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Lookup NU author(s): Dr Jingqi Zhu
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0).
The focus on inter-firm governance relations within global supply chains analysis has left social relations at workplaces as a ‘black box’ and relatively underdiscussed. Through an in-depth, comparative study of two Chinese IT service providers for Japanese clients, this article explores how the work and employment relations in the supplier firm are shaped by the institutional contexts of both the supplier firm and the lead firm as well as by the nature of the global supply chain in which they are located. The article shows how the intersection of global supply chains and local institutional environments creates potential gaps between what is required by the lead firms and what is feasible within the supplier firms. Therefore, managers in the supplier firm have to negotiate ways of managing these expectations in the light of their own institutional constraints and possibilities. We identify three forms of adaptation made by the suppliers that we describe as wholesale adaptation, ceremonial adaptation and minimal adaptation to lead firms’ expectations. We argue that these interactions and forms of adaptation can be extended and explored more generally in global supply chains and provide the basis for a fruitful integration of institutional approaches with global supply chain analysis.
Author(s): Zhu J, Morgan G
Publication type: Article
Publication status: Published
Journal: Human Relations
Year: 2018
Volume: 71
Issue: 4
Pages: 510-535
Print publication date: 01/04/2018
Online publication date: 18/08/2017
Acceptance date: 05/05/2017
Date deposited: 05/10/2017
ISSN (print): 0018-7267
ISSN (electronic): 1741-282X
Publisher: Sage
URL: https://doi.org/10.1177/0018726717713830
DOI: 10.1177/0018726717713830
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