Trust and Trustworthiness in Supply Chain Management

Trust and Trustworthiness in Supply Chain Management
Author: Yanchong Zheng
Publisher:
Total Pages:
Release: 2011
Genre:
ISBN:

This dissertation studies the role of two important behavioral factors, trust and trustworthiness, in supply chain management. In particular, we investigate an important operations context, forecast information sharing. We consider a two-tier supply chain in which the upstream supplier solicits demand forecast information from the downstream manufacturer for making capacity investment decisions. To ensure abundant supply, the manufacturer has an incentive to inflate her forecast in a costless, nonbinding, and nonverifiable type of communication known as "cheap talk." In Chapter 2, we employ a novel methodology that combines theoretical modeling with experimental methods to show that the non-pecuniary factors of trust and trustworthiness can significantly improve the efficacy of forecast sharing. Specifically, we first show that under standard game theory, the only equilibrium in our setting is uninformative: the manufacturer's report is independent of her forecast and the supplier does not use the report to determine capacity. However, we observe in controlled laboratory experiments that parties cooperate even in the absence of reputation-building mechanisms and complex contracts. We argue that the underlying reason for cooperation is trust. The current literature on forecast sharing and supply chain coordination implicitly assumes that supply chain members either absolutely trust each other and cooperate when sharing forecast, or do not trust each other at all. Contrary to this all-or-nothing view, we determine that a continuum exists between these two extremes. In addition, we determine (i) when trust is important in forecast information sharing, (ii) how trust is affected by changes in the supply chain environment, and (iii) how trust affects related operational decisions. To explain and better understand the observed behavioral regularities, we also develop an analytical model of trust to incorporate both pecuniary and non-pecuniary incentives in the game-theoretic analysis of cheap-talk forecast communication. The model identifies and quantifies how trust and trustworthiness induce effective cheap-talk forecast sharing under the wholesale price contract. We also determine the impact of repeated interactions and information feedback on trust and cooperation in forecast sharing. We conclude with a discussion on the implications of our results for developing effective forecast management policies. In Chapter 3, we further extend our research on trust and trustworthiness in supply chains to a multi-country context. We experimentally investigate the country-level variations in trust and trustworthiness between China and the U.S. in forecast sharing. We first note that both trust and trustworthiness and the supplier's capability to solve for the optimal capacity decision affect the efficacy of forecast sharing and the resulting profits. Thus, we disentangle these two aspects with a novel experimental design. Our experimental results first demonstrate the robustness of the pull-to-center bias in both countries when people solve a complex decision problem under uncertainty (i.e., the newsvendor problem). We next determine that Chinese consistently exhibit lower trust and trustworthiness than their U.S. counterparts. In addition, when risk or vulnerability entailed by trusting another increases, the relative decline in trust (measured by the percentage decrease of trust) is more evident in the U.S., whereas the absolute decline is more pronounced in China. This chapter takes the first attempt to manifest the impacts of cultural and institutional heterogeneity between China and the U.S. on strategic supply chain interactions. Our conclusions underscore the importance for firms to devote more time and effort to maintaining a trusting relationship with their Chinese partners than they do with U.S. ones. Chinese companies and government should in turn proactively cultivate a cooperative mindset among the young generation and establish an environment conducive for efficient inter-organization transactions. We also highlight the critical environment (e.g., one with a high overage risk) in which sustaining this trusting and cooperating relationship is most imperative. To conclude, this dissertation demonstrates that non-pecuniary factors such as trust and trustworthiness can have significant impacts on operational decisions. Behavioral operations research is a promising and important research area that not only improves our scientific understanding of human decision making, but also helps prescribe better managerial strategies for environments where non-pecuniary incentives are salient.

Establishing Trust and Trustworthiness for Supply Chain Information Sharing

Establishing Trust and Trustworthiness for Supply Chain Information Sharing
Author: Özalp Özer
Publisher:
Total Pages: 26
Release: 2017
Genre:
ISBN:

In this chapter, we discuss when, how, and why trust and trustworthiness arise to support credible information sharing and cooperation in a supply chain. Synthesizing our learning, we identify the four building blocks of trust and trustworthiness as personal values and norms, market environment, business infrastructure, and business process design. We elaborate on these building blocks and offer tangible insights into how to establish more trusting and cooperative supply chain relationships.

