Mending fences in a buyer–supplier relationship: The role of justice in relationship restoration

Saif Mir, Misty Blessley, Zach Zacharia and John Aloysius

Journal of Supply Chain Management, 2022, vol. 58, issue 3, 23-46

Abstract: While the extant literature has examined causes for buyer–supplier relationship dissolution, the restoration of severed buyer–supplier relationships has been overlooked. Drawing on organizational justice theory, our research develops and tests a model of relationship restoration. We examine how the supplier's restoration tactics—acknowledgment, compensation, and operational transparency, influence the interactional, distributive, and procedural fairness perception, respectively, of the buyer, resulting in relationship restoration. The results are based on a 2 (Acknowledgment – Yes/No) × 2 (Compensation – Yes/No) × 2 (Operational Transparency – Yes/No) vignette‐based study with 390 experienced practitioners. The analysis shows that compensating the buyer and providing transparent procedures for dealing with similar situations in the future, lead to higher distributive fairness and procedural fairness, respectively, resulting in restored relationships. Compensation makes up for past supplier malperformance, whereas operational transparency mitigates future concerns. We also find that restoration tactics based on interactional justice are less effective than those based on procedural and distributive justice. There is only marginal support for the indirect positive effect of acknowledgment on restoration intentions (p

Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/jscm.12272

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:jscmgt:v:58:y:2022:i:3:p:23-46

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.blackwell ... bs.asp?ref=1523-2409

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Supply Chain Management is currently edited by Lisa Ellram, Craig Carter and Chad Autry

More articles in Journal of Supply Chain Management from Institute for Supply Management
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().