Content uploaded by Barbara D. Adams
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Barbara D. Adams on Apr 03, 2015
Content may be subject to copyright.
A preview of the PDF is not available
Review of Interorganizational Trust Models
Abstract and Figures
The Canadian government has sought a coherent strategy and policy for missions that rely on the integration and coordination of multiple government agencies so that national goals in international operations can be effectively achieved. Likewise, the recent Canadian Forces (CF) Joint Doctrine Manual (2009) explicitly called for a whole-government approach to operations. To this end, DRDC Toronto has recently begun an Applied Research Program (ARP) exploring the psychological dynamics of trust in the interagency domain, with the intent to develop a conceptual model. This report is in support of these efforts. This report reviewed current interorganizational trust models, in particular those that would be relevant in a Joint, Interagency, Multinational, and Public (JIMP) context. Effort was made to find articles which were relevant to the Canadian military context; however, these articles were scarce, with most research performed in a business context. Approximately 30 primary articles identified in the search were selected and reviewed in detail. Challenges uncovered in this review included a lack of relevant research and models related to interorganizational trust, lack of empirical testing of models and the varying quality of the research that could be retrieved. Emerging themes including the importance of the level of analysis, the components, process and antecedents are discussed. The relationship between trust and performance, and the growing attention to trust violations and repair as well as measures of interorganizational trust are also explored.
Figures - uploaded by Barbara D. Adams
Author content
All figure content in this area was uploaded by Barbara D. Adams
Content may be subject to copyright.
... Studies operationalise these constructs as unrelated (Plank et al., 1999), as well as recursive (Sun and Lin, 2010). Other researchers posit that salesperson trust precedes organisational trust (Adams et al., 2010;Jena and Guin, 2010;Geigenmüller and Greschuchna, 2011), or that organisational trust is an antecedent of salesperson trust (Doney and Cannon, 1997). ...
During initial business-to-business encounters, salespeople try to enhance buyers’ future interaction intentions. A common belief is that increasing buyers’ similarity perceptions increases the chances of future interaction. This study assesses the impact of the similarity-attraction effect on future interaction.
By synthesising social psychology and marketing literature, a conceptual framework is proposed, in which perceived similarity influences salesperson trust. This relationship is mediated by task-related and social assessments of buyers. Task-related assessments comprise willingness (benevolence and integrity) and competence (power and expertise). Social attraction is conceptualised as
likeability. Salesperson trust drives anticipated future interaction, together with organisational trust and anticipated added value.
The conceptual framework was empirically tested through a cross-sectional survey. Dutch professional buyers assessed recent initial sales encounters. A sample of 162 dyads was analysed, using PLS-SEM, including FIMIX segmentation. This study demonstrates support for a third willingness construct: willingness behaviour. This construct implies that buyers are more influenced by expectations regarding behaviour, than assessments of salespeople’s attitudes. A homogeneous analysis supports the influence of perceived similarity on salesperson trust, both directly and through willingness behaviour. However, model-based segmentation uncovers a segment of cost-oriented dyads and a segment of more profit-oriented dyads.
In cost-oriented dyads, there is no significant direct effect between perceived similarity and salesperson trust, and willingness behaviour nearly fully mediates this relationship. In more profit-oriented dyads, the similarity-attraction effect is not present. Theoretical and methodological contributions and managerial implications of these findings are discussed.
... This question is answered by analyzing and discussing the three modeling approaches, namely: reputation, game-theory, and cognition. The analysis and discussion partly draw from other related works in (Adams, Flear, Taylor, Hall, & Karthaus, 2010;Artz & Gil, 2007;Pinyol & Sabater-Mir, 2013;Sherchan, Nepal, & Paris, 2013). ...
Collaboration on resource sharing advocates a joint usage of resources by multiple parties (actors) to attain mutual benefits. Resource sharing becomes vital when resources under consideration are scarce, challenging, and expensive to attain; as well when they are idle or underutilized. In collaborative logistics, resource sharing entails the joint usage of the physical and non-physical assets. Shared assets include the transportation vehicles (trucks), warehouses, distribution centers, information, on-demand staffing, and logistics services offered under cloud computing. Through sharing, collaborating partners in logistics can reduce costs and harms to the environment, but also improve the efficiency of logistical functions. Although collaborative sharing is beneficial, still many difficulties impede its uptake. The difficulties include how to choose partners, establish and maintain trust among partners involved. Indeed, in both academia and industry, low-level trust inhibits the collaboration critically on sharing logistics resources. To this end, the present dissertation addresses the trust problem encountered by collaborating partners when they are sharing logistics resources. It deals with the trust problem by developing the Trust Mechanism (TrustMech) concept. The primary role of the TrustMech is to help logistics stakeholders acquire the far-reaching understanding about the trustworthiness of prospective networks of sharing they configure, before advancing them to an implementation stage.