Handbook of Information Exchange in Supply Chain Management

Handbook of Information Exchange in Supply Chain Management
Author: Albert Y. Ha
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 398
Release: 2016-10-03
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 3319324411

Sharing accurate and timely supply and demand information throughout a supply chain can yield significant performance improvements to all members of the supply chain. Despite the benefits, many firms are reluctant to share information with their supply chain partners due to an unequal distribution of risks, costs, and benefits among the partners. Thus, incentive mechanisms must be in place to induce communication, cooperation, and collaboration among all members of a supply chain. The issue of Information exchange/sharing has been examined by various researchers over the last 15-20 years. However, there is no research book that compiles various approaches, analyses, key implications, as well as future development of this area. This book will serve as a handbook for researchers who are interested in learning the state of the art of the line of research in this area and explore open research topics in this area. Contributors, all leading researchers, have committed to delivering 18 chapters, broken into four distinct sections covering the Value of Information Sharing, Contracting and Information, Information Signaling, and Incentives for Information Sharing.

Trust, Trustworthiness, and Information Sharing in Supply Chains Bridging China and the U.S.

Trust, Trustworthiness, and Information Sharing in Supply Chains Bridging China and the U.S.
Author: Özalp Özer
Publisher:
Total Pages: 26
Release: 2017
Genre:
ISBN:

Whether and how trust and trustworthiness differ between a collectivist society, e.g., China, and an individualistic one, e.g., the U.S., generate much ongoing scientific debate and bear significant practical values for managing cross-country transactions. We experimentally investigate how supply chain members' countries of origin -- China versus the U.S. -- affect trust, trustworthiness, and strategic information sharing behavior in a cross-country supply chain. We consider a two-tier supply chain in which the upstream supplier solicits demand forecast information from the retailer to plan production; but the retailer has an incentive to manipulate her forecast to ensure abundant supply. The levels of trust and trustworthiness in the supply chain and supplier's capability to determine the optimal production quantity affect the efficacy of forecast sharing and the resulting profits. We develop an experimental design to disentangle these three aspects and to allow for real-time interactions between geographically distant and culturally heterogeneous participants. We observe that, when there is no prospect for long-term interactions, our Chinese participants consistently exhibit lower spontaneous trust and trustworthiness than their U.S. counterparts do. We quantify the differences in trust and trustworthiness between the two countries, and the resulting impact on supply chain efficiency. We also show that Chinese individuals exhibit higher spontaneous trust towards U.S. partners than Chinese ones, primarily because they perceive that individuals from the U.S. are more trusting and trustworthy in general. This positive perception towards U.S. people is indeed consistent with the U.S. participants' behavior in forecast sharing. In addition, we quantify that a Chinese supply chain enjoys a larger efficiency gain from repeated interactions than a U.S. one does, as the prospect of building a long-term relationship successfully sustains trust and trustworthiness by Chinese partners. We advocate that companies can reinforce the positive perception of Westerners held by the Chinese population and commit to long-term relationships to encourage trust by Chinese partners. Finally, we also demonstrate that both populations exhibit similar pull-to-center bias when solving a decision problem under uncertainty (i.e., the newsvendor problem).

The Handbook of Behavioral Operations

The Handbook of Behavioral Operations
Author: Karen Donohue
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 688
Release: 2018-11-06
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1119138302

