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Higher education institutions around the world seek to expand their capacity to compete with one another in attracting more doctoral students and recruiting talented researchers by enhancing the quality and performance of their doctoral programs. In this study, we adopt a service perspective lens and explore the relationship between doctoral supervision and students’ working conditions by investigating the influence of supervisors’ power sources. Interview data was obtained from 22 doctoral students and 16 supervisors studying and working, respectively, at public universities in Iran. The findings suggest that the use of mediated power by supervisors is associated with poor-quality doctoral supervision, which negatively impacts the mental well-being and perceptions of decent work of doctoral students. Building on the literature and evidence from the interviews, we elaborate our arguments and offer several practical implications for higher education institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Addressing tropical deforestation in the palm oil sector involves a diverse range of stakeholders who engage or disengage with each other. Palm oil global value chain (GVC) firms (plantation companies, traders and processors, and consumer goods manufacturers and retailers), as well as nongovernmental organisations, financial institutions, consultancies and certification bodies, pursue their respective organisations' agendas through engagement practices, including through coalitions, in a palm oil sustainability network (POSN). Building on interviews with different stakeholder groups, this qualitative study characterises and critically analyses 'stakeholder engagement' by examining (1) the priority targets for engagement among different POSN stakeholders, (2) how mechanisms and tools are used in POSN stakeholder engagement or disengagement for addressing deforestation, and (3) the implications of stakeholder engagement or disengagement for addressing deforestation. Engagement and disengagement practices are shaped by and reshape GVC governance, with powerful stakeholders emerging as knowledge brokers and norm setters, raising important challenges for how deforestation is addressed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Humanity's intrusion into nature—with the objective of selling animals and plants as medicine, food, and tourist attractions—is detrimental not only to biodiversity and the health of ecosystems but also to local communities, global society, and human health. Often, traffickers exploit legal supply chains to secretly move endangered species and protected wildlife to end consumers. Serendipitous discoveries of wildlife trafficking attempts raise concerns that existing efforts to prevent wildlife trafficking and other criminal exploitation of legal supply chains brought about by international laws, regulations, and voluntary initiatives may often fail. Indeed, most supply chains are designed for economic purposes such as efficiency or responsiveness rather than security. Scholarship in supply chain management has thus far dedicated scarce attention to the overarching phenomenon of illegal exploitation of otherwise legal supply chains, referred to as "supply chain infiltration." Because we were unable to speak with perpetrators directly, we obtained insights from expert stakeholders in order to study the delicate and covert topic of what makes supply chains vulnerable to wildlife trafficking, as well as how this vulnerability can be mitigated. Our data set comprises 37 semi‐structured interviews with knowledgeable stakeholders concerning wildlife trafficking, specifically in maritime supply chains. This research develops a model that explains supply‐chain‐related vulnerabilities to wildlife trafficking and elaborates regarding how respective actors can contribute in addressing this understudied issue. We introduce the concept of "societal supply chain risk" to refer to hazards that emanate from or materialize within supply chains, which primarily affect actors in the supply chain context—and possibly even humanity in its entirety. Our research calls for more supply chain research, exploring situations in which individual firms may not be affected but can contribute to the solution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The purpose of this article is to discuss the theme of managing operations and supply chains in the so-called "new normal". It reflects the themes emerging from recent research and how these might be conceptualized. Design/methodology/approach: The article reviews research presented at the EurOMA 2021 conference and eight papers subsequently developed into full journal papers. It considers conceptual themes contained in these papers and how they reflect recent turbulent events in the external business environment. Findings: The article notes the themes of resilience in relation to the Covid-19 pandemic, environmental sustainability, especially climate change and the Sustainable Development Goals, and the significance of digital technologies. Additional themes relating to inter-organizational relationships, complexity and manager cognition are also considered. In order to provide useful insights for future disruptions, general concepts on epistemology and responsiveness are described. Originality/value: The article discusses general principles across cutting-edge research in operations and supply chain management, to support improved performance to add economic and social value. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores the impact of supply chain collaboration on eco‐innovations in the context of 220 Chinese manufacturing supplier firms involved in global supply chain networks. It investigates how supplier and customer collaborations help firms to enhance product eco‐innovations, and/or process eco‐innovations, and how the institutional context (i.e., regulatory, market, and community pressures) influences these relationships. The structural equation modeling approach is used to analyze the data captured from medium and large manufacturing enterprises in three major sectors: automotive, electronics, and textiles. The results show that community pressure has a positive effect on supplier collaboration, which further leads to enhanced process eco‐innovation. On the other hand, the findings indicate that while market pressure enhances customer collaboration, this does not reinforce product eco‐innovation. Contrary to our expectation, regulatory pressures do not impact supplier or customer collaboration for innovation. Overall, different institutional factors indicate divergent effects on supply chain collaboration and product/process eco‐innovation. The importance of normative pressures, such as those applied through the local community and interest groups, for eco‐innovations in production processes is further discussed as a typical feature of the institutional environment of Chinese supplier firms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reflects on the implications of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic on modern slavery risks in supply chains. We first reason that the global supply and demand shock resulting from COVID-19 exacerbates workers' vulnerability to modern slavery. Then, we discuss challenges firms face to detect, prevent, and mitigate increasing modern slavery risks in supply chains during COVID-19. We conclude our paper by arguing that proactive, value-oriented, and long-term supply chain management approaches increase firms' resilience to cope with highly volatile and extreme events, such as COVID 19. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore contextual barriers to supplier development for sustainability (SDS) in global supply chains and managerial remedies to mitigate such barriers. Design/methodology/approach – A dyadic case study design was adopted with a Western European buyer and six of its Chinese suppliers. The database consists of 41 interviews and 81 documents. Findings – Contextual barriers to SDS in global supply chains derive from complexities in the sustainability concept, socio-economic differences, spatial and linguistic distance, as well as cultural differences between buyers and suppliers. Partial remedies include effective joint communications, an open organizational culture, and the fostering of cross-contextual understanding. Research limitations/implications – The findings contribute to theory development at the intersection of sustainable and global supply chain management research. They help to explain why scarce sustainability-related progress in global supply chains has occurred in recent years. Practical implications – The identified barriers facilitate managerial decision making that will expedite SDS progress in global contexts. Social implications – By diffusing knowledge regarding available remedies, the study contributes to improving SDS effectiveness, thereby fostering sustainability capabilities and performance of suppliers. Originality/value – This research highlights the criticality of contextual barriers to SDS. The barrier effects that stem from differing real-world conceptions of sustainability may inform future sustainable supply chain management research within and beyond SDS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]