Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Table 8. Examples of competitive advantage factors
Author
Years
Examples
Porter
1985
Low cost and differentiation of product or service.
Flexibility of production schedule, different price range with good product quality and introduce
new products regularly.
Swamidass
1986
Outstanding technology, good quality reputation, customer orientation, high customer satisfaction
and low cost in production.
Aaker
1989
Quality, cost, efficiency, shipment date, customer response, flexibility, innovation and customer
service.
Giffi et al.
1990
Low price, design flexibility, quality consistence, quick production, reliability and customer
service after sale.
Miller & Roth
1994
Hill and Jones
2001
Efficiency, good quality, quick customer response and innovation
be classified as greening the suppliers, by help-
ing them to establish their own environmental
management systems, requiring them to obtain
third-party environmental certification, and hold-
ing environmental seminars for suppliers in order
to discuss current environmental issues and share
knowledge together with other suppliers. More-
over, external environmental management through
greening the process, green product innovation,
green managerial innovation and developing new
green technology such as pollution preventing
technologies and pollution controlling technolo-
gies can also help to reduce hazardous emissions
and waste which might cause negative impact on
the natural environment.
Based on the above literature, it is straightfor-
ward to come up with the following proposition:
capabilities of greening of suppliers has a positive
influence on green innovation (Rao,2002; Tuk-
ker et al, 2001; Poter and Van Der Linde, 1995;
Shrivastava, 1995); green innovation has a posi-
tive contribution to environmental performance
(Cairncross, 1992; Hart, 1995; Schmidheiny,
1992; Shrivastava, 1995; Poter and Van Der Linde,
1995; Vermulen, 2002; Tukker et al, 2001); green
innovation has positive contribution to competi-
tive advantage (Porter and Van Der Linde, 1995;
Klassen and Whybank, 1999; Rao, 2002; Rao,
2005); and capabilities of greening of suppliers
have a positive contribution to environmental
performance (Rao, 2002; Rao, 2005; Tukker et
al, 2001) and competitiveness (Rao, 2002; Rao,
2005). A model for studying the relationship be-
tween these factors is proposed diagrammatically
in Figure 1.
More specifically, the following hypotheses
associated with the model (Figure 1) are worth
further empirical research:
H1:
Greening of suppliers is positively associated
with green innovation
H2:
Green innovation is positively associated
with environmental performance
H3:
Green innovation is positively associated
with competitive advantage
H4:
Environmental performance is positively as-
sociated with competitive advantage
H5:
Greening of suppliers is positively associated
with environmental performance
H6:
Greening of suppliers is positively associated
with competitive advantage
H7:
Green product innovation, green process in-
novation, green managerial innovation are
positively associated with each other
CONCLUSION
In this article, a review of the literature and the
performance indicators of the four key aspects
