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Gaining comparative advantage in supply chain relationships: the mediating role of market-oriented IT competence

  • Original Empirical Research
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Abstract

Trading partners continue to make significant investments in information technology (IT) infrastructure to facilitate the flow of market information across supply chains, yet the underlying mechanisms linking IT implementation to firm performance have not been clearly specified. Drawing on the resource-advantage theory of competition, we develop and test a model that proposes market-oriented IT competence as a mediator of the effects of a firm’s IT infrastructure on market information flow which, in turn, yields comparative advantages in supply chain relationships. Market-oriented IT competence is conceptualized as a firm’s ability to deploy an IT infrastructure in support of the organization-wide collection, dissemination and use of market information to respond to market needs. We test the effects of market-oriented IT competence using data collected from managers in the logistics services industry. Findings show that market-oriented IT competence is a critical link between IT infrastructure and comparative advantage in supply chain relationships.

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Notes

  1. We are grateful to an anonymous reviewer for pointing us to the excellent review of the concept of information overload by Eppler and Mengis (2004). As noted in this review, studies of information overload in decision making by individuals provide mixed support for an inverted-U relationship between information quantity and various dependent variables. Because our unit of analysis is the firm, rather than an individual, we conceptualize information quantity as a linear variable. Post-hoc tests demonstrated that relationships between information quantity and other variables (i.e., information quality, informational advantage and relational advantage) are indeed linear.

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  1. Marketing Area, Rawls College of Business MS2101, Texas Tech University, Lubbock, TX, 79409, USA

    Donna F. Davis

  2. Department of Management, Colorado State University, 217 Rockwell Hall, Fort Collins, CO, 80523-1275, USA

    Susan L. Golicic

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  1. Donna F. Davis
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Correspondence to Donna F. Davis.

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Table 4 Scale items and reliabilities
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Davis, D., Golicic, S. Gaining comparative advantage in supply chain relationships: the mediating role of market-oriented IT competence. J. of the Acad. Mark. Sci. 38, 56–70 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11747-008-0127-8

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