Evaluation of Socio-Cultural Impact on Supply Chain Integration: the role of trust and leadership among grocery supplies in Ghana

Abstract

While prior studies on the link between cultural factors and supply chain integration produce conflicting outcomes, this study set out to explore the indirect (moderating) role of trust and leadership in the quest to clear the confusion in extant literature. To the best of the researchers’ knowledge, limited or no study so far has been conducted to explore the moderating role of trust and leadership in the relationship between socio-cultural factors and integration in the supply chain. Thus, it is necessary to understand how trust and leadership could moderate the relationship between socio-cultural factors such as national culture, cross-cultural differences, organizational culture, and openness to diversity as a determinant of SCI. A review of existing literature was conducted to achieve this objective, and gaps were identified. A conceptual framework with six main hypotheses was developed based on the gaps identified. To validate the model, a well-structured questionnaire was designed and piloted, and data was gathered from 511 senior managers of grocery businesses in Ghana. The hypothesized model was validated with PLS-SEM. The study concludes that all the socio-cultural factors (organizational culture, national culture, cross-culture, and openness to diversity) are important in the quest to improve supply chain integration. Trust and Leadership do not just support integration but serve as an avenue to reap superior integration along the supply chain. Based on the findings, this study concludes that socio-cultural factors, trust, and leadership are inevitable in achieving supply chain integration, particularly in the grocery industry in emerging markets like Ghana. The study contributes to the extant literature by examining the drivers of SCI in the context of the food manufacturing sector. This study contributes to understanding the effect of socio-cultural dimensions on SCI while inspiring a small amount of academic research in food manufacturing. The study contributes to filling the gap by combining Dynamic Capability Theory (DCT) and Relational View theories (RVT) to understand the phenomena under study.