suite 483, The Pennsylva-

nia State University, University Park, PA 16802. E-mail:

cwc13@psu.edu

Journal of Business Logistics, 2014, 35(3): 165–171

© Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals