An empirical analysis of strategic decision-making criteria in logistics procurement: How executives select logistics service providers in the Turkish automotive industry

This thesis empirically investigates the decision-making criteria, their hierarchy of importance, and the underlying cognitive structure used in the selection of logistics service providers within the Turkish automotive industry from a senior executive perspective. Increasing uncertainties and risks in global supply chains have rendered the selection of a logistics partner a vital strategic decision in a highly integrated sector such as automotive. However, a comprehensive empirical study on the factors driving this decision, particularly within the Turkish context, is absent in the existing literature. To address this research gap, data was collected from 81 senior and mid-level executives responsible for logistics purchasing in the Turkish automotive industry. It is crucial to note that this group constitutes nearly the entire population of such decision-makers, making the study a near-census rather than a sample-based inquiry. Given the limited and specific nature of this professional population, conventional sample size calculations would be misleading. The research thus captures a comprehensive view of the sector's decision-making criteria. To provide richer context and triangulate the findings, the primary quantitative survey was supplemented with qualitative insights gathered from in-depth, face-to-face interviews with 5 of the 81 participants. The collected data was analyzed using statistical methods including Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA), the Friedman Test, Independent Samples t-Tests, and One-Way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA). The research findings reveal three fundamental conclusions regarding the decision-making criteria in the sector. First and foremost, the Price criterion is unequivocally ranked last in the hierarchy of importance, whereas criteria focused on operational assurance and risk mitigation, such as "Legal & Insurance" and "Safety & Security," are assigned the highest priority. Second, the nine different criteria are found to be structured along two primary dimensions in the minds of the decision-makers: a holistic "Overall Service Quality and Assurance" factor, which includes all non-price quality elements, and a completely independent "Price" factor. Third, it was found that decision priorities are largely independent of total work experience and position, suggesting the existence of a strong and homogenous professional culture within the sector. In conclusion, this study empirically demonstrates that strategic logistics procurement decisions in the Turkish automotive industry are driven by risk aversion and a search for assurance, rather than classical cost-minimization assumptions. This aligns with Agency Theory and modern supply chain resilience paradigms. The revealed two-dimensional cognitive structure is interpreted as a practical reflection of the Bounded Rationality theory. These findings offer concrete managerial implications for both logistics service providers to reposition their value propositions and for automotive firms to standardize their supplier selection processes. Keywords: Logistics Service Provider Selection, Outsourcing, 3PL, Decision-Making Criteria, Automotive Industry, Turkey, Supply Chain Management, Strategic Procurement.