Redalyc.Mass Customization in Flat Organization: the Mediating Role
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Journal of Applied Research and Technology ISSN: 1665-6423 [email protected] Centro de Ciencias Aplicadas y Desarrollo Tecnológico México Yinan, Qi; Tang, Mincong; Zhang, Min Mass Customization in Flat Organization: The Mediating Role of Supply Chain Planning and Corporation Coordination Journal of Applied Research and Technology, vol. 12, núm. 2, abril, 2014, pp. 171-181 Centro de Ciencias Aplicadas y Desarrollo Tecnológico Distrito Federal, México Available in: http://www.redalyc.org/articulo.oa?id=47431170001 How to cite Complete issue Scientific Information System More information about this article Network of Scientific Journals from Latin America, the Caribbean, Spain and Portugal Journal's homepage in redalyc.org Non-profit academic project, developed under the open access initiative Mass Customization in Flat Organization: The Mediating Role of Supply Chain Planning and Corporation Coordination Yinan, Qi1, Mincong Tang*2 and Min Zhang3 1 School of Business, University of International Business and Economics, Beijing, PR. China 2 International Center for Informatics Research, Beijing Jiaotong University, Beijing, PR. China *[email protected] 3 Norwich Business School University of East Anglia, Norwich Research Park, Norwich, NR4 7TJ, UK ABSTRACT Based on the information processing theory, this study proposes that organizational flatness is an antecedence to the mass customization capability and the supply chain planning and corporation coordination mediates the relationship between organizational flatness and mass customization capability. Data from plants located in multiple countries across three different industry groups is analyzed to test the research hypotheses. The results show that the effect of organizational flatness on MCC is mediated by the coordination practices. It is the supply chain planning and corporate coordination that directly improve the MCC. Our results emphasize the importance of centralized management of value chain decisions and sharing of knowledge for MCC. 1. Introduction Mass customization capability (MCC) is now widely communication across manufacturing units’ accepted as an ability to reliably offer a high boundaries [5]. volume of different product options for a relatively Researchers have argued that the implementation large market that demands customization without of manufacturing innovation can be affected by the substantial trade-offs in cost, delivery, and quality organization’s structural design [6,7]. Based on the [1]. Nowadays MCC has become an imperative for information processing theory, the flat structure, many manufacturers to survive in the growing which is an important characteristic of flexible competition characterized by heterogenic customer organization, might play very important role in demands, accelerated new product development building MCC because the complex and dynamic investments, and shortened product life cycles [2]. production environment demands lateral relations and cross-boundary coordination ([1,8]). However, In moving to mass customization, an increasing there are inconsistent findings in the literature number of manufacturers distribute their concerning the effects of flexible organizational production capacity worldwide to achieve lower structure on MCC (e.g. [2]; [9]). Moreover, despite production and logistics costs, deeper knowledge the progress in research on MCC, the coordination of customer needs, and better customer services issues across supply chain and within the [2,3]. Such multisite manufacturing and distributed corporation have not been well studied. Therefore, production system represent a critical issue for we develop a framework to empirically explore the coordination of the different production plants and effects of structure flatness in facilitating among supply chain partners ([3,4]. Thus, mass coordination mechanisms (e.g. corporation customization implementation may be thwarted by coordination and supply chain planning) and the lack of mechanism to facilitate effective lateral building MCC in this work. Journal of Applied Research and Technology 171 Mass Customization in Flat Organization: The Mediating Role of Supply Chain Planning and Corporation Coordination, Yinan Qi et al. / 171‐181 2. Literature Review and Hypotheses [3]._MCC is highly related to specifying the interfaces across the value chain and Mass customization requires that certain standardizing them, which demands global conditions be in place and a collection of coordination capabilities. In order to efficiently and speedily customize for individuals, manufacturers manufacturing practices be implemented, such as need to consider both suppliers and customers time-based practices [10], modularity [11], when making decisions and planning their postponement [12], sociotechnical work design [2], activities at the supply chain level, which enables and learning [1]. As forecast and planning become them optimize the production process to deal with very complex, manufacturers need to redesign the the bottleneck and potential defects across the product, process, and the supply chain to ensure value chain [16, 24]. Thus, cross-border channels responsiveness to customer with low cost [13], connecting with external stakeholders will result in which have resulted in a highly distributed and faster and better decisions, which greatly improve autonomous manufacturing system either across plants’ the responsiveness and flexibility. the supply chain or within different plants inside the Therefore, we propose the following hypothesis: corporation [4]. H1: Supply chain planning is positively related to Managing these distributed manufacturing under MCC an uncertain demand is certainly the most challenging issue in low cost and high variety Corporate coordination refers to both coordinate production [14, 23]. Rungtusanatham and the purchasing and distribution activities and share Salvador argued that constraints, both between the innovations and knowledge among different plant and its parent organization and between plants at the corporate level. The basic tenet of plant and other entities within its supply chain, are mass customization is to reuse the common one of the important hindrance factors of the components among different products. Sharing transition from mass production to mass innovations and knowledge not only ensures that customization [13]. every unit of the corporation follows similar technical standards when designing product but Supply chain planning concerned with the details also helps the employees to understand the of coordination of the entire manufacturing knowhow of the components developed by others. production activities, including both suppliers and In this way, components can be reconfigured and customers. Though customization is embraced by reused not only in one plant but within the whole the manufacturer, cost and lead-time reduction corporation. Moreover, the standardization of initiatives are stressing suppliers to deliver to tight information system not only guarantees the just-in-time schedules and reduce the stocks in the information transparency among plants but also supply pipeline, which relies on the supply chain facilities the communication between plants and management and especially the responsiveness of supply chain partners. It provides a channel for the planning system [15]. The interdependences of explicit knowledge (the operational information) design and production require a lot of and tacit knowledge (knowhow of product and communication between manufacturers and their process) flow freely in the corporation. external stakeholders and such network production raises the importance of coordination of The need for rapid response to market changes, manufacturing facilities across the supply chain. for costs and time to market reductions, and for Coordination in the supply chain can be achieved highly customized products requires the enterprise by centralized planning [4]. Moreover, the value chain and production system to be more and application of design practices (modular design, more distributed. Aggregate planning with other configuration design and product family design) units helps the corporation increase volume on and advanced manufacturing technologies both raw material purchasing and common parts (postponement, build-to-order) demands the production, which reduce the total cost and bring manufacturer to replace internal production the economy of scale. Such coordination efforts planning by the complexity of external supply help corporate to locate the component part at low planning, since this supports the network operation cost production facilities and postpone the 172 Vol. 12, April 2014 Mass Customization in Flat Organization: The Mediating Role of Supply Chain Planning and Corporation Coordination, Yinan Qi et al. / 171‐181 customization physically near the customers [12]. other branches. Further, a flat structure is an Thus, aggregating the purchasing and distribution important characteristic of the flex organization, activities at the corporation level harmonize the which is good at information processing [8] and product production and achieve systematic knowledge on product design and production optimization. Coordination efforts link the value processes, such as innovation and purchase chain into a tightly connected agile network, in information, flows freely among the employees in which the main planning tasks at corporate level is different plants. Therefore, we propose the the coordination of various