Per Hilletofth

Energy management (EnM) is crucial for reducing GHG emissions, but there is still a large potential to improve the energy efficiency of manufacturing companies. One approach that could be leveraged is to reduce Scope 3 emissions by extending EnM towards suppliers and integrating it into supply chain management (SCM); however, research linking these perspectives remains limited. This paper aims to investigate drivers and barriers associated with extending EnM towards suppliers and how EnM practices are considered in supplier selection. Based on a nationwide online survey sent to Swedish manufacturing companies, this paper provides new insights for practitioners and policymakers to develop strategies to integrate EnM into SCM, contributing to closing the energy efficiency gap. The results show that organizational and economic drivers and barriers related to prioritization and structure are individually perceived as most important for extending EnM towards suppliers, but supply chain-related factors play an important role when factor groups are considered. Further, the study highlights that economic criteria are still perceived as more important than energy-related criteria when it comes to supplier selection, which is initially conceptualized as a potential supply chain EnM gap.

Purpose: Global supply chain interdependencies increase firm’s disruption exposure, intensifying scholarly and managerial interest in resilience. Despite previously identified resilience activities, limited understanding exists of how capabilities are developed, aligned and enacted across organizational and inter-organizational contexts. Therefore, this study aims to investigate how firms build supply chain resilience through coordinated capability configurations. Design/methodology/approach: A systematic literature review using Scopus and Web of Science, synthesizing 52 peer-reviewed articles. Extracted data was descriptively and thematically analyzed, identifying resilience-related activities and capabilities and examining their distribution across organizational functions, supply chain levels and theoretical perspectives. Findings: Supply chain resilience arises from operational, relational and transformational capabilities across internal, supply chain and ecosystem levels. This study introduces a three-dimensional framework linking who enacts resilience, where it is targeted, and it’s strategic justification, while proposing a typology of resilience orientations spanning single dimensional, to fully integrated resilience approaches. Research limitations/implications: This study advances a configurational and capability-based understanding of supply chain resilience by integrating the resource-based view, relational view and dynamic capabilities view. The proposed framework and typology provide a foundation for cumulative theory development and future empirical research on resilience capability alignment. Practical implications: The findings of this study offer a structured approach for diagnosing and developing resilience strategies. Through a multidimensional perspective, firms can better align capabilities across functions and supply chain levels and balance efficiency and redundancy in dynamic environments. Originality/value: This study moves beyond descriptive reviews of resilience activities by developing an integrative framework and typology explaining how resilience capabilities are systematically configured and enacted in global supply chains.

Purpose: There is a knowledge gap in the literature on how firms initiate the manufacturing relocation process and how decision-makers can adopt a more proactive approach to relocation. This paper aims to address these gaps by presenting a conceptual model for the initiation of the manufacturing relocation process. Design/methodology/approach: The conceptual model is developed by integrating literature on relocation decision-making with related topics such as operations strategies, internationalisation and sourcing decision-making. Findings: The proposed conceptual model consists of five stages, including firms’ strategies, awareness, incubation, triggers/tipping points and initial evaluation. To show how the model could be applied in practice, we provide insight into four different pathways for initiation. Furthermore, the paper suggests an approach for practitioners on how to work proactively with the initiation, where scenario building is strongly recommended as part of this process. Research limitations/implications: As this is a conceptual paper, its main limitation is the absence of original empirical evidence. Instead, the arguments and ideas presented are grounded in prior empirical studies identified in the literature. Another limitation concerns the availability of relevant literature, which is addressed by drawing on insights from adjacent fields. These limitations highlight the need for future research to further develop and validate the proposed conceptual model from both empirical and theoretical perspectives. Originality/value: The proposed conceptual model makes a valuable contribution to both research and practice by establishing a foundation for understanding and advancing the topic. As the first extensive model on the initiation phase, it provides novel insights and a basis for further development. In addition, the paper outlines promising avenues for future research, particularly emphasising the need for empirical validation and continued refinement of the four pathways.

Purpose: Sustainable public procurement (SPP) uses governments’ purchasing power to incorporate sustainability into commercial relationships between public buyers and suppliers. Collaboration between stakeholders can contribute to SPP implementation, but there is still limited research helping understand when to collaborate in SPP. This paper aims to provide depth on collaboration between stakeholders in SPP. Design/methodology/approach: This paper discusses who collaborates with whom (collaboration channels), how to collaborate (mechanisms), why and why not collaborate (benefits and drawbacks), and who can facilitate collaboration in SPP. This research is based on semi-structured interviews with SPP practitioners from different contexts. Grounded Theory was used to support the research design, including data collection and analysis. Findings: This paper offers a systemic approach interconnecting collaboration channels, mechanisms, benefits, drawbacks, and facilitators. This systematisation sheds light on decision-making processes towards collaborative initiatives, considering different contexts. The implementation of collaborative SPP initiatives may be determined by individual commitment and organisational capacity to navigate the legal and bureaucratic pathways to SPP. Practical implications: This research offers a practical tool for planning, assessing, and improving collaborative SPP initiatives. Practitioners can use the 27 benefits to build the case for collaboration; the 10 drawbacks to mitigate risks; the 15 mechanisms to develop interaction formats for each procurement phase; and the stakeholder classification to engage potential collaborators. Originality/value: This paper provides a more complete understanding of collaboration in SPP. The paper offers a categorisation of SPP stakeholders and a framework that contributes to decisions on collaborating, which require balancing benefits and drawbacks. Collaboration can break the public procurement walls, but it is not a silver bullet for addressing the complexity of SPP.

