The analysis of the mediation role of supply chain collaboration on the effect of inter-organizational system usage to firm performance: An application in Turkish construction sector

With the globalization of competition, decreasing product life cycles, time focused competition, rapid changes in information technologies forced the firms to rearrange their supply chain strategies. Therefore, organizations recognize that they need to increase the overall performance of supply chain instead of one. With this context, internet based technologies, particularly inter-organizational systems (IOS), integrates firms with their supply chain members and give them the opportunity to optimize their processes. So, by working together, firms achieve greater successes than working alone. This PhD. thesis also aims this holistic success instead of individual, so in order to have more information about this issue, it examines the mediation role of supply chain collaboration while inter-organizational systems affect the firm performance. While explaining the relationships between the variables used in the model of this research, various theories are used (etc., transaction cost theory, resource dependent theory, social exchange theory). Inter-organizational systems are explained by three sub-construct which are integration, communication and information in IOS. Supply chain collaboration is considered with five sub-construct which are, goal congruence, decision synchronization, incentive alignment, resource sharing and joint knowledge creation. The sub-constructs of firm performance are costs, process improvement and responsiveness. Research realized with field interviews and large-scale survey study. Data are collected from national construction sector and 138 usable responses were taken. The statistical methods used include confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modelling (i.e. LISREL). According to the results of research, the mediation effect of supply chain collaboration while inter-organizational systems effect to firm performance, is supported. The research extends our understanding of supply chain collaboration, and issues involved in managing the collaboration. A better understanding of supply chain collaboration leads to the better management of it. At the end of the research, suggestions for future researches are discussed.