Supply chain collaborative advantage: A firm's perspective

In the past decades, firms have strived to achieve greater collaborative advantages with their supply chain partners. The objective of the study is to uncover the nature and characteristics of supply chain collaborative advantage from a focal firm's perspective. Collaborative advantage is defined as strategic benefits gained over competitors in the marketplace through supply chain partnering and partner enabled knowledge creation, and it relates to the desired synergistic outcome of collaborative activity that could not have been achieved by any firm acting alone. The research conceptualizes supply chain collaborative advantage as the five dimensions: process efficiency, offering flexibility, business synergy, quality, and innovation. Data were collected through a web survey of U.S. manufacturing firms in various industries. Reliable and valid instruments were developed through rigorous empirical analysis including structured interviews, Q-sort, and a large-scale study. Predictive validity is evaluated by demonstrating a strong and positive relationship between supply chain collaborative advantage and firm performance. The construct and measures in this study have provided a rich and structured understanding of collaborative advantage in a supply network. The results of the structural analysis indicate that supply chain collaborative advantage indeed has a bottom-line influence on firm performance. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.