As supply chain activities become more dispersed among customers, suppliers and service providers, there is an increased need for customers and suppliers to work together more closely. Supply chain integration (SCI) has been a highly researched topic during the last 20 years. A metaanalytic approach is used to provide a quantitative review of the empirical literature in SCI, and examines relevant design and contextual factors. Eighty independent samples across 86 peer-reviewed journal articles, yielding a total of 17,467 observations, were obtained and analyzed. While general support exists in favor of the positive impact of SCI on firm performance in the literature, this research helps clarify mixed findings that presently exist. Our results indicate that there is a positive and significant correlation between SCI and firm performance. Additional subgroups and moderators are tested and provide nuanced views of the scope and specific dimensions of SCI, firm performance and their relationships.

Sustainability has become a popular topic, not only in business research at large, but specifically in the supply chain management (SCM) discipline. In addition, the business ethics (BE) field has an extensive stream of literature focusing on supply chain topics. While some exchange of ideas can be witnessed, the two streams developed largely independently. A key purpose of this article is to examine and contrast existing research and knowledge creation, focusing on sustainability and corporate social responsibility (CSR) issues in supply chains, within and across these two disciplines. The in-depth systematic literature review covers 195 articles, published in 12 peer-reviewed journals from 2007 to 2013, examining the methodological and theoretical approaches, as well as the main research focus areas. We found highly complementary research topic areas but only limited synergy and dialogue between the disciplines. The research area at large would benefit from greater integration. Based on our findings, we propose a future research agenda that connects across the disciplines and highlights key areas that would benefit from further inquiry.

Information management is a core supply chain activity that is increasing in importance as firms strive to become more responsive to growing customer demand for innovative products. However, effective processing of information from customers and suppliers remains a struggle for most firms. Absorptive capacity provides a useful view of information processing activities, but the current understanding of how firms use it to improve performance and why some firms seem to develop it while others do not remains unclear. This study is grounded in information processing theory, and examines the role of absorptive capacity in linking a firm's responsive strategy and performance. We test a structural equation model on data from 711 manufacturing firms, and validate our results on a second sample of 677 firms. Our study makes three major contributions by providing evidence that: (1) absorptive capacity is motivated by a firm's responsive strategy; (2) it fully mediates the relationship between responsive strategy and firm performance, indicating that absorptive capacity is a necessary competence for firms that aim to deliver innovative products to customers; and (3) the relationship between responsive strategy and absorptive capacity is U‐shaped, indicating that when firms attempt to blend efficient and responsive strategies, their ability to develop absorptive capacity is diminished.

Interest in third‐party logistics has been steadily increasing over the last two decades. Recently, increased focus by researchers has produced a solid literature base of academic research. In this article, a meta‐analytic approach is employed to provide a quantitative review of the empirical literature and examine relevant constructs. Fifty‐four samples across 69 peer‐reviewed journal articles, yielding a total of 9,386 observations, were obtained and analyzed. We used transaction cost economics and the resource‐based view as lenses to hypothesize a structural model of the relationships between relational governance structure, logistics customer service, and firm performance. Additional relationships were also found and analyzed, helping to clarify the mixed existing findings in the literature. The study concludes by mapping out future directions for 3PL research, based on the study's findings.

Logistics customer service has received considerable attention over the past several decades. Evidence exists that superior logistics customer service leads to better overall firm performance. Yet mixed findings were observed, and this relationship has been tested across multiple operationalizations and diverse industry settings, which may contribute to these mixed findings. There is thus a need for a systematic analysis that examines all of the prior evidence in an aggregate inquiry of logistics customer service. Meta-analysis, which is a relatively under-utilized methodology in supply chain management research, is applied to provide a quantitative examination of 37 sample studies and an assessment of overall population effects. The main contribution of this research is that we statistically aggregate and summarize existing research on logistics customer service. In addition, moderators that affect the relationship between logistics customer service and firm performance are examined. The results provide evidence that logistics customer service has a significant positive relationship with firm performance; however, significant heterogeneity was detected. This points to areas in need of additional research in order to obtain generalizable evidence.