Fairness as a new antecedent for acquiring and preserving supplier satisfaction through the handling of conflict
Bezoen, Jelle (2022)
Pro gradu -tutkielma
Bezoen, Jelle
2022
School of Business and Management, Kauppatieteet
Kaikki oikeudet pidätetään.
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi-fe2022120769605
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi-fe2022120769605
Tiivistelmä
The concepts known as supplier satisfaction and preferred customer status have been gaining importance within supply chain management research. As such, these concepts must be assessed and updated in new and divergent situations to strengthen the research. To that extent this research looks to replicate this research in a new setting, mitigate the detrimental effect of conflict on supplier satisfaction through the usage of Conflict Handling Satisfaction and fairness, and potentially add the loss of supplier satisfaction as an new research branch.
The collection of data has been done by means of a questionnaire focused on both sides of a buyer-supplier dyad. However, dyadic research plays a minor part in this paper and is primarily preliminary research to further build upon in the future.
The effects of the antecedents of supplier satisfaction, and the further correlation between supplier satisfaction and preferred customer status have been reaffirmed within a new local online context. Furthermore, the augmenting effects of fairness on Conflict Handling satisfaction and Conflict Handling Satisfaction on supplier satisfaction in a conflict setting has been established.
For a few items the specific formulation of questions created a bias in the answering of these questions. The limited target audience translated into a scarce availability of respondents. The anonymity of the data acquisition limits the analysability of the dyadic results of this research. There is an increased difficulty associated with testing for conflict without active conflict being present within the testing environment. That being said, it is equally difficult to find organisations dealing with active conflict willing to allow this situation to be researched from an academic point of view.
Replication of the supplier satisfaction model in a new contexts strengthens the model and increases the range of its usability, both in future research directions and greater comparison material. Furthermore, two aspects have contributed to the satiation of research gaps and pave the way for future research to expand in their respective subjects; The addition of “loss of supplier satisfaction” to the supplier satisfaction research chain, and the establishing of the augmenting effect of fairness on Conflict Handling Satisfaction, and the effect of Conflict Handling Satisfaction on supplier satisfaction.
Additionally, this research introduces a pre-liminary investigation of the unhabitual inter-organisational and dyadic buyer supplier perspective pertaining to conflict and fairness. This paper expands research done into fairness, conflict and Conflict Handling Satisfaction by investigating the underexamined subject of inter-organisational conflict and fairness,
The successful application of the supplier satisfaction model as input for supplier relationship assessment provides managers with new ways to analyse suppliers. Furthermore, this research has developed a fairness toolset to assist managers in mitigating or solving the negative effects of conflict on supplier satisfaction. Compared to the common antecedents of supplier satisfaction, conflict handling is a measure that is easier to implement. As such, it provides a wide range of companies with the ability to mitigate loss of supplier satisfaction.
Originality/value
Within the supplier satisfaction research chain the fairness principles have not been previously been introduced. As such, this research is the first to inaugurate these principles.
The collection of data has been done by means of a questionnaire focused on both sides of a buyer-supplier dyad. However, dyadic research plays a minor part in this paper and is primarily preliminary research to further build upon in the future.
The effects of the antecedents of supplier satisfaction, and the further correlation between supplier satisfaction and preferred customer status have been reaffirmed within a new local online context. Furthermore, the augmenting effects of fairness on Conflict Handling satisfaction and Conflict Handling Satisfaction on supplier satisfaction in a conflict setting has been established.
For a few items the specific formulation of questions created a bias in the answering of these questions. The limited target audience translated into a scarce availability of respondents. The anonymity of the data acquisition limits the analysability of the dyadic results of this research. There is an increased difficulty associated with testing for conflict without active conflict being present within the testing environment. That being said, it is equally difficult to find organisations dealing with active conflict willing to allow this situation to be researched from an academic point of view.
Replication of the supplier satisfaction model in a new contexts strengthens the model and increases the range of its usability, both in future research directions and greater comparison material. Furthermore, two aspects have contributed to the satiation of research gaps and pave the way for future research to expand in their respective subjects; The addition of “loss of supplier satisfaction” to the supplier satisfaction research chain, and the establishing of the augmenting effect of fairness on Conflict Handling Satisfaction, and the effect of Conflict Handling Satisfaction on supplier satisfaction.
Additionally, this research introduces a pre-liminary investigation of the unhabitual inter-organisational and dyadic buyer supplier perspective pertaining to conflict and fairness. This paper expands research done into fairness, conflict and Conflict Handling Satisfaction by investigating the underexamined subject of inter-organisational conflict and fairness,
The successful application of the supplier satisfaction model as input for supplier relationship assessment provides managers with new ways to analyse suppliers. Furthermore, this research has developed a fairness toolset to assist managers in mitigating or solving the negative effects of conflict on supplier satisfaction. Compared to the common antecedents of supplier satisfaction, conflict handling is a measure that is easier to implement. As such, it provides a wide range of companies with the ability to mitigate loss of supplier satisfaction.
Originality/value
Within the supplier satisfaction research chain the fairness principles have not been previously been introduced. As such, this research is the first to inaugurate these principles.