Sustainable evaluation and verification in supply chains: Aligning and leveraging accountability to stakeholders

• Date: 01 September 2015
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1016/j.jom.2015.06.002
• Author: Robert D. Klassen,Matteo Kalchschmidt,Stephan Vachon,Jury Gualandris
• Published date: 01 September 2015

Journal

of

Operations

Management

38

(2015)

1–13

Contents

lists

available

at

ScienceDirect

Journal

of

Operations

Management

j

o

ur

na

l

ho

mepage:

www.elsevier.com/locate

/jom

Sustainable

evaluation

and

verification

in

supply

chains:

Aligning

and

leveraging

accountability

to

stakeholders

Jury

Gualandrisa,

Robert

D.

Klassenb,

Stephan

Vachonb,∗,

Matteo

Kalchschmidtc

aUniversity

College

Dublin,

Smurfit

Graduate

Business

School,

Ireland

bWestern

University,

Ivey

Business

School,

Canada

cUniversità

degli

studi

di

Bergamo,

Department

of

Management,

Information

and

Production

Engineering,

Italy

a

r

t

i

c

l

e

i

n

f

o

Article

history:

Received

4

September

2013

Received

in

revised

form

23

June

2015

Accepted

25

June

2015

Available

online

4

July

2015

Accepted

by

Daniel

R.

Guide

Keywords:

Social

responsibility

Monitoring

Inclusivity

Stakeholder

engagement

a

b

s

t

r

a

c

t

Managers

are

being

challenged

by

multiple

(and

diverse)

stakeholders,

which

have

variety

of

expectations

and

informational

needs

about

their

firm’s

supply

chains.

Collectively,

these

expectations

and

needs

form

a

multi-faceted

view

of

stakeholder

accountability,

namely

the

extent

to

which

a

firm

justifies

behaviors

and

actions

across

its

extended

supply

chain

to

stakeholders.

To

date,

sustainable

supply

chain

manage-

ment

research

has

largely

focused

on

monitoring

as

a

self-managed

set

of

narrowly

defined

evaluative

activities

employed

by

firms

to

provide

stakeholder

accountability.

Nevertheless,

evidence

is

emerging

that

firms

have

developed

a

wide

variety

of

monitoring

systems

in

order

to

align

with

stakeholders’

expectations

and

leverage

accountability

to

stakeholders.

Drawing

from

the

accounting

literature,

we

synthesize

a

model

that

proposes

how

firms

might

address

accountability

for

sustainability

issues

in

their

supply

chain.

At

its

core,

the

construct

of

sustainable

evaluation

and

verification

(SEV)

captures

three

interrelated

dimensions:

inclusivity,

scope,

and

disclosure.

These

dimensions

characterize

how

supply

chain

processes

might

identify

key

measures,

collect

and

process

data,

and

finally,

verify

materi-

ality,

reliability

and

accuracy

of

any

data

and

resulting

information.

As

a

result,

the

concept

of

monitoring

is

significantly

extended,

while

also

considering

how

different

stakeholders

can

play

diverse,

active

roles

as

metrics

are

established,

audits

are

conducted,

and

information

is

validated.

Also,

several

antecedents

of

SEV

systems

are

explored.

Finally,

the

means

by

which

an

SEV

system

can

create

a

competitive

advantage

are

investigated.

©

2015

The

Authors.

Published

by

Elsevier

B.V.

This

is

an

open

access

article

under

the

CC

BY-NC-ND

license

(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

1.

Introduction

The

challenge

to

integrate

environmental

and

social

issues

into

the

management

of

supply

chains

has

grown

significantly

over

the

last

two

decades.

To

illustrate,

Mattel

initiated

a

massive

recall

of

products

–

made

by

a

supplier

in

China

–

after

discovering

they

con-

tained

lead

paint

applied

by

a

second-tier

supplier

(Story,

2007).

McDonald’s

Europe

had

to

address

issues

of

soybean

agriculture

in

Brazil

because

Greenpeace

reported

that

the

firm’s

sourcing

prac-

tices

contributed

to

the

depletion

of

the

rainforest

(Stoll,

2009).

More

recently,

Victoria’s

Secret

was

involved

in

a

scandal

regard-

ing

children

picking

cotton

in

Burkina

Faso

(Simpson,

2011).

This

new

operating

context

is

the

cumulative

result

of

diverse

demands

∗Corresponding

author.

Fax:

+1

519

661

3959.

E-mail

addresses:

jury.gualandris@ucd.ie

(J.

Gualandris),

rklassen@ivey.ca

(R.D.

Klassen),

svachon@ivey.ca

(S.

Vachon),

matteo.kalchschmidt@unibg.it

(M.

Kalchschmidt).

from

multiple

stakeholder

groups

including

investors,

consumers,

supply

chain

partners,

legislators,

and

non-governmental

organi-

zations

(NGOs).

It

is

not

surprising

that,

in

order

to

address

the

changing

and

diverse

concerns

of

a

wide

variety

of

stakeholders,

firms

have

adopted

a

plethora

of

practices,

which

in

turn

continue

to

evolve

over

time.

The

initial

focus

on

internal

operations

(Klassen

and

Whybark,

1999)

has

broadened

into

a

stronger

external

orienta-

tion

(Gualandris

and

Kalchschmidt,

2014;

Pagell

and

Wu,

2009).

As

a

result,

many

firms

are

now

attempting

to

ensure

that

operations

and

performance

within

their

plants

–

as

well

as

those

managed

by

partners

operating

upstream

and

downstream

in

the

supply

chain

–

are

more

sustainable.

Overall,

this

evolution

highlights

the

importance

for

firms

to

address

the

diverse

expectations

and

informational

needs

of

multiple

stakeholders

exposed

to

supply

chain

externalities

(Gonzalez-Benito

et

al.,

2011;

Hall

and

Vredenburg,

2003).

Collec-

tively,

these

expectations

and

needs

form

a

multi-faceted

view

of

stakeholder

accountability,

namely

the

extent

to

which

a

firm

jus-

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jom.2015.06.002

0272-6963/©

2015

The

Authors.

Published

by

Elsevier

B.V.

This

is

an

open

access

article

under

the

CC

BY-NC-ND

license

(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.

0/).