A comprehensive review of behavioral operations management that puts the focus on new and trending research in the field The Handbook of Behavioral Operations offers a comprehensive resource that fills the gap in the behavioral operations management literature. This vital text highlights best practices in behavioral operations research and identifies the most current research directions and their applications. A volume in the Wiley Series in Operations Research and Management Science, this book contains contributions from an international panel of scholars from a wide variety of backgrounds who are conducting behavioral research. The handbook provides succinct tutorials on common methods used to conduct behavioral research, serves as a resource for current topics in behavioral operations research, and as a guide to the use of new research methods. The authors review the fundamental theories and offer frameworks from a psychological, systems dynamics, and behavioral economic standpoint. They provide a crucial grounding for behavioral operations as well as an entry point for new areas of behavioral research. The handbook also presents a variety of behavioral operations applications that focus on specific areas of study and includes a survey of current and future research needs. This important resource: Contains a summary of the methodological foundations and in-depth treatment of research best practices in behavioral research. Provides a comprehensive review of the research conducted over the past two decades in behavioral operations, including such classic topics as inventory management, supply chain contracting, forecasting, and competitive sourcing. Covers a wide-range of current topics and applications including supply chain risk, responsible and sustainable supply chain, health care operations, culture and trust. Connects existing bodies of behavioral operations literature with related fields, including psychology and economics. Provides a vision for future behavioral research in operations. Written for academicians within the operations management community as well as for behavioral researchers, The Handbook of Behavioral Operations offers a comprehensive resource for the study of how individuals make decisions in an operational context with contributions from experts in the field.

Network Trust and Trust Behaviors Among Executives in Supply Chain Interactions

Network Trust and Trust Behaviors Among Executives in Supply Chain Interactions
Author: Emily Choi
Publisher:
Total Pages: 41
Release: 2019
Genre:
ISBN:

We integrate the results of a social network survey and a forecast information sharing experiment to examine the role of trust and trustworthiness in impacting high-ranking executives' decisions in supply chain interactions. The members of our executive sample have on average 17 years of work experience. A significant portion of them hold positions at the C-level in world-leading organizations that span a wide range of industries. By examining the roles of trust and trustworthiness in the decision making of high-ranking executives, we find strong external validation for as well as demonstrate how these nonpecuniary, behavioral factors impact the outcomes of business interactions. We employ a multi-method research design that allows us to investigate the extent to which the executives' trust beliefs toward a relevant network of exchange partners (which we define as their "network trust") impact their trust behaviors when engaging in business interactions with members of this network. We determine the conditions pertaining to the executives' professional experiences that strengthen or weaken the impact of network trust on the executives' trust behaviors in supply chain interactions. For example, executives with more diverse professional experiences rely more on network trust to shape their trust behaviors. Conversely, executives with prior positive trust experiences rely less on network trust in their trusting behaviors. We quantify that improved trust and trustworthiness can yield up to 41%, 6%, and 5% gain in the expected profit of the supplier, the retailer, and the supply chain. Our results offer tangible implications for how organizations can better leverage executives' knowledge about how much to rely on network trust in business interactions to achieve better outcomes.

Trust and Reputation for Service-Oriented Environments

Trust and Reputation for Service-Oriented Environments
Author: Elizabeth Chang
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 374
Release: 2006-07-11
Genre: Technology & Engineering
ISBN: 0470028254

Trustworthiness technologies and systems for service-oriented environments are re-shaping the world of e-business. By building trust relationships and establishing trustworthiness and reputation ratings, service providers and organizations will improve customer service, business value and consumer confidence, and provide quality assessment and assurance for the customer in the networked economy. Trust and Reputation for Service-Oriented Environments is a complete tutorial on how to provide business intelligence for sellers, service providers, and manufacturers. In an accessible style, the authors show how the capture of consumer requirements and end-user opinions gives modern businesses the competitive advantage. Trust and Reputation for Service-Oriented Environments: Clarifies trust and security concepts, and defines trust, trust relationships, trustworthiness, reputation, reputation relationships, and trust and reputation models. Details trust and reputation ontologies and databases. Explores the dynamic nature of trust and reputation and how to manage them efficiently. Provides methodologies for trustworthiness measurement, reputation assessment and trustworthiness prediction. Evaluates current trust and reputation systems as employed by companies such as Yahoo, eBay, BizRate, Epinion and Amazon, etc. Gives ample illustrations and real world examples to help validate trust and reputation concepts and methodologies. Offers an accompanying website with lecture notes and PowerPoint slides. This text will give senior undergraduate and masters level students of IT, IS, computer science, computer engineering and business disciplines a full understanding of the concepts and issues involved in trust and reputation. Business providers, consumer watch-dogs and government organizations will find it an invaluable reference to establishing and maintaining trust in open, distributed, anonymous service-oriented network environments.