This study explores the critical dynamic capabilities (DC) needed to ensure supply chain resilience during large-scale disruptions, such as those experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic. By utilising the balanced scorecard (BSC) framework, the research connects dynamic capabilities to organisational strategy and key perspectives on financial performance, processes, growth, and learning. Additionally, it considers the customer perspective to meet changes in demand and internal processes, which reveals the importance of operational-level flexibility. Through 24 expert interviews conducted online and in person in Sweden and Finland, the study demonstrates how strategic resources can be transformed into complementary capabilities that enhance supply chain resilience. The findings indicate that developing dynamic capabilities at all levels of the supply chain is a strategic action for achieving supply chain resilience and crucial for managerial action for effectively responding to large-scale disruptions. The research presents a comprehensive approach to building critical dynamic capabilities organised through the BSC framework.

Background: Customer orders are key in developing logistics processes and in strategic developments of customer orientation. This paper investigates the notion of customer orientation. In the literature, the concept of customer is underdeveloped in that it is seen as a single object rather than how it is enacted in multiple ways. The study examines a customer-oriented production process managed in the supply chain of an automotive manufacturer.

Methods: Based on a longitudinal study we explain what constitutes customer knowledge and what processes are involved in constructing this knowledge.

Results: The study shows that in a supply chain, multiple versions of customers coexist and overlap that have implications on how multiple-customer orientation is performed and aligned in the supply chain.

Conclusions: We find that customer representations proliferate as a result of multiple objectives; we demonstrate what objects and assemblages bring particular customer representation to life and show that these are used to shape customer orientation.

In this study, we argue that recognizing dynamic capabilities (DC) as a learning process is a key step in developing supply chain resilience. This sustains the needs of companies and individuals during the recovery and mitigation stages. This study draws on sensemaking theory to enact learning. Learning as the sensemaking of individuals and organisations in crisis conditions vehicles behavioural processes of managerial risk decision-making in uncertain environments. Learning can impact the individual and company's outcome in building DC for recovery and mitigation from crises and conclude that not only DC are strategic to recovery and mitigation, but meta and functional capabilities are also crucial for the supply chain resilience (SCR). This study examines the learnings from crises and the implications of dynamic capabilities for supply chain resilience. Specifically, recovery and the mitigation stages use the experiences of individuals as well as organisations. DC would be used to perform within significantly differing strategies to create quick solutions, the prevailing approaches used to manage supply chain resilience are less appropriate. While this study focuses on DC to help solve the recovery and mitigation of crises, broader learning applicability to other resilient supply chain are also discussed, such as  the design and management of long-term strategies of contextually specific supply chains.   

This study sheds light on the Hydrogen technology in transportation for reaching the sustainability goals of societies, illustrated by the case of Mexico. In terms of the affected supply chains the study explores how the packaging and distribution of a fuel-saving tool that allows the adoption of hydrogen as complementary energy for maritime transportation to improve economic and environmental performance in Mexico. This exploratory study performs interviews, observations, simulations, and tests involving producers, suppliers, and users at 26 ports in Mexico. The study shows that environmental and economic performance are related to key processes in Supply Chain Management (SCM) in which packaging and distribution are critical for achieving logistics and transportation sustainability goals. Reusable packaging and the distribution of a fuel-saving tool can help decrease costs -, of transport, and downstream/upstream processes in SCM while at the same time increasing the environmental performance.

Background: The enacted sensemaking of third-party logistics (TPL) providers during the pandemic crisis may present an opportunity to explore their strategic operations.

Objectives: The aim is to understand the TPL strategic implications related to a crisis and specifically how TPL providers make sense of and respond to crises. The two research questions are as follows: How has the COVID-19 pandemic crisis affected the business operations of TPL providers? What have TPL providers learnt from enacting the crisis, and how has this experience affected their strategic development?

Method: We conduct an abductive study using combined data from interviews and a targeted archive search. The data are focused on the Swedish context and on a period of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Results: Three distinct groups of TPL providers have different sense and action processes impacting their business operations. This research shows how an understanding of servitisation is relevant for TPL theory. Finally, we develop the strategic perspective of TPL providers by defining TPL providers as value-cocreating relationships that can help manage the complexities of logistics services.

Conclusion: This research shows that TPL providers play an important role in crises, as they contribute to solving customer problems. This role appears to be strengthened during crises, but it imposes great demands on TPL providers.

Contribution: Third-party logistics providers work with their customers during crises. The sensemaking view emphasises the importance of personnel, organisational commitment, capacity and expectations during crises. This is an interplay that requires adaptation to short-term changes in operational processes and adaptability in long-term operations.

Supply chains can play a major role in reducing countries’ safety and security threats; the role of network responsiveness offers insights into management exchanges responding to the preparedness of developed countries like Sweden. Illustrating the managing of overall supply chain capabilities among network responsiveness stems from the supply chain responsiveness concept. Several challenges to responsiveness prevent actors’ networks from fully benefitting from coordination. A management approach is employed to explore the impact of network responsiveness on the supply chain as an overarching strategy for safety and security. The study suggests three different approaches which differ in their impact on the network’s responsiveness: (i) an overall strategic planning approach, (ii) one integrated system approach for the overall response, and (iii) a coordination approach for managing the overall supply chain responsiveness strategy.

