Sustainable Chain Management

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Sustainable Chain Management
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Abstract
Procurement management is an important activity that is always incorporated in the life
cycle of a product. It must be involved because it is required in different stages where there is a
movement of raw materials and end products right from the producers, suppliers all the way to
the end consumers. In the procurement process, the supply chain should be sustainable because
all the businesses aspire for sustainability. In this paper, a critical study of the sustainability of
the supply chain of IBM and Walmart is done. This is done using two articles: 1) "Sustainable
human resource management with salience of stakeholders: A top management perspective" and
“Green supply chain management: A review and bibliometric analysis.” The information from
these articles can be of great contribution in understanding the concept of sustainability in the
procurement management and supplies process.

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Contents
Introduction.................................................................................................................... 3
Comparative Summary of Research Articles...........................................................................4
Comparative Case Analysis................................................................................................ 6
Implications of the Research Articles.................................................................................... 9
Conclusion................................................................................................................... 11
References................................................................................................................... 12
Appendices.................................................................................................................. 15

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Introduction
Chain management is one of the most important activities in the production process. All
the organization must have a well-developed supply chain management because it plays a
significant role I the completion of the production cycle. Supply chain helps in the distribution of
the supplies that an entity uses as inputs or rather raw materials. For efficiency purposes, the
supply chain should be sustainable. Meaning, the management must adopt sustainable programs
to safeguard the environmental, economic, and social viability and impacts of the clients and
vendors. This paper uses IBM and Walmart as case studies to analyze the effectiveness of
sustainable chain management practices.
Comparative Summary of Research Articles
"Sustainable human resource management with salience of stakeholders: A top
management perspective" is an article that was written by Järlström, Maria, Essi Saru, and
Sinikka Vanhala and published by Journal of Business Ethics. The writers used the article to
study the role of sustainability in the supply chain management process. “Green supply chain
management: A review and bibliometric analysis”, on the other hand, is an article that was
written by Jabbour, Charbel José Chiappetta, and Ana Beatriz Lopes de Sousa Jabbour and
published by the Journal of Cleaner Production. In this article, the main topic of study is the
sustainability of the supply chain management system. According to these studies, supply chain
management is a key component in the life cycle of a product. It can be much better if it is as
sustainable as possible. Therefore, whenever conducting any business activities, deliberate
measures must be taken to ensure that the business operations as sustainable in different aspects.
Despite exploring the topic of sustainable supply chain management, the articles have some
differences. The most outstanding difference is that two articles address different aspects of
supply chain management.

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The first article revolves around environmental management system sustainability.
Meaning, it focuses on environmental sustainability. It advocates for the compliance of the
environmental policies that are required in the corporate world today. Currently, the global
community has become vulnerable climate change (Fahimnia, Sarkis & Davarzani 2015). Since
climate change is mainly human-triggered, it can be addressed by adopting acceptable
environmental conservation and protection measures (Meixell & Luoma 2015). Therefore, to
achieve this, all the organizations must ensure that their supply chain is environmental-friendly at
all times. There are many ways through which this can be accomplished. Most importantly, the
production process should be pollutant-free. All the organizations should refrain from acts of
pollution because it contaminates the environment and makes it harmful and unsustainable.
Instead what needs to be done is to go green and embrace the usage of renewable energy sources
such as solar and wind (Calatayud, Mangan & Christopher 2019). Any form of environmental
degradation such as the discharging of untreated wastes to the nearby water bodies must also
stop.
The second article differs from the first one because it analyzes the concept of
sustainability from a different perspective. According to his article, sustainable supply chain
management not only involves the environmental conservation, but a strict observance of
sustainable labor practices. All the businesses depend to the employees because they are the
source of labor on which the business relies to manage its production process and day-to-day
operations (Järlström, Saru & Vanhala 2018). Therefore, even if many organizations have been
engaging in unlawful and unethical labor practices such as overworking, exploitation, poor
remuneration, and the hiring of minors, an entity that is committed to observing running a
sustainable business must refrain from such. It should ensure that that its supply chain is

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sustainable when it comes to labor management (Silvestre 2015). Apart from refraining from
such acts, the organization should stop it collaboration with other entities that still violate labor
standards. At no any given time should such non-compliant suppliers be entertained.
It is evident, from the above researches, that sustainability is an issue that has become of
concern to many organizations. Ordinarily, all the organizations should engage in sustainable
business practices because it is what the laws and ethical standards permit. The supply chain
should be composed of the entities which are committed to observing environmental
sustainability. Meaning, whenever engaging in business activities, deliberate measures should be
taken to ensure that the environment is made as safe as possible (Su, Horng, Tseng, Chiu, Wu &
Chen 2016). Meaning, no matter the nature of business activities, there should be no room for
air, water, soil, and land pollution as well as the over-exploitation of energy and the natural
resources. At the same time, measures must be taken to implement right and acceptable labor
practices which can accommodate all the workers regardless of their diversities (Hackius &
Petersen 2017). This indicates that a sustainable supply chain revers environmental safety,
equality, fairness, accountability, and inclusivity.
Comparative Case Analysis
There are two cases that are analyzed in this paper. He first se involves IBM. The second
one involves Walmart. IBM and Walmart are multinational companies whose operations extend
beyond their countries’ borders. On its part, IBM- International Business Machines Corporation
is concerned about the provision of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) services
to its global market. Walmart, on the other hand, deals in retail services-grocery stores,
departmental stores, and hypermarkets. The multinational nature of these companies has made it
necessary for them to partner with many stakeholders in their supply chain (Touboulic & Walker