مقاله سال ۲۰۱۶

 مجله مدیریت خرید و تامین – Journal of Purchasing and Supply Management

This Special Issue focuses on novel research methods in the area of purchasing and supply management (PSM). Our note comments on case studies, which are not a novelty in this research field. Rather, casebased articles are frequently published e.g. in JPSM, and they are thus appreciated, or at least accepted, by the research community. However, a relatively standardised way of dealing with and of motivating case studies seems to be followed. In this note we suggest development of more diversified approaches to this inherently flexible method of scientific inquiry. Also, we suggest that paying more attention to reflection in and on case studies would be a way of advancing research in the field of PSM.

Several scholars have discussed the use of case studies in the area of PSM and operations management (see e.g., Voss et al., 2002; Dubois and Araujo, 2007; Ketokivi and Choi, 2014). Indeed, in the broader field of management studies, there is a spur of interest towards qualitative research approaches (Alvesson and Sköldberg, 2009). Recent methodological discussions have focused on the issue of explicating the different traditions. For instance, there are calls for more pluralistic approaches in international business when theorising from case studies (Welch et al., 2011) and discussions of what constitutes good case studies in industrial marketing (Piekkari et al., 2010). Moreover, these authors observe that scholars tend to refer to the same key sources – most notably Yin (2013 and previous editions) and Eisenhardt (1989) – when building the foundation for their case studies. These references are frequently used to motivate and legitimize case studies and often relatively little more is said about the approaches adopted.

It is, however, important to note that there are different traditions in and approaches to case research. Both Yin and Eisenhardt present a view on case research that is basically positivistic, while other scholars advocate alternative approaches: for instance, ‘intrinsic’ case studies (Stake, 2005) or critical realist approaches (Easton, 2010). While recent methodological discussions and reviews have raised the emerging versatility in approaches to case research, it is unclear to what extent such approaches have been adopted in JPSM, or in the PSM field more generally. In this note we look into this and wish to highlight the possibilities involved in using case studies in more diversified ways to advance our understanding of PSM phenomena.