Purpose For the past 20 years, Latin American countries have gone from being a low-cost region to significant players in the world economy, with five of its countries ranked among the world’s 50th largest by gross domestic product. This paper aims to study the contribution of Latin American researchers in the field of supply chain management (SCM) to aid an understanding of the Latin American impact within global supply chains (SCs). Design/methodology/approach The authors present a study which includes a bibliometric analysis of the papers authored by Latin American researchers in the SCM field and which were exclusively published in journals included in the Journal Citation Reports. In addition, the authors conducted a survey to Latin American researchers and consultants to gain greater understanding of the main difficulties, which in their opinion, have negatively affected the SCM area in Latin America within the past five years, and identify possible misalignment between Latin American research and the challenges for SC in the region. Findings The results show that Latin American research on SCM in the past nine years is not significant for the field considering the number of papers, citations and the papers published in top journals. Another interesting finding is the lack of collaboration among researchers from different Latin American countries, as well as with corporate. Finally, survey results reveal significant differences regarding the main difficulties each country perceived as relevant. Practical implications Comparing results from both analyses, relevant misalignments stand out between published research and the main difficulties detected. These suggest a challenging opportunity for Latin America, emphasizing the need to increase research contribution of the scientific community, through collaboration and alignment toward overcoming the most troublesome difficulties for Latin America. Therefore, the authors suggest future regional research directions which could also help global companies to tackle the challenges faced and optimize performance of their Latin American SCs. Originality/value To the best of the authors’ knowledge, no previous research on the quality and impact of Latin American research in SCM has been conducted. Also, misalignments between researchers and practitioners in the region, which allow identifying weaknesses of Latin American SCs, have not been studied before.
Purpose – The purpose of this article is to create a list of supply chain (SC)-related difficulties based on the existing SC literature. It also presents an exploratory survey concerning the main difficulties which Uruguayan managers consider to have the most negative impact on their SCs. Design/methodology/approach – The survey was carried out within small- and medium-sized manufacturing and retailing companies in Uruguay, yielding 99 valid responses. A statistical analysis of the survey is introduced including a ranking of the difficulties and a grouping of those using factorial analysis. A difficulty, as understood throughout this paper, is any factor that significantly impacts, or has impacted in recent years, the performance of SCs. Findings – Eighteen main difficulties hindering SC performance were identified. Moreover, an exploratory analysis of the survey showed that the main concerns to SC managers are related to workforce availability and government policies. Practical implications – Difficulties encountered by SCs would not only be of interest to scholars but also to the managers who face the challenge of the day-to-day managing of a SC. Once the difficulties over the SCs are identified, strategies can be designed and implemented to attain desired benefits. Today’s intense competition requires firms to be more aware of their SC and to achieve excellence in many areas, especially at small- and medium-sized enterprises. Originality/value – There is a growing body of literature concerning isolated issues that SCs have to face; however, an exhaustive list of difficulties is hardly available. Moreover, first-hand information of Uruguayan managers was ascertained to rank each one using a Likert scale.
Purpose This paper aims to outline the barriers in introducing Lean in health care and to asses which of these have a greater impact in the Uruguayan health-care sector. Design/methodology/approach To uncover the barriers hindering Lean health-care implementation, a literature review was undertaken. Once identified, first-hand information was obtained from managers and professionals involved in managerial activities who evaluated each of the difficulties using a Likert scale. Findings In total, 17 barriers to the implementation of Lean health care were identified. Survey results show that the highest scores correspond to “controllable” barriers, those which can be overcome, almost exclusively, by the organization willing to implement the program. Practical implications Managers need to understand and ascertain the existing barriers before implementing Lean if they want to develop strategies to mitigate them. Although the exploratory study was conducted in the Uruguayan health-care sector, it could be replicated elsewhere. Originality/value An exhaustive list of barriers was synthesized and was later assessed by managers in the Uruguayan context. This is an important first step that could help foresee obstacles and develop strategies prior future implementation.
PurposeUrban logistics presents a series of challenges, as the interests of the different stakeholders are not always aligned. The aim of this research is to explore the potential of applying Lean principles to reduce waste in urban logistics.Design/methodology/approachAs a structure for “going to gemba,” the authors implemented the shadowing technique to better understand the perspective of companies distributing products in the city of Montevideo, Uruguay. Then, meetings were conducted to validate the observations by the people shadowed.FindingsThe results show that most of shipper's time is dedicated to waiting (59%), which is followed by driving (22%), and only a small section of time was dedicated to unloading and verification activities (19%). Although collaborative solutions are needed along with the different stakeholders, this research highlights how deploying Lean thinking can improve significantly urban logistics achieving up to 25% improvement in the number of stores served per shift.Practical implicationsFrom an academic point of view, this study emphasizes the importance of continue applying and evaluating the Lean practices into transportation contexts. From a company's perspective, the authors have presented a list of propositions that can be implemented for carriers in order to reduce waste and/or improve the efficiency of the urban transportation process.Originality/valueBased on the literature review carried out, the subject study of Lean and its application to urban logistics remains mostly unexplored in the scientific literature.
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