Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of use of information technology (IT) and relational aspect on supply chain collaboration (SCC) in the context of developing country, in this case India. The study has considered two important components of use of IT namely, information sharing and information quality and further investigated their impact on SCC. Two important components of relational aspect, namely, trust and commitment have been considered, as identified from literature review, trust has been considered as an antecedent to commitment and the impact of commitment on SCC has been investigated. The research also investigates the impact of SCC on financial performance of the firm. Design/methodology/approach Based on extensive review of SCC literature a research model has been proposed hypothesizing the relationships between information sharing, information quality, trust, commitment, SCC and financial performance. The proposed research model is tested using data from 166 manufacturing firms across India. Structural equation modeling was used to test the hypothesized relationships between constructs. Findings The results showed that there is significant positive impact of information sharing and information quality on SCC. Consistent with earlier literature, trust was found to have a significant positive impact on commitment and commitment was found to have significant positive impact on SCC. Further, the findings confirmed the positive relationship between SCC and financial performance of the firm. Originality/value This is the first study to the best of our knowledge which has investigated the impact of SSC on financial performance in Indian context. This study has taken into account both use of IT and relational aspect simultaneously and investigated their impact on SCC.

This study examined the role of individual and contextual factors in the development of career optimism, which leads to career decisiveness using motivational systems theory (MST). The study was conducted by adopting a longitudinal study design using responses from 254 management students in India. Results of structural equation modeling analyses suggested that the hypothesized model adequately fit the data. Career optimism mediated the relationship between each of the components of MST (goal, capability beliefs, context beliefs, and emotions) and career decisiveness except goals. Career optimism partially mediated the relationship between goals and career decisiveness. Furthermore, results indicated that none of the demographic variables (age, gender, qualification, and academic background) had any effect on either career optimism or career decisiveness.

A systematic review of literature on the relationship between Supply Chain Integration (SCI) and firm performance shows inconsistency in the results. Some of the studies show a direct relationship between SCI and firm performance, while other shows no significant relationship between these constructs. Further, there is a stream of research which proved that the relationship between SCI and performance is mediated through some intermediate performance outcomes. Based on the gaps identified through an extensive literature review, this study proposes that three dimensions of SCI -supplier integration, customer integration and internal integration will lead to different performance outcomes which will further influence financial perfor mance of the firm. Further, a conceptual framework is presented postulating the relationship between constructs of interest.

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Purpose Even though supply chain integration (SCI) has been considered as a vital contributor to business performance, the research shows inconsistency in its finding. Accounting for these inconsistencies, researchers (Fabbe-Costes and Jahre, 2007; Van der Vaart and van Donk, 2008) have highlighted the need to relate the level of integration in a single relationship to the performance outcomes of that relationship. The purpose of this paper is to make an effort in this direction and investigate the impact of customer integration (an important dimension of SCI) on customer-related performance outcome (CRPO) and financial performance of the firm. Design/methodology/approach Based on an extensive literature review, a research model has been developed hypothesizing the relationships between customer integration, CRPO and financial performance. The research model is then tested using data collected from 214 Indian manufacturing companies. Structural equation modeling was used to test the hypothesized relationship between constructs of interest. Findings The result showed that there is no direct effect of customer integration on financial performance instead the relationship is fully mediated through CRPO. Originality/value This study conceptualizes and develops scale for the specific performance outcome resulting from a high level of integration between manufacturer and key customers and labels it as CRPOs. It further investigates the mediating role of this immediate performance outcome on the relationship between customer integration and firm performance.