The TrustMech stands on a mitigation approach that focuses on estimating outcomes of trust uncertainties – rather than – their sources. Henceforth, this dissertation advances on estimating outcomes of trust uncertainties to answer the following central Research Question (RQ): how can collaborating partners acquire the far-reaching understanding about the trustworthiness of prospective networks of sharing they configure? An approach to the research problem, which as well answers the RQ proceeds as follows. The first steps involve establishing behavioral factors and parameters, which influence trust in collaborative sharing of logistics resources. The second stage entails establishing a conceptual framework that depicts and guides trust-based interaction of collaborating partners. The third step comprises developing the TrustMech concept, validating it in both the conceptual and operational aspects, and demonstrating its application by carrying out controlled (simulation) experiments in Multi-Agent Systems. In particular, the proposed TrustMech concept characterizes fundamental logical processes that account for trusting decisions, actions, and reactions of collaborating partners to reinforce emergent trusting outcomes.
The core contributions of this dissertation are the general-purpose TrustMech and the operational TrustMech. The operational TrustMech is customary for collaborative sharing of logistics resources. Regarding its application, the operational TrustMech provides logistics managers and stakeholders the ability to IV
forecast how a configured network of sharing may, in respect of trustworthiness, function upon its implementation. To clarify further, the operational TrustMech scrutinizes many issues. For example, it scrutinizes trustworthiness of the configured network regarding possible strengths and pitfalls and provides pathway explanations underlying such foreseen strengths and pitfalls. Secondly, the operational TrustMech scrutinizes effects which such strengths and pitfalls can generate. Moreover, the operational TrustMech estimates an extent to which behavioral factors influence the trustworthiness of the individual partner and entire resource sharing network. Future research works include extending the TrustMech and replicating the study using system data. Additional future work consists of adjusting the design and settings used, as well as incorporating additional predictor and response variables into the operational TrustMech.
... Beyond these requirements, trust difficulties resulting from uncertain behavioral aspects remain rarely investigated. Nevertheless, trust reviews in [33,34] have emphasized on trust context and models, leaving out behavioral aspects. In essence, building trust in logistics collaboration may involve identifying behavioral factors and their influential mechanisms. ...
Logistics collaboration has emerged a prevalent strategy to mitigate challenge individuals and organizations encounter. A successful collaboration, however, depends on certain trustworthy behaviors partner exhibit. To that end, understanding aspects constituting behavioral uncertainty and mechanisms by which such aspects affect partner trust is a necessary. This necessity counts on emergent behavioral trust uncertainties, constituted by partner’s actions and interactions occurring during collaboration. While this is a necessary requirement, most of the studies in the literature lack to take into account the influence of behavioral uncertainty on collaboration and partner trust. To that effect, this paper uncovers outlined limitation by establishing behavioral factors influencing partner trust in operational stage of logistics collaboration. To accomplish this objective, a systematic literature review (SLR) is deployed to consolidate research domains of logistics, supply chain, collaboration, and trust. SLR proceeds by defining a review protocol, followed by a search process conducted in 5 databases using 20 search terms on articles published between 2001 and 2015 inclusively. Among findings this SLR has revealed are four behavioral factors and thirteen criteria proposed to affect partner trust. Additionally, these factors constitute success and measurable criteria needed for empirical investigation which may employ experimental and/or case-study methods. Moreover, synthesized factors extend further an understanding of behavioral trust in ad hoc collaborative networks, a large part of which being supported by networks of humans and computers.
Small and medium-sized enterprises have found their way into multi-cultural relations to outsource or offshore their business processes. Relationships are built either from an economic or emotional point of view. Our study particularly focused on how SMEs owner/managers build, maintain, and–when necessary–exit their relationships with other SMEs by using trust as a core element. We have chosen for a qualitative research strategy by conducting semi-structured interviews in The Netherlands, Germany, UK, Denmark and Sweden. The countries selected are representatives of the application of Northern-European and Anglo-Saxon business models. Our results suggest that trust is of the essence in the relationship building process and that the perception of trust needs to be understood and managed in multi-cultural relations by all parties involved. We can also conclude from our results that SMEs are intrinsically inclined to base their offshore activities on trust. For practical reasons, partners in relationships need to be educated and trained how to build trust in multi-cultural relations. Future research should focus on the firms’ culture to examine the influence on trustful multi-culture relationships.
