Theorizing Through Literature Reviews
There are many misconceptions about how to write a good literature review. In their award-winning article Theorizing Through Literature Reviews: The Miner-Prospector Continuum, Breslin and Gatrell (2023) introduce the miner–prospector continuum to guide scholars on how best to craft literature reviews. They argue that scholars can choose from eight review strategies. At the miner end, authors (1) spot conceptual gaps, (2) organize and categorize literatures, (3) problematize the literature, or (4) identify and expose contradictions. These strategies build carefully on established scholarship, ensuring incremental improvements in understanding in a relatively well-defined field. Moving toward the prospector end, reviewers may (5) transfer theories across domains, (6) develop analogies and metaphors across domains, (7) blend and merge literatures across domains, and (8) set out new narratives and conceptualizations. Such prospecting is riskier but can spark imaginative leaps and open fresh directions for the discipline. All strategies on this continuum have value and can lead to better literature reviews in SCM research.
Breslin, D., & Gatrell, C. (2023). Theorizing Through Literature Reviews: The Miner-Prospector Continuum Organizational Research Methods, 26(1), 139–167. https://doi.org/10.1177/1094428120943288
Should I Choose a Systematic, Narrative, or Critical Review for My PhD?
Many PhD students in our discipline begin their research with a systematic literature review, but I believe this may not always be the most effective approach. As a PhD typically consists of three papers, the focus of the first paper should be on exploration and reflection, rather than being confined to the rigid framework of a systematic review. A systematic review can limit creative and critical thinking, making it more difficult for PhD students to step outside of predefined boundaries. Instead, a more flexible approach – such as a narrative or critical literature review – can encourage deeper engagement with existing academic discourses. This allows students to question established assumptions, challenge theoretical consensus, or resolve intellectual controversies. This openness to critique and exploration is more likely to spark new ideas that can guide the development of meaningful research questions for the second and third papers. Ultimately, this approach may lay a stronger foundation for making original contributions to the discipline.
How to Do a Systematic Literature Review
There has been a recent trend in several management disciplines, including supply chain management, to create knowledge by systematically reviewing available literature. So far, however, our discipline lacked a “gold standard” that guides researchers in this endeavor. The Journal of Supply Chain Management has now published our new article, Durach, Kembro & Wieland (2017): A New Paradigm for Systematic Literature Reviews in Supply Chain Management. Our systematic literature review process follows six steps: (1) develop an initial theoretical framework; (2) develop criteria for determining whether a publication can provide information regarding this framework; (3) identify literature through structured and rigorous searches; (4) conduct theoretically driven selection of literature and a relevance test; (5) develop two data extraction structures, integrate data to refine the theoretical framework, and develop narrative propositions; and (6) explain the refined framework and compare it to the initial assumptions. We believe that these best-practice guidelines, although developed for the SCM discipline, can be used as a blueprint also for adjacent management disciplines.
Durach, C.F., Kembro, J. & Wieland, A. (2017). A New Paradigm for Systematic Literature Reviews in Supply Chain Management. Journal of Supply Chain Management, 53 (4), 67-85. DOI: 10.1111/jscm.12145
A Theory of Robust Supply Chains
Strategies and practices to achieve supply chain resilience have been at the heart of supply chain management practice and research for almost a decade. However, such efforts have often focused on ways to make supply chains more reactive to turbulence and disruptions. In our recent article, Antecedents and Dimensions of Supply Chain Robustness, my co-authors, Christian F. Durach and José A.D. Machuca, and me build a theoretical framework that depicts antecedents and dimensions of a second, rather proactive construct: supply chain robustness. We define supply chain robustness as the ability of a supply chain to resist or avoid change. Some of my previous research has shown that this construct is even more positively related with business performance than supply chain agility. Through reviewing 94 articles, and a Q-sorting exercise, we identify four (i.e. leadership commitment, human capital, relationship magnitude, and risk management orientation) important intra-organizational robustness antecedents and four (i.e. node centrality, bargaining power, visibility, and network complexity) inter-organizational robustness antecedents.
Durach, C., Wieland, A., & Machuca, J. (2015). Antecedents and Dimensions of Supply Chain Robustness: A Systematic Literature Review. International Journal of Physical Distribution & Logistics Management, 45 (1/2), 118-137 https://doi.org/10.1108/IJPDLM-05-2013-0133
