Kraljic's (1983) purchasing portfolio approach holds that different types of purchases need different sourcing strategies, underpinned by distinct sets of resources and practices. The approach is widely deployed in business and extensively researched, and yet little research has been conducted on how knowledge and skills vary across a portfolio of purchases. This study extends the body of knowl...

The Balanced Scorecard (BSC), as a strategic management and control tool with an integrated set of leading and lagging performance measures, can secure successful implementation of purchasing strategies. However, the quality of the BSC itself as well as the effectiveness of the process to set up, implement, and use the BSC are crucial. Recognizing the growing importance of the purchasing-BSC (P...

The emergence of the purchasing function from a position of "corporate obscurity" to a role that is active and integrated is evident in highly developed economies. In the African countries, the tendency is for top management to be hesitant to acknowledge that in a cost competitive environment it would be prudent to develop purchasing’s profit generating potential. Central to the notion of devel...

Summary Kraljic's purchasing portfolio approach has inspired many academic writers to undertake further research into purchasing portfolio models. Although it is evident that power and dependence issues play an important role in the Kraljic matrix, scant quantitative research has been undertaken in this respect. In our study we have filled this gap by proposing quantitative measures for ‘relati...

BACKGROUND Purchasing refers to the process by which pooled funds are paid to providers in order to deliver a set of health care interventions. Very little is known about purchasing arrangements in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), and certainly not in Kenya. This study aimed to critically analyse purchasing arrangements in Kenya, using the National Hospital Insurance Fund (NHIF) as a c...

proposed to establish a service packages, whether through a single obligatory list or through the definition of a flexible, high priority set to be offered to specific populations according to their economic possibilities. For the strategic purchasing of services, two alternatives are proposed: to assign the fund either to a single national manager or to each of the existing public provider ins...

When a product of uncertain quality is first introduced, consumers may be enticed to strategically delay their purchasing decisions in anticipation of the product reviews of their peers. This paper investigates how the presence of social learning interacts with the adoption decisions of strategic consumers and the dynamicpricing decisions of a monopolist firm, within a simple two-period model. ...