Linking Sustainable Supplier Selection to Firm’s Sustainable Performance: The Moderated Mediating Role of Supplier Development and Leadership for Functional Integration

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

N.A.

The authors propose an empirical study to investigate the moderated mediation model to enhance a firm's sustainability performance.

The authors used the data set from the fourth round of the High-Performance Manufacturing project. 

The results reveal that the effect of sustainable supplier selection transfers to sustainability performance through sustainable supplier development practices.

The authors did a good job in performing the analysis and presenting the results. However, I do have some major suggestions:

1. In section 4.1 the authors claim to provide theoretical contributions. This claim can not be true since the study uses only empirical results and analysis. I suggest that the authors either remove that section or reword it. 

2. Table 2, please write the acronym of SSDP, SP, LSFI, and SSS in the main text, not below Table 2. Same comment for Table 3.  

3. The literature review seems to be old and no citations for papers published in 2022 and 2023. I suggest the authors add the following citations that are more recent:

 "A systems approach to carbon policy for fruit supply chains: Carbon tax, technology innovation, or land sparing?." Science of The Total Environment 767 (2021): 144211.

"A multi-objective home healthcare delivery model and its solution using a branch-and-price algorithm and a two-stage meta-heuristic algorithm." Transportation Research Part C: Emerging Technologies 147 (2023): 103838.

Author Response

The authors propose an empirical study to investigate the moderated mediation model to enhance a firm's sustainability performance. The authors used the data set from the fourth round of the High-Performance Manufacturing project. The results reveal that the effect of sustainable supplier selection transfers to sustainability performance through sustainable supplier development practices.

The authors did a good job in performing the analysis and presenting the results. However, I do have some major suggestions:

Response> We appreciate your positive evaluation of our study and the helpful comments and suggestions. All the changes to our manuscript are highlighted with red-colored text.

1. In section 4.1 the authors claim to provide theoretical contributions. This claim can not be true since the study uses only empirical results and analysis. I suggest that the authors either remove that section or reword it. 

Response> Thank you! We changed it to “4.1. Implications for research”. Also, we revised the 4.2 section title to “4.2. Implications for practice”.

2. Table 2, please write the acronym of SSDP, SP, LSFI, and SSS in the main text, not below Table 2. Same comment for Table 3.  

Response> We moved the acronyms to the main text.

3. The literature review seems to be old and no citations for papers published in 2022 and 2023. I suggest the authors add the following citations that are more recent:

 "A systems approach to carbon policy for fruit supply chains: Carbon tax, technology innovation, or land sparing?." Science of The Total Environment 767 (2021): 144211.

"A multi-objective home healthcare delivery model and its solution using a branch-and-price algorithm and a two-stage meta-heuristic algorithm." Transportation Research Part C: Emerging Technologies 147 (2023): 103838.

Response> Thanks for providing valuable information to enhance the quality of our manuscript. We added the recent articles to our manuscript, including two citations above.

Reviewer 2 Report

This article studied the moderated mediation model in which leadership support for functional integration complements sustainable supplier management to enhance a firm's sustainability performance. However, there are the following specific shortcomings.

(1)  First of all, during the selection of variables, the descriptions in the text do not match the titles. The title has ‘Sustainable Supplier Management’ as the explanatory variable, but in the model clock of the article, this variable becomes the mediating variable. The so-called moderating effect occurs in ‘Sustainable Supplier Management’ and ‘Supplier selection’, which does not match the title. The relationship between variables is rather confusing, so please think carefully and unify them.

(2)  Secondly, The article does not sufficiently demonstrate ‘sustainable’, and the understanding of this concept is not deep enough. The concept of 'sustainable' needs to be integrated with the context of the study, rather than being a passing comment.

(3)  In addition, the introductory section is not comprehensive enough for the concept of 'functional integration', and additional content is needed to provide an overview of it.

(4) Finally,  what does ‘slection’ mean in Figure 1?

In my opinion, This article has many flaws in details. Major review before publication.

Author Response

This article studied the moderated mediation model in which leadership support for functional integration complements sustainable supplier management to enhance a firm's sustainability performance. However, there are the following specific shortcomings.

Response> We appreciate the valuable comments and suggestions. All the changes to our manuscript are highlighted with red-colored text.

(1)  First of all, during the selection of variables, the descriptions in the text do not match the titles. The title has ‘Sustainable Supplier Management’ as the explanatory variable, but in the model clock of the article, this variable becomes the mediating variable. The so-called moderating effect occurs in ‘Sustainable Supplier Management’ and ‘Supplier selection’, which does not match the title. The relationship between variables is rather confusing, so please think carefully and unify them.

Response> We agree with this comment. So, we changed the title to “Linking sustainable supplier selection to firm’s sustainable performance: the moderated mediating role of supplier development and leadership for functional integration” to address our research model more clearly. We also revised overall of our manuscript to avoid some confusion. For instance, we added sub-title 2.1, and 2.2 sections to show the mediation and moderating hypotheses clearly.   

(2)  Secondly, The article does not sufficiently demonstrate ‘sustainable’, and the understanding of this concept is not deep enough. The concept of 'sustainable' needs to be integrated with the context of the study, rather than being a passing comment.

Response> In the first paragraph of Introduction section, we tried to demonstrage the concept of “sustainability”.    

(3)  In addition, the introductory section is not comprehensive enough for the concept of 'functional integration', and additional content is needed to provide an overview of it.

Response> In introduton section, We just added the definition of functional integration to enhance the readability of our manuscript. Mainly, we strengthened the 2.2 section to explain the moderating role of leadership support for functional integration more clearly.

(4) Finally,  what does ‘slection’ mean in Figure 1?

Response> Thank you! We revised it to “selection”. 

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The authors did a good job addressing my comments, well-done. 

Author Response

The authors did a good job addressing my comments, well-done. 

Response> Thanks for your valuable comments during the review process, which is very helpful in enhancing the quality of our manuscript.

Reviewer 2 Report

The article meets the requirements of publication and can be accepted.

Author Response

The article meets the requirements of publication and can be accepted.

Response> Thanks for your valuable comments during the review process, which is very helpful in enhancing the quality of our manuscript.