Determinants of purchasing team usage in the supply chain

Abstract

Abstract Increased attention on supply chain management has highlighted the pivotal role that supply chain management and purchasing teams can play in the overall competitiveness of many firms. This paper presents findings from an exploratory study that analyzes the impact of purchasing’s strategic role, industry context and purchasing organizational structure, on the use of various forms of purchasing teams. Using survey data from a broad sample of industries, we found that team usage was a two‐dimensional construct: internal teams and councils, and customer teams. In addition, purchasing’s strategic role comprised two factors: product and technology planning, and external systems planning. After controlling for firm size, purchasing’s strategic role was positively related to the greater use of internal teams and councils, but not customer teams. Industry context also played a role in the usage of teams, with internal teams and councils more extensively used by the firms that manufactured discrete goods. Meanwhile, firms in the service sector favored the use of customer teams. Finally, both industry context and purchasing’s organizational structure were related to the strategic role assumed by purchasing, with a decentralized structure tending to reduce that strategic role.