Editorial

Citation

Burgess, T. and Heap, J. (2013), "Editorial", International Journal of Productivity and Performance Management, Vol. 62 No. 3. https://doi.org/10.1108/ijppm.2013.07962caa.001

Editorial

Editorial

Article Type: Editorial From: International Journal of Productivity and Performance Management, Volume 62, Issue 3.

This issue of the journal has its main emphasis on supply-chain performance but includes a secondary emphasis on managerial initiatives such as total quality management (TQM), Six Sigma and total productive maintenance (TPM). The first four papers are academic papers while the last two fall into the category of reflective practice. The first paper by Björklund and Forslund integrates the modern concern for the environment with the performance of supply chains. Logistics and transportation are often singled out because of the environmental damage arising from their fuel-related emissions; hence environmental management and environmental performance measurement systems (EPMS) are of increasing interest in this industrial sector. The authors carried out a questionnaire survey of shippers and logistics service providers in Sweden to find out why they use EPMS and applied regression analysis to the relationship between their EPMS and its supply-chain focus. Perhaps, unsurprisingly, the most common reason given for using an EPMS was a company's internal focus rather than looking at the supply chain overall; and this same emphasis came through in the results of the regression analysis. The paper's findings indicate that there is still a long way to go in terms of securing the often-advocated, all-embracing supply-chain management approach.

In the second paper the authors study the performance of another important element of transportation: airlines. Singh and Sushil deploy an interesting approach to modelling the connection between the input factors and outcome variables for total quality management (TQM). Their method, total interpretive structural modelling (TISM), uses data obtained from industry experts in India to identify variables and relationships within a model that describes how performance occurs within a TQM environment. Although the model is developed within a particular geographical context, India, it appears worthy of trying out elsewhere in other airline settings. Even if the model is not transferable, their interesting methodology appears suitable for use in many other situations.

With our modern economy dependent on goods flowing smoothly along supply lines, the condition of road infrastructure makes an important contribution to supply-chain performance. In the past road maintenance was often the responsibility of, and carried out by, public sector organisations such as local government. More and more the task of maintenance is outsourced to the private sector and managed on a performance basis. In the third paper Sultana, Rahman and Chowdhury review the literature on the managerial initiative of performance-based contract maintenance of road infrastructure.

If, as is often stated, competition between supply chains will become the norm then the problem of measuring the performance of supply chains will be increasingly important. In our next paper, Vaidya and Hudnurkar set out to tackle this problem using a systematic, quantitative approach that relies on the analytic hierarchy process. They provide a comprehensive set of criteria that can be used to evaluate the supply-chain performance. They also include in their paper a worked out case study to demonstrate their advocated approach.

In our fifth paper Kokkranikal, Antony, Kosgi and Losekoot concentrate on one of the currently popular managerial initiatives relevant to our area, Six Sigma. They examine, via a case study of a hotel within a major international chain, the barriers and challenges to implementing Six Sigma in the hospitality industry. They surface three challenging issues related to the industry, namely: data collection, defining projects and obtaining group consensus. One hopes that as Six Sigma penetrates more and more into our business fabric that these barriers and challenges might be observed less and less!

Our last piece is a reflective and personalised account of the adoption of TPM by Munjal-Showa Limited, an Indian-based automotive supplier. This is a real antidote to the drier, academic accounts that are often published in journals – including some in our own! However, the presentation style should not lead the reader to underestimate the value of the piece – it describes an initiative of importance for any manufacturer and contains some impressive data on the benefits that TPM has brought to this company.

Tom Burgess and John Heap