An empirical investigation and prioritization of barriers toward implementation of agile manufacturing in the manufacturing industry

Abstract

<jats:sec><jats:title content-type="abstract-subheading">Purpose</jats:title><jats:p>The study aims at empirically investigating and prioritizing the critical barriers for the successful implementation of agile manufacturing in the medium- and large-scale Indian manufacturing industries.</jats:p></jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title content-type="abstract-subheading">Design/methodology/approach</jats:title><jats:p>A literature review of peer-reviewed journals and discussion with experts is used to identify 17 barriers to the implementation of agile manufacturing. An empirical survey is then conducted to collect data regarding the agile manufacturing barriers and is further analyzed using the factor analysis and vlsekriterijumska optimizacija i kompromisno resenje (VIKOR).</jats:p></jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title content-type="abstract-subheading">Findings</jats:title><jats:p>Based on the survey of empirical data, the investigated critical barriers were reduced in five critical categories, as follows: Managerial constraints, technological constraints, human resource–related constraints, operational constraints and organizational culture-related constraints, which are further ranked in terms of their severity using VIKOR. This research advocates the development of a strategy for addressing the most critical barriers instead of focusing on all for the successful implementation of agile manufacturing.</jats:p></jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title content-type="abstract-subheading">Originality/value</jats:title><jats:p>This work contributes to agile manufacturing literature by the structured presentation of the barriers to implement agile manufacturing in the Indian manufacturing industry. It also extends the integrated factor analysis and VIKOR method to investigate and rank the barriers.</jats:p></jats:sec>

An empirical investigation of the relationship among agile manufacturing practices and business performance: a pilot study

“…For further adequacy checking, the Kaiser–Meyer–Olkin test was also performed (Ruben et al , 2020). Results showed the value was found to be 0.82, which is more than an acceptable value of 0.6 (Kumar et al , 2020b). This value infers that the considered sample size is adequate.…”

“…Soepardi et al (2018) also enlightened the importance of top management commitment to manage responsibility for achieving the firm's long-term goals. Top management should develop an innovative and continuous learning culture by providing technical and financial support, where everyone can offer innovative ideas and share knowledge with willingness to achieve the ultimate goal of customer delight by delivering superior value products keeping in mind economical and ethical constraints (Kumar et al, 2020b). The role of employees for the sake of the betterment of business performance cannot be overlooked.…”

“…The work highlighted eight attributes that are imperative for successful implementation of agile manufacturing, “leadership support, human resources related issues, organizational culture-related issues, supplier-related issues, customer related issues, innovation, concurrent engineering, and Information technology.” Soepardi et al (2018) also enlightened the importance of top management commitment to manage responsibility for achieving the firm’s long-term goals. Top management should develop an innovative and continuous learning culture by providing technical and financial support, where everyone can offer innovative ideas and share knowledge with willingness to achieve the ultimate goal of customer delight by delivering superior value products keeping in mind economical and ethical constraints (Kumar et al , 2020b). The role of employees for the sake of the betterment of business performance cannot be overlooked.…”

“…Gunasekaran (1998Gunasekaran ( , p. 1223, defined agile manufacturing as: the capability to survive and prosper in a competitive environment of continuous and unpredictable change by reacting quickly and effectively to changing markets, driven by customer-designed products and services With the advent of agile manufacturing, firms acquire the ability to react dynamically to prevailing and future customers' demands (Sindhwani et al, 2020). As customers are demanding products with high quality and low price in compressed time, the implementation of agile manufacturing is a must for manufacturing firms (Kumar et al, 2020b). Timely and customized goods and services are vital concepts for customer satisfaction in current competitive market situations (Gunasekaran, 1998).…”

“…With the advent of agile manufacturing, firms acquire the ability to react dynamically to prevailing and future customers’ demands (Sindhwani et al , 2020). As customers are demanding products with high quality and low price in compressed time, the implementation of agile manufacturing is a must for manufacturing firms (Kumar et al , 2020b). Timely and customized goods and services are vital concepts for customer satisfaction in current competitive market situations (Gunasekaran, 1998).…”