Contemporary managerial thinking and practices have been developed in an economic context dominated by industrial logic. This logic conceals the imposing weight of services. Logistics is an activity that is undergoing major changes due to new technologies and managerial innovations. The advent of the supply chain service (SSCM), as a dual concept combining both traditional supply operations and the coordination of various resources, with a view to customer satisfaction, while integrating constraints of time, capacity, shared resources, and co-production, has turned logistics research upside down. The purpose of this chapter is to establish a qualitative analysis of the impact of MCSS practices on the performance of the service company. The theoretical analysis and the review of interviews show that SSCM approaches differ, and that company performance is viewed differently depending on each SSCM practice, and also depending on the multiple facets of this performance. Based on this qualitative review, several observations are identified.
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The development of services appears to be a major predisposition of economies both in macro-economic terms, through the domination of the tertiary sector, and in micro-economic terms, due to the nature of the tasks performed within companies or the nature of the products and services offered. Faced with the challenges of competitiveness, optimizing the Service Supply Chain (SSC) is becoming one of the key factors in the performance of service companies, in terms of customer satisfaction and loyalty, profitability, sales and market share. Service Supply Chain Management (SSCM) is a cross-functional process, encompassing the steering dimensions of demand, capacity and resources, customer and supplier relations, the ordering process, service performance, and information and technology (Ellram et al., 2004).
Performance refers to the degree to which results are achieved in relation to the efforts made and resources absorbed. It is based on the concepts of effectiveness and efficiency. Its measurement is therefore multi-variable, covering several levels. Performance is a difficult notion to define, and a comparison of possible translations reveals this conceptual difficulty. Performance cannot be reduced to a single dimension that would encompass all the others. On the contrary, it is necessary to recognize the coexistence of several dimensions, for which there is no single optimum that would impose itself on all stakeholders. Performance becomes “global” when the company strives to satisfy the expectations of investors and other stakeholders. Supply chain performance measurement focuses on improving the operation of production support processes and increasing productivity.
The aim of this work is to establish a qualitative analysis of the impact of SSCM practices on the overall performance of the service company. The theoretical analysis carried out and the review of the interviews conducted show that SSCM approaches are many and varied, and that the overall performance of the company is apprehended unequally according to each SSCM practice. On the basis of this qualitative review, we have identified a number of possible observations and considered a number of avenues for further reflection.