Fashion companies are extremely sensitive to the new challenge emerging from recent sustainability scandals. Existing literature has debated sustainability extensively by considering practices of ...sustainability that companies should apply. However, little research has focused on the design of a proper sustainability roadmap from a supply chain (SC) perspective to address the steps involved in implementing sustainability practices. The objective of this study is to design a sustainability roadmap for fashion companies. Based on case studies of three tiers of three fashion SCs as an empirical basis, social and environmental sustainability practices were grouped into a five-step roadmap. The main result of the paper is a five-step roadmap, characterised in terms of practices and main goal. The roadmap is then discussed in terms of possible paths of developing, in terms of evolution within a step and among different steps.
The critical role of blockchain technology in ensuring a proper level of traceability and visibility along supply chains is increasingly being explored in the literature. This critical examination ...must focus on the factors that either encourage or hinder (i.e. the drivers or barriers) the implementation of this technology in extended supply chains. On the assumption that the blockchain will need to be adopted at the supply chain level, the enabling factors and the contingent variables of different supply chains must be identified and analysed. The appropriate identification of supply chain partners is becoming a critical factor of success since the globalization of supply chains makes their management and control increasingly difficult. This is particularly true of the fashion industry. Five blockchain providers and seven focal companies working in the fashion industry were interviewed to compare their different viewpoints on this topic. The results highlight which drivers, barriers, and supply chain variables impact the implementation of the blockchain and specific research propositions are formulated.
Green Buildings (GB) have been continuing to grow in line with the sustainability trend worldwide. However, GB projects frequently involve more risks than conventional projects due to their adoption ...of innovative sustainability technology. Consequently, risk management (RM) is more complicated and necessary for GB projects compared with conventional projects, especially in developing countries with few GB risk studies. As a first effort, this research aimed to explore risk factors that GB projects frequently confront in Vietnam. First, the 53 risk factors were identified by reviewing previous studies and interviewing industry professionals. A questionnaire was then developed to collect data from 207 construction professionals to assess the importance of GB risk factors. The result provided a ranking list of GB risks and their corresponding evaluations. Next, exploratory factor analysis was conducted and revealed the six most influential risk components: (1) human resource and technical risk in the construction phase, (2) performance risk in the operation phase, (3) human resource risk in the design phase, (4) financial risk, (5) regulation and complexity risk, and (6) material risk. Also, this research found no differences in risk preferences among various roles in GB projects. These findings provided insight into GB risks that can be useful for practitioners and future research. The final contribution included discussions on critical risks and suggestions for further research directions.
•Identify risk factors in Green Building projects by literature review and interviewing experts.•Evaluate risk factors based on a survey of 207 construction professionals.•Conduct Exploratory Factor Analysis to find out the most influential risk components.•Found no differences in risk preferences among various roles in Green Building projects.•Discuss critical risks and suggest future research directions.
There has been considerable interest in investigating risk factors in Green Building (GB) projects, with increasing debates in recent years. This study aims to investigate tendencies and identify ...gaps in the GB risk literature, which can define future research guidelines, with an extensive analysis of the latest contributions. A systematic literature review was conducted by analyzing 64 relevant studies from 2006 to 2020. The results revealed that the GB risk topic is somewhat nascent but growing and almost limited to several countries, including Singapore, the USA, Australia, and China. Notably, this research discovered and classified the main themes of GB risk studies: (1) identify risk factors in implementing GB projects, (2) create risk assessment models for GB projects, (3) study according to specific types of GB risks, and (4) investigate risks in green retrofit projects. Also, a comprehensive list of GB risk factors was provided that could be a helpful reference for industry practitioners and future researchers. Furthermore, this research identified gaps in the current literature, such as inconsistency in identifying GB risk factors, lack of investigation of the relationship between GB risks and project outcomes, and lack of exploring in cross-country or developing countries. Finally, this research suggested future research directions to enrich the literature. Thus, this study contributes a valuable platform for both practitioners and researchers to comprehend the development of the GB risk literature.
PurposeRisks in implementing green building (GB) projects have emerged as a significant obstacle for GB development, especially in developing countries. In recent years, both academics and ...construction practitioners have paid considerable attention to the risks associated with GB. In this study, the authors aimed to create a comprehensive risk assessment model that considers three crucial risk features: impact level, probability of occurrence and risk manageability.Design/methodology/approachIn the research, authors adopted the mean scoring and fuzzy synthetic evaluation method to assess GB risks. Based on expert assessments, this model can determine the significance of risk factors, risk groups and overall risk. Notably, this research applied the proposed model to assess GB risks in Vietnam by surveying 58 GB experienced professionals.FindingsThe findings revealed that GB risks are relatively high in Vietnam, implying that risk management is essential for GB projects to succeed. The results also showed that “lack of experience of GB designers” is the most critical factor, and “human resources risk in the design phase” is the top crucial risk group.Originality/valueThis study contributes a novel and practical model to help practitioners assess risks in GB projects. In addition, this research offers detailed GB risk evaluations in Vietnam and thus could be a valuable reference for construction practitioners and future studies.
