Supply chain literature has increasingly argued that supply chains are being used by a wide range of industries to generate innovations which deliver competitive advantage, and that social factors such as trust and collaboration play a key role in making effective supply chain management (SCM). Closer examination of the research suggests that much of this literature is based on studies of industries which deliver consumer products and these studies are predominantly conducted within a positivist research framework. This research bias has resulted in far less attention being paid to studies of mature industrial markets. This case study seeks to redress such bias by posing an overall question regarding the role of social factors in innovation within a well established supply chain which existed across three mature, capital intensive industries � steel manufacturing, transport and railroad track construction and working outside the positivist paradigm by using a m ultidisciplinary research approach within a �critical realist framework�. In responding to the overall research question, three subordinate questions were explored. Firstly, how well suited are present corporate governance structures of individual organisations to deal with the newly emerging interconnected organisational structures in order to support the generation of innovations within supply chains? Secondly, what has been the impact of the widespread adoption of information technology in generating innovation in supply chains? And thirdly, what is the role played by interorganisational social networks in generating innovations within supply chains? The overall findings were that the social factors played a far more important role than had hitherto been acknowledged in either supporting or inhibiting innovation within supply chains. Corporate governance was seen to generally inhibit innovation between organisations. The claims of much of the SCM literature which asserts a strong link between IT and innovation in supply chains was not supported. In fact, it was found that the majority of subjects preferred to get information through social systems. The role of interorganisational networks (IONs) was found to be most effective at generating incremental innovations aimed at maintaining operational efficiency. A critical realist research approach was able to uncover some difficulties associated with a purely positivist research paradigm which restricts investigation to the empirical level of ontology. The critical realist approach was able to explore social causal mechanisms and structures which were not as readily accessible at the empirical level of inves tigation. It was found that multiple realities existed across the supply chain, and that the positivist assumption of a mono reality which underpins much of the enterprise resource planning (ERP), process management and governance approaches was in fact inhibiting the ability of the social system to be innovative and ultimately driving up costs. In fact a process management approach supported by information technology and operating within present corporate governance structures created conflicting goals which increased complexity. A key finding of this study was how the open social system of the supply chain used dynamic relationships to overcome the rigidities and complexity of a closed systems logic embedded in the formal governance and information systems.

Globally, the use of ERP systems has increased significantly. Organizations in developed and developing countries are pursuing ERP systems to stand out globally for facilitating their growth beyond their previous inhouse systems. Even if public organizations were not the main target of ERP systems, as ERP systems were first developed for manufacturing organizations, due to the countless benefits gained from the utilization of the systems they became part of the worldwide trend of implementing ERP systems long ago. These organizations have different culture and encounter numerous challenges due to several reasons. The purpose of this study was to explore ERP system implementation challenges by developing countries’ public sector organization’s and identify which critical factors has high impact in the success or failure of the implementations. The participants were 11 experienced IT experts with adequate knowledge on the ERP currently or previously involved in ERP implementation in Ethiopia, chosen case country in public sector organizations. The results of this study are comprised of systematic literature review and qualitative analysis, and data were collected using documentary search and semi-structured online interviews, respectively. Through deductive thematic analysis, themes were identified which are presented in 5 categories: critical success factors, ERP systems pre-implementation challenges, during implementation challenges, post implementation challenges, success of ERP system implementation and its measurements. The results are discussed based on comparison of the literature findings and qualitative analysis.

Thesis (MPhil (Information Science))--University of Stellenbosch, 2007. / This research aims to present a discussion of the relevant literature with regard to the relationship between organizational learning orientation, knowledge transfer and ERP implementations with the purpose of determining whether or not a learning orientation is an antecedent to knowledge transfer in ERP implementations, and could be added to the critical success factors for ERP implementations. The research strategy selected for this study is a conceptual review. The rationale for using this strategy was to gain an in-depth understanding of the available literature. Thereafter this information was structured to enable solving the problems of identifying the barriers that impact the creation of a learning organization. It was also determined whether there are learning activities and initiatives that foster a learning orientation and whether there are knowledge transfer barriers that prevent the knowledge from being transferred even if the organization has a learning orientation. The study identified that the literature around organizational learning, knowledge transfer and ERPs was filled with constructs regarding positive correlations between learning, knowledge transfer and technology implementations. However, the review could not conclusively identify any strong correlation to support organizational learning as an antecedent to knowledge transfer in an ERP implementation.