B2B relationship management: a framework to explore the impact of collaboration

The present paper aims to propose an integrated framework, based on two levels, able to characterize collaborative relation between two or more partners in a Supply Chain, evaluating the related performances. In the first level, related to the context point of view, the most common parameters, identified from a literature review, characterizing a relation have been used to built an integrated analysis framework. The second level is related to the performance side and has been realized through two main attributes: the perceived satisfaction of the relation and its perceived effectiveness. The implementation of the approach has been realized through a survey of different companies, useful to propose a first analysis on how the characteristics of a relation impact on its performance. As an operative tool of the proposed approach a new dashboard is proposed, which allows to follow all the attributes characterizing utmost each relation type, as well as the sensitivity of the perceived performance for each attribute.