09 Dec 2025
Recently, a research paper entitled “Does Supply Chain Visibility Improve Firm Resilience: An Organizational Information Processing Theory Perspective” by professor Lujie Chen has been published on Transportation Research Part E.
Over the past five years, manufacturing supply chains have faced unprecedented shocks. The COVID-19 pandemic exposed vulnerabilities in global value chains, causing large-scale production shutdowns and transportation disruptions. At the same time, geopolitical tensions have further restricted the flow of raw materials and components across borders, while environmental challenges and market turbulence have magnified uncertainty and systemic risk. In this high-risk environment, traditional management models have shown clear limitations, leaving firms without sufficient buffers or recovery mechanisms when disruptions strike. As a result, building resilience—greater shock absorption and faster recovery—has become a strategic priority for corporate leaders.
To address this challenge, this study applies Organizational Information Processing Theory (OIPT), which argues that firms must match external uncertainty with internal information-processing capacity. Within this framework, Supply Chain Visibility (SCV) is defined as a critical mechanism for information input and coordination. By enabling greater transparency and timely monitoring, SCV helps firms identify risks earlier, reallocate resources across nodes, and act swiftly during disruptions. Thus, SCV represents a foundational capability for building resilience. However, its effectiveness is not automatically guaranteed, but shaped by governance structures, resource availability, and institutional context.
The results confirm that SCV significantly enhances resilience. Firms with greater visibility detect disruptions earlier, coordinate resources more effectively, and maintain continuity during crises. SCV therefore emerges not as a passive transparency tool but as a strategic capability that enables firms to strengthen resilience in the face of shocks.The analysis reveals several contingencies. Environmental complexity, customer concentration, and financial and inventory slack strengthen the positive effect of SCV, while supplier concentration shows no significant effect, highlighting the greater influence of customer-side risks. By contrast, environmental dynamism weakens SCV’s benefits, suggesting that in volatile markets, visibility must be complemented by redundancy and flexibility strategies. Subgroup regressions show that state-owned enterprises (SOEs) benefit more from SCV due to their stable governance structures, resource allocation advantages, and policy support. Non-SOEs, facing resource constraints and weaker institutional backing, find it more difficult to fully leverage SCV. To bridge this gap, non-SOEs may need to pursue institutional innovation, cross-firm collaboration, and stronger partnerships with government and other stakeholders.
The findings suggest a practical pathway for firms to strengthen resilience through supply chain visibility. First, prioritize client-side visibility by establishing data-sharing and early-warning mechanisms with key customers. Since demand-side disruptions are often the most immediate and severe, closer monitoring of order flows, payment behaviors, and customer requirements allows firms to anticipate risks earlier and prepare timely responses.
Second, resilience requires maintaining rational redundancy. Financial reserves safeguard liquidity in the face of sudden revenue declines, while moderate inventory buffers ensure production continuity during supply interruptions. The goal is to hold “just enough” slack to balance efficiency with risk mitigation, avoiding both excessive costs and vulnerability to shocks.
Third, strengthen responsiveness by enhancing transparency and monitoring across supply chain nodes. Investment in real-time dashboards, predictive analytics, and fast feedback systems enables firms to address small problems before they escalate. By accelerating decision-making and coordination, visibility becomes an active capability that supports continuous operations even under stress.
Finally, SCV must be dynamically adjusted to environmental conditions. Firms should periodically reassess which supply chain links are most critical and allocate monitoring resources accordingly. In volatile settings, visibility should be broadened and combined with redundancy measures, while in more stable contexts, focus can shift toward process optimization. This adaptive approach ensures that SCV remains a long-term enabler of resilience.
Lujie Chen is a full Professor of Management at Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University. Prof Chen is Elsevier-Stanford University World's Top 2% Scientists 2024 and 2025. She is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy in the UK and an expert in the fields of supply chain management and business analytics. Professor Chen have published over 60 high-quality and impactful papers in top-tier journals such as the Journal of Operations Management (UTD 24), Harvard Business Review (FT50), International Journal of Operations and Production Management (ABS 4), British Journal of Management (ABS 4), and European Journal of Operational Research (ABS 4) , among others. She has served as a guest editor for special issues of several respected journals such as International Journal of Operations and Production Management, Industrial Marketing Management, International Journal of Production Economics, and Journal of Business Research. She is currently serving as an Associate Editor for the International Journal of Operations and Production Management (ABS 4) and department editor for IEEE TEM (ABS 3) and editorial board for Humanities and Social Sciences Communications (Nature Portfolio，CAS Humanities Q1 & JCR Q1).
Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review is a top international journal published by Elsevier. Founded in 1997, it is a bimonthly journal. The journal is indexed by both SCIE and SSCI, and mainly publishes high-quality articles in the field of logistics and transportation research. Its subjects include transportation economics, transportation infrastructure and investment appraisal, logistics management practice and performance research, etc. In the 2025 Chinese Academy of Sciences division, its major subject of engineering and technology is in Zone 1, and the minor subjects of economics, engineering: civil, operations research and management science, and transportation are all in Zone 1.
09 Dec 2025