The action research cycle reloaded: Conducting action research across buyer-supplier relationships

Abstract

a b s t r a c tBuyer-supplier relationships in purchasing and supply chain management practice are instrumental and often "messy". Indeed, the buyer and the supplier generally interact while pursuing their own interest, which are often subject to change over time. The action research method can help address the complexity of buyer-supplier relationships, generating important theoretical insights and relevant managerial implications. First, action research helps the researcher to better understand the problem by integrating diverse perspectives. Second, it allows the researcher to influence the buyer-supplier relationship directly, providing mutually beneficial solutions. This study proposes action research as a suitable interactive method that could complement other methodologies in the field of purchasing and supply chain management, as well as in other fields. An expanded action research framework -the "action research cycle reloaded" -is proposed and the role of the action researcher in the buyer-supplier context is discussed. The framework is applied to study the design and implementation of a supplier performance measurement system in the banking industry.

Qualitative Research Methodology in Social Sciences and Related Subjects

“…Vieri Maestrini, Davide Luzzini, Abraham B. (Rami) Shani, and Filomena Canterino have investigated the potentialities of action research within purchasing and supply management research, focusing in particular on buyer-supplier relationship issues [Maestrini et al, 2016]. Joseph A. Maxwell reviews earlier research, in both the natural and social sciences that clearly integrated qualitative and quantitative approaches and methods, and discusses some contemporary research traditions [Maxwell, 2016].…”

How inventory consignment programs can improve supply chain performance: a process oriented perspective

“…The data collection in the field was conducted through the participant observer approach (Roy et al, 2011;Maestrini et al 2016) by the authors because of their involvement with the buying organization (which had no previous IC experience) in evaluating potential inventory management systems. Schensul et.…”

Action Research Projects: one step ahead in the researcher-practitioner relationships

“…This chain of cycles is characterized because, at the end of each cycle, the teamwork performs a reflection on results, and it proposes a new cycle on the basis of the learning obtained previously. This iterative relation among AR cycles is called by Maestrini et al (2016) "the action research cycle reloaded", which they considere an effective research methodology in the field of purchasing and supply chain management.…”

“…In the cyclical process of AR presented by Susman and Evered (1978) in the Figure 1, it is possible to observe that in the axis is the "development of a client-system infrastructure". From a management perspective, Maestrini et al (2016) locate in this point the "monitoring" pointing out that this is a meta-step which is present throughout the cycle steps. Thus, the monitoring not only controls the managerial processes, but also it is concerning to monitoring the learning process and synthesizing theoretical advancement.…”