Las cadenas de suministro pueden desempeñar un rol importante en la reducción de amenazas a la seguridad y protección de países desarrollados, como Suecia. Este articulo ofrece perspectivas acerca de la cadena de suministro y deriva del concepto de preparación para emergencias. Varios desafíos impiden que las redes de actores se beneficien plenamente de la coordinación. El estudio enfoca el impacto de las redes de actores en la cadena de suministro como una estrategia general para el manejo de la seguridad. Tres enfoques difieren en su impacto en la capacidad de las redes de actores envueltos; (i) un enfoque de planificación estratégica general, (ii) un enfoque de sistema integrado para la respuesta general, (iii) un enfoque de coordinación para gestionar la estrategia general de capacidad en respuesta a la cadena de suministro.

Contemporary (third-party logistics providers) TPLs are in danger of being stuck in the middle, unable to perform customer adaptation as well as before and unable to achieve sufficient economies of scale. This conceptual paper aims to explore challenges facing the strategic development of TPLs within a context of increased digitalization, e-commerce and servitization. There are two apparent strategic paths. Under circumstances of strong price pressure, there is demand for standardized TPL services offering simplicity, minimalism and functionality based on digitalization, e-commerce and servitization. Alternatively, with market developments responsive to supply chain complexity, digitalization, e-commerce and servitization enable development towards innovation and change. We conclude that these developments do not invalidate existing frameworks for TPL strategies but contribute alternative strategies. We formulate three propositions for each strategic path. To avoid being stuck in the middle, TPLs are encouraged to either develop efficient services through servitized logistics chains and digital solutions or develop advanced solutions to integrate the consumer into the logistics network system through competencies to control increased levels of complexity.

This study explores servitization as an innovative market strategy for manufacturers and investigates how the decision making logics change over time in the servitization transformation process. Effectuation theory is applied to examine servitization as a new theoretical exploration. A longitudinal case study of a global heavy vehicle manufacturer's servitization process in China reveals that the decision makers adjust their decision making logics depending on the stage of the servitization process and associated risk patterns. As the servitization process evolves into a more sophisticated stage, decision makers will change their decision making logics from a causation dominant logic to an effectuation dominant logic in order to cope with the increased risks. Effectuation theory originally developed from entrepreneurship research is found to be a valid theory for the explanation of the risk and uncertainty control behaviors in the servitization transformation process of manufacturing firms. 

Voluntary networks are actors in civil society and central to the emergency preparedness efficiency of developed countries’. This study focuses on the voluntary defense networks in Sweden, a unique set of networks that contribute to the efficiency of emergency preparedness. Through interviews with experts in Swedish civil and military fields and their associated voluntary defense networks, as well as secondary data, we examined the coordination of these voluntary defense networks in practice. Although voluntary network coordination is highly associated with efficiency, in practice, most voluntary networks are not well coordinated. This study confirms that civil and military practitioners in developed countries, struggling with the coordination of voluntary networks are not isolated in their struggle; inattentive practices are indeed the norm. This article also establishes a course that civil and military practitioners can follow to improve emergency response efficiency.

Las redes voluntarias son actores de la sociedad civil e importantes para la eficiencia en la preparación de emergencia de los países desarrollados. Este estudio es sobre las redes de defensa voluntarias en Suecia, un conjunto único de redes voluntarias que contribuyen a la eficiencia de la preparación para emergencias. Las entrevistas con expertos en el campo civil y militar sueco y sus redes de defensa voluntarias asociadas y datos secundarios expusieron el examen de la coordinación de la red de defensa voluntaria en la práctica. La coordinación voluntaria de la red está significativamente asociada con la eficiencia, pero en la práctica, la mayoría de las redes voluntarias no están bien coordinadas. Si los profesionales civiles y militares de los países desarrollados están luchando con la coordinación de redes voluntarias, este estudio confirma que no son únicos en su lucha. La práctica indiferente es de hecho la norma. Los profesionales civiles y militares pueden seguir una ruta adecuada aquí establecida cuando se busca mejorar la eficiencia de la respuesta de emergencia.

This article investigates the performance-based logistics (PBL) theory and explores the potential of introducing the PBL service model to Taiwan's heavy vehicle supply chains. A multiple case study approach is used to explore this research question. Four case firms are selected for this study. The analyses have identified several major risks and influencing factors that hinder the application of the PBL model to Taiwan's heavy vehicle supply chains. However, with PBL's strength to bring sustainability benefits, an extended assessment analysis of the risks and influencing factors is conducted, and the counter-risk strategies are explored. This study has shown there is a high opportunity for PBL development in Taiwan if the obstacles can be dealt collaboratively in the heavy vehicle supply chains. The research findings provide valuable insights into Taiwan's heavy vehicle supply chains and similar emerging Asian economies relying mainly on international heavy vehicle suppliers.