Trust and commitment in supply chain management: a systematic review of literature

What is it about?

Trust and commitment (T&C) between stakeholders of an organization influence the performance of the firm. They are key to high-value strategic relationships when the stakes involved of the partners are high. Over the recent years there has been a growing academic and corporate interest in trust in supply chain management (SCM). The increasing number of publications over the years on T&C in supply chain relationships is an indication of its growing importance. The current literature review paper provides a comprehensive perspective on the topic using Bibliometric analysis followed by a systematic review of literature. 207 relevant articles were extracted from the Scopus database using the relevant key word searches. This data was used for Bibliometric analysis, which provided information on the key journals, authors, country contribution in the field using quantitative analysis. For the purpose of the systematic review another 48 relevant publications were identified for the purpose of this study. Hence 255 papers were analyzed for the sake of this study. Systematic review of literature related to T&C meets the following objectives. Firstly, it reviews the concepts of T&C and types of trust; secondly it presents the antecedents and consequences of trust and commitment; and concludes with further research directions. 15 definitions of trust; 9 definitions of commitment; 13 classifications of trust; 40 antecedents of trust; 39 consequences of trust; 11 antecedents of commitment; and 15 consequences of commitment were identified and analyzed. Discussion on the antecedents, consequences of T&C are presented. The paper concludes with suggestions for future research based on the analysis of the literature.

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