Although trust has been given much attention in the management literature as an explanatory factor, less research has been devoted to defining and operationalizing the role of trust, particularly in relation to interorganizational collaboration. The role of trust in collaboration is usually attributed ex post; successful alliances seem to involve trust; unsuccessful alliances do not. As such, much of the extant literature has treated trust as a residual term for the complex social-psychological processes necessary for social action to occur. Yet the relationship between trust and performance remains somewhat elusive in collaborative relationships, perhaps due to the frequent application of interpersonal types of trust to interorganizational types of collaborations. Based on a synthesis of research on trust with research on other aspects of collaboration, this paper identifies the multi-dimensional role played by trust in collaborative relationships. By distinguishing between different roles of trust pertaining to different phases of alliance evolution, and recognizing the recursive nature of collaborative trust, this paper attempts to respond to calls for research examining the evolution of trust and its impact on interorganizational collaborative relationships. The simultaneous focus on trust as an antecedent of relationship development, a moderator of these on outcome, and direct effects on relationship outcome has important implications for both research and practice alike.
A conceptual challenge in exploring the role of trust in interorganizational exchange is translating an inherently individual-level concept-trust-to the organizational-level outcome of performance. We define interpersonal and interorganizational trust as distinct constructs and draw on theories of interorganizational relations to derive a model of exchange performance. Specifically, we investigate the role of trust in interfirm exchange at two levels of analysis and assess its effects on negotiation costs, conflict, and ultimately performance. Propositions were tested with data from a sample of 107 buyer-supplier interfirm relationships in the electrical equipment manufacturing industry using a structural equation model. The results indicate that interpersonal and interorganizational trust are related but distinct constructs, and play different roles in affecting negotiation processes and exchange performance. Further, the hypotheses linking trust to performance receive some support, although the precise nature of the link is somewhat different than initially proposed. Overall, the results show that trust in interorganizational exchange relations clearly matters.
We examine how uncertainty moderates the trust-performance relationship in alliances, building on the distinction between behavioral uncertainty, which relates to anticipating and understanding partners' actions, and externally caused environmental uncertainty. We argue that trust matters more to performance under behavioral uncertainty and less under environmental uncertainty. In data from 126 international alliances, the positive relationship between trust and performance is stronger under high behavioral uncertainty and weaker under high environmental uncertainty. We conclude that partners should concentrate on developing interorganizational trust where potential improvement in alliance performance justifies this effort, which in turn depends on the type of uncertainty faced.
Non-traditional performance indicators have gained broad acceptance in recent years. We continue this discussion and contribute to the knowledge base by employing trust and commitment as two critical intangibles existing between organizations that directly and indirectly influence performance metrics. Each interorganizational contact creates a transactional history that influences cumulative perceptions of trust, that then guide outcome behavior. Using an interdisciplinary foundation, we test a causal model where formal and informal interorganizational relationship structures impact trust and commitment, which then stimulates performance outcomes. The healthcare industry provides the field context where we empirically test our model. A survey was administered to physician practice professionals to measure the theoretical dimensions of the dyad's relationship structure, including antecedents to the mediating variables, trust and commitment, and the resulting outcome constructs. Results demonstrate that relationship dynamics are vital drivers of tangible outcomes. Trust and commitment emerge as variables to be explicitly managed to improve performance.
How can relationships be repaired after being damaged? There is a small but growing body of work on the topic from a number of different disciplinary perspectives using different theoretical lenses and at different levels of analysis. We begin by examining the existing streams of work on relationship repair and organizing them into a conceptual framework. We then consider four questions that probe assumptions or overlooked issues in existing research with the intent of moving toward a more comprehensive conceptual foundation.
As strategic alliances become an increasingly important weapon for companies in achieving a competitive advantage, an important subject of investigation has become those factors that contribute to the success of the alliance. Trust between the alliance partners has been proposed to be one of those critical success factors. The high levels of uncertainty and interdependence that characterizes high technology alliances make trust particularly important in these contexts. Very little is known, however, about the process of trust creation or erosion in strategic alliances. This study addresses this shortcoming in cross-sectional trust research by utilizing a longitudinal survey design to examine the antecedents and outcomes of trust formation between strategic alliance partners. We contrast a transaction cost economics view of trust with a social exchange perspective to more fully explore what may influence changes in the level of trust between partners. Results suggest that the development of trust was not a function of the formal incentive systems that transaction cost economists deem necessary to prevent opportunistic behavior. Conversely, factors from social exchange theory – communication, shared values, and relationship equity – provide a more thorough explanation of what contributes to the development of higher levels of organizational trust. Finally, this study provides evidence that as trust increases between partners, the alliance benefits by displaying higher levels of dependence, higher levels of partner learning, and higher levels of performance.