PurposeSupply chain (SC) configuration has gained increased acceptance as an important issue when evaluating new customization possibilities and this evidence has contributed to the strengthening of ...the debate between global vs local production locations. This work contributes in enrichment of this topic by studying how local or global SC location decisions influence performances by considering a SC point of view, in terms of cost and time, in traditional and customized productions.Design/methodology/approachA discrete event simulation approach, based on experimentation through executable configurations, was used to evaluate different SC scenarios for customized as well as traditional products within the footwear industry.FindingsThe results indicated that to identify proper SC locations, existing trade-offs between the time and cost performances should be studied, avoiding the evaluation of a single performance independently and, instead, adopting a complete SC point of view while considering these performances.Research limitations/implicationsThis evidence has contributed to the reinforcement of the discussion between far-shore destinations vs near-shore production locations. Further studies are encouraged to adopt the present model, in which addition of other variables such as specific manufacturing competences to differentiate suppliers, both local and global suppliers, or the possibility of realizing special types of product customization required by final consumers can be done.Practical implicationsThe paper contributes to the academic and practitioners' debate by proposing a systemic approach to assess SCs’ performances in customized contexts and to compare them to traditional collections. Results indicate that cost and time performance must find a balance that does not necessarily correspond to an exclusively local or global production.Originality/valueThis work contributes to the SC configuration issue by considering the trade-off between efficiency and effectiveness (i.e. SC costs and SC times) for customized productions by reviving and enriching it with an SC perspective in customization contexts.
The issue of sustainability is receiving increasing attention, and this debate now needs to be extended to consider the perspective of the supply chain. This article aims to investigate ...sustainability choices made along the supply chain (SC) by considering the static complexity of the SC. It investigates the different perspectives and tensions that can exist between SC partners when sustainability programs are introduced. Through 18 cases, the aarticle addresses the different types of static SC complexity faced by the different tiers of the SC. For the focal company, the complexity is both upstream and downstream: for first‐tier suppliers, it is upstream, and for second‐tier suppliers, the complexity is largely downstream. These various types of complexity require the adoption of different sustainability practices: for the focal company, these involve sourcing and organizational practices; for the first‐tier suppliers, they involve sourcing practices; and for the second‐tier suppliers, organizational practices.
This paper describes an approach used to evaluate the performance of different supply chain configurations in customised contexts. Based on historical data collected from the supply chain of a shoe ...producer, different configurations are evaluated based on a discrete-event simulation by highlighting the performance of the supply chain (in terms of supply chain order lead-time and inventory volume) when the production switched from standard production (characterised by batches of large quantities of the same product) to customised production (characterised by a small of series batches with high product variability). The simulation approach relies on experimentation through executable configurations, which enables the creation of different scenarios, and is then applied to the case of an actual firm in the footwear industry. The managerial implications of these findings are discussed.
Today, the sustainability challenge has become a relevant issue in the fashion industry. However, given that the request for sustainability is relatively new in this industry, empirical research that ...could guide companies towards supply chain sustainability is lacking. This study aims to deepen the understanding of the main strategic approaches to sustainability used in fashion supply chain management (SCM). Ten case studies were examined in terms of the practices that characterise these approaches. Moreover, contextual factors, drivers and barriers that support or hinder different approaches were identified. To accomplish this goal, both environmental sustainability and social sustainability were investigated, and all the areas of fashion SCM (i.e. new product development, source, make, deliver, retail, return, governance) were considered simultaneously to offer a wide overview of this industry's sustainability issue.
Decisions on where and how to locate a production and supply network have become an increasingly important part of a firm’s global supply network strategy and are critical to obtain competitive ...advantages. This paper contributes to extend knowledge in the field of production and supply network strategy in the fashion industry. Analysing the supply network strategy literature, the paper investigates production and supply network configurations that fashion-industry firms implement to remain competitive in a global context. Statistical analyses on survey data from 132 Italian fashion companies highlight the existence of three different clusters of companies that have identified alternative ways to organise their production and supply networks that are aligned with their specific competitive priorities (e.g., critical success factors). The study characterises the three different clusters of production and supply strategies of fashion companies, and provides useful interpretation of differences among clusters. In particular, the research distinguishes which subset of managerial capabilities (e.g., ability to trace supply network processes, collaborate along the chain and realize production, prototypes and samples in local networks linking brand reputation to Made-in-Italy,) fashion companies should possess and nurture to successfully develop and implement different, either local or international, production and supply network configurations.
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