Purpose: The objective of this paper is to provide insights into the significance of communication factors for sustainability practices and their interconnections within organisations. In order to achieve this, the paper explores the differences between civil society organisations (CSOs), corporations and public sector organisations (PSOs). Furthermore, it analyses the relationship between these factors and the performance of organisations in relation to environmental, social and economic sustainability. Design/methodology/approach: A literature review was conducted to identify eight relevant communication factors. A survey was then carried out to explore sustainability integration, focusing on communication factors and sustainability performance. Data analysis included descriptive statistics, Pearson correlations, and ANOVA to identify patterns and relationships. Findings: The results show that all communication factors are critical for organisational sustainability, with policies ranked first. The results of the correlation analyses indicate that all eight communication factors are interconnected, though the strength of these relationships varies. The reporting shows a low correlation with other communication factors. While there are statistical differences in communication factors across different types of organisations, the “policy” factor is ranked first in all three types. The results also indicate that employee engagement has a significant correlation with all three aspects of sustainability performance. The overall results show that communication factors, including leadership, employee engagement, training, diversity and inclusion, policies, vision and mission and support, have a significant impact on sustainability performance in organisations. Practical implications: This paper explores key communication factors in sustainability, analysing their interrelations in different type of organisations and links to performance. By mapping factors such as policy, support, reporting and training, the paper highlights how integrated communication structures influence sustainability outcomes. The central roles of support and policy suggest that formal structures are vital for embedding sustainability. PSOs, CSOs and corporations can strengthen their impact through tailored strategies, such as mandatory training, cross-functional teams or incentive-based programs. Improving communication factors enables better alignment with sustainability goals, enhances employee engagement and supports more effective organisation-wide efforts to drive sustainability outcomes and broader societal impact. Social implications: This study underscores the societal benefits of effective communication strategies for sustainability. Enhanced communication channels can promote transparency, inclusivity and stakeholder collaboration, shaping public policy and fostering community engagement. By integrating sustainability-focused factors, including leadership and support, into policy frameworks, organisations and policymakers can address sustainability challenges more cohesively. These strategies promote collective action and catalyse progress toward sustainable development goals through increased awareness and collaboration. Originality/value: This paper provides insights into the interconnections of communication factors for sustainability in different types of organisations and their relationship with performance, emphasising the need for a holistic and integrated approach.

Sustainable public procurement (SPP) has been incorporating sustainability issues into commercial relationships between governments and businesses. SPP implementation can be undertaken with the support of organisational changes. Research has highlighted the role of stakeholders' collaboration in driving changes for SPP. However, there is limited understanding of the forces fostering and blocking the implementation of collaboration. This paper analyses drivers for and barriers to implementing collaboration in SPP, based on semi‐structured interviews with SPP practitioners from different world regions (Brazil and Sweden). This paper provides a catalogue of forces influencing organisational changes towards collaboration in SPP (categorised into internal, connecting‐protagonist, connecting‐supporting and external), including 23 drivers, 40 barriers and 24 strategies to overcome such barriers. This paper also proposes an understanding of how organisational changes for collaboration are interconnected with changes for implementing SPP. Organisational changes for SPP must be understood as multiple and composite instead of single and monolithic.

In the recent years there has been an increased interest towards relocating manufacturing back to Europe. Consequently, it becomes important to develop evaluation models of manufacturing location. We use secondary data to establish model for European Union 27 (EU-27) countries. Findings reveal in pairwise model comparison, that larger European countries seem to be the best locations in general (France, Germany, Italy, and Spain), however, few smaller countries perform high as well (like Ireland, Sweden, Luxemburg and Finland). In general, small member countries have the lowest performance. Typically, these are weak in population and severance pay terms. Lower-performing countries often also miss the larger role of medical and pharmaceutical industry within exports. Results were compared to classical rank-based evaluation. We did find some differences, and it could be said that larger countries lost their higher status, but Ireland and Sweden were still in highest ranks.

Purpose: The objective of this article is to analyze the integration between the internal functions related to demand and supply processes. The studied object was an agribusiness company that uses digital technologies to operate its inbound logistics.Design/methodology/approach: A case study was conducted in a global agribusiness company that went through a restructuring process with the implementation of a shared service center. In-depth interviews were conducted with employees from the demand and supply areas. The analysis involved description of cross-functional integration processes from the areas of demand and supply, the identification of technologies from Industry 4.0 present in the activities of those areas and their role in the integration process.Findings: The analysis revealed the mediating role of technology in cross-functional integration, the presence of new integration factors and their impact on process performance. A framework was developed that describes the relationship between technology and integration factors, their impacts, and the implications for theory and practice.Practical implications: Regarding this study, the focal company migrated its activities, which were previously isolated and dispersed across branches, to a centralized shared services unit. This research contributes by providing managers with elements to support their investment decisions in technologies that facilitate the integration process, mainly in the areas of planning and execution. It also contributes to the planning of processes, helping managers who are implementing or migrating activities and areas to new management structures.Originality/value: This paper brings two new assumptions that may guide future investigations about cross-functional integration and its effects on demand and supply integration (DSI): (1) Digital technologies are able to support cross-functional integration in order to provide information integrity, team alignment, agile and assertive decision making within supply and demand processes; (2) Cross-functional integration, mediated by digital technologies, can generate agility and accuracy of information in the demand and supply processes. This accuracy and agility provide improvements in demand and supply process performance metrics, such as predictability, assertiveness, standardization, productivity and response time.