To maximize the efficiency of extended operations and

To maximize the efficiency of extended operations and processes, collaborative
enterprises must be able to access accurate and timely information: selected leading
measures, such as, aggregate demand and tracking data showing how products move
through each distribution channel (Lee and Whang, 2001) enable decisions makers to
be proactive. This means taking “improvement actions” before “corrective actions” are
even needed, thanks to a better understanding of what is going on or what is about to
happen (Holmberg, 2000, Schmitz and Platts, 2004).
Again the need for more appropriate measures is agreed upon in literature (e.g.:
Schmitz and Platts, 2004). While in the previous section more appropriate was used
related to the scope of the measures being required, here it refers to their ability to
foster proactive management: “Performance measures must be selected that will allow
for a more complete and accurate analysis” (Beamon, 1999). Although this area has
been pointed out many times as strategically important, it still is not sufficiently
understood (Keebler et al. , 1999, Atkinson et al. , 1997; Vitale and Mavrinac, 1995;
Eccles, 1991).
Collaborative performance management: where should we go?
Despite the vast amount of literature on performance measurement frameworks and
systems most of the work is concerned with performance measurement within one
organization (Schmitz and Platts, 2004). Previous work in this area has generally
focused on (see also Beamon, 1999):
.
developing new performance measures for specific applications;
.
benchmarking, as in Camp (1989);
.
categorizing existing performance measures, as in Neely et al. (1995);
.
comparing methods, their application and empirically analyzing performance
measurement systems already in use (Yeniyurt, 2003); and
.
building rules or frameworks by which performance measurement systems can
be designed and developed for various types of systems (Eccles, 1991; Kaplan
and Norton 1992; Vitale and Mavrinac, 1995; Caplice and Sheffi, 1995; Keebler
et al. , 1999).
There has been far too little focus on going beyond this previous work and developing
a universal framework for the selection of performance measures for collaborative
enterprises and the use of these measures to collaboratively manage the collaborative
enterprise through measures. As a result, literature relating to strategic and
performance management of collaborative enterprises is still rather rare (Bititci et al. ,
2003; Bititci et al. , 2004; Busi and Andersen, 2004, Yeniyurt, 2003, Beamon, 1999).
Schmitz and Platts(2004) conclude from their literature review that, although the
importance of this area is widely acknowledged, there are “significant gaps in
theoretical and empirical knowledge” and there is no research on any real application
of an integrated performance measurement system for supply chain management.