Summary of the methodological discussion and implications for this

This thesis aims at theory building, introduces frameworks and illustrates them with examples and qualitative case studies. For the theory building purpose the thesis also borrows approaches, theories and frameworks from other disciplines. With the help of case studies and illustrations the aim is to modify and further develop these theories in the service context, particularly in the logistics services context. The implications of the modularity approach for service industries, and particularly for logistics, are discussed in all the papers of this dissertation. Because of the limited amount of previous research on service modularity, qualitative methods are well justified (Eisenhardt, 1989; McCutcheon and Meredith, 1993; Voss et al., 2002; Sachan and Datta, 2005; Frankel et al., 2005; Eisenhardt and Graebner, 2007; Golicic and Davis, 2012), and used.

Paper 1 (“The Concept of Modularity: Diffusion from Manufacturing to Service Production”) presents a literature review of the key modularity-related themes. The literature review in paper 1 is conducted using the integrative literature review method, in which past research is summarized by drawing overall conclusions from separate studies (Cooper, 1989). In an integrative review, reviewers present the state of knowledge regarding a particular topic and try to find issues that the research has not dealt with.

The stages of a systematic review are: 1) planning the review (the need for a review, proposal for a review, and the review protocol), 2) conducting the review (selection of studies, evaluation of data, synthesis), and 3) reporting and dissemination (Cooper, 1989; Tranfield et al., 2003). For paper 1, three searches were conducted in two journal databases, the search term

“Modularity” being used in Emerald and ProQuest, and the search string

”Modularization OR Modularisation” being used in Emerald. These searches resulted in about 1000 articles, among which the most relevant

were selected for further inspection. The first screening was done by the research group members by reviewing the article abstracts, and after that by voting about the relevancy of each article. The final decisions about relevancy were made after going through these articles. After this procedure 33 articles were selected and studied in more depth. In addition, a few

“classics” of the field and a few recent, highly relevant articles were reviewed. These were articles that, for some reason, were not included in our searches and/or selections, and they were included to assure the quality of the research.

Paper 2 (“Views of Logistics Service Providers on Modularity in Logistics Services”) is empirical and the paper focuses on how the concept of modularity is understood and used in practice among Finnish LSPs. The interviews for paper 2 were conducted in 2009, and 25 Finnish LSPs were interviewed. The sample of companies selected for the interviews contained companies that were different in terms of size, geographical range, services, and operations, for example. The interview questions included both open-ended questions and structured statements (on a scale of 1=totally disagree to 7=totally agree). Structured statements were used to achieve better generalizability of the findings in cross-case analyses. Modularity themes found in the literature were used in preparing the questions. These themes included definitions of modularity, the applicability of modularity, the benefits and disadvantages of modularity in logistics, and the future development of modularity in logistics.

In Paper 3 (”Framework for modularity and customization: service perspective”) a theoretical framework is constructed based on the literature on modularity and customization. The framework makes it possible to analyze different levels of modularity and customization related to e.g. the service product, processes and organization, and reveals four key combinations of modularity and customization. The framework is also used to present examples from the automotive industry, chosen to illustrate the logic of the framework, i.e. how different business models can be distinguished within the framework.

Paper 4 (“Matching Service Strategies, Business Models and Modular Business Processes”) describes modules at three levels: the strategic, business model and business process levels. To increase the understanding of how these frameworks can be used in analyzing services, a qualitative research strategy is used. Thus, examples of selected logistics services and a company case study are presented. The single case study of Itella Corporation combines data collection methods from several sources such as the Internet, interviews, questionnaires, and internal company material.

Introduction

Paper 5 (“Modularity and customization in LSPs’ service strategies”) classifies service strategies that LSPs apply, and analyzes whether the service strategies that the LSPs use are reflected in their approaches to modularity and customization from three perspectives: service offerings, service production processes and service production networks. An analysis of the structured statements played an important role in this paper. Five case examples chosen from the year 2009 interviews are used to describe the types of LSP strategy, and to show how modularity and customization are used in implementing these strategies. The cases are presented using the framework developed in paper 3. The findings show that different service strategies are also reflected in differences related to modularity and customization in the service offerings, processes and networks.

Paper 6 (“Development of outbound logistics services in the automotive industry – case SE Mäkinen”) uses a single case study approach. The case company, SE Mäkinen, is an LSP offering services for the automotive supply chain. The in-depth information regarding the case company has been collected from company interviews, public sources (e.g. the Internet) and internal company material. In this paper the case study is used to increase the understanding of the service model and service development throughout the history of the case company.

The thesis is based on the paradigm of critical realism, with mainly an abductive research approach. Kovács and Spens (2005) describe the abductive process as an iterative process moving back and forth between theoretical and empirical research and consisting of five phases: 0) prior theoretical knowledge, 1) deviating real-life observations, 2) theory matching (iterative process between theory matching and real-life observations), 3) theory suggestion, and 4) application of conclusions. As a whole, the research process of the thesis follows an abductive research approach (see Table 2). The use of this approach is also supported by a suggestion of Kovács and Spens (2007) to the effect that borrowing theories from other disciplines may initiate an abductive research process.

Additionally, the abductive approach is used explicitly in paper 5, where the systematic combining approach, originally presented by Dubois and Gadde (2002), is used in an iterative negotiation process between the LSP theories and the characteristics of the case companies observed in the empirical investigation. Dubois and Gadde present systematic combining as a process where matching between theory and reality, and direction and redirection of the study are continuous. An abductive approach can also be found in the research reported in paper 3 because, after discovery of an inadequate theory, there followed an iterative process of framework building and matching examples with the framework.

A summary of the research phases and methods used in the research papers is presented in Table 2.

Table 2. Summary of the research phases and methods used in the research papers.

Paper Phase of the abductive process Methods

1 The Concept of Matching modularity theory in the service context

This thesis uses a combination of methods: A systematic literature review method is combined with usage of illustrative examples and single and multiple case studies based on interviews, questionnaires, and other material. These methods are used because they complement each other.

Literature reviews build theoretical understanding, illustrative examples act as “rehearsal opponents”, single cases bring in-depth understanding about causal or other kinds of relationships in definite contexts, and multiple cases bring generalizable perspectives. A slightly pragmatist view of research methods has been adopted, i.e. using a combination of approaches that works best for the research problem under study (Golicic and Davis, 2012). In particular, the more than 20 cases of the multiple case design is justifiable because the aim has been to achieve versatile perspectives by simultaneously collecting in-depth qualitative data through interviews and observations, and quantifiable data through structured questionnaires.

The iterative structure of the theory building process in this research is illustrated in Figure 1.

Introduction

Figure 1. The iterative structure of the theory building process in this research.

Theory building in this research relies on the analysis of case studies, borrowing theories and approaches from other disciplines (interdisciplinary), and meta-framework building. The borrowed approaches include modularity and business model approaches and service strategy literature. Following the paradigm of critical realism, any theories or frameworks presented in this thesis should be evaluated mainly in terms of their practicality (Kovács and Spens, 2007).

Chapter 4 contains a discussion of the research limitations, validity and reliability.

Literature review Theoretical understanding

Understanding contextual

causality

Illustrative examples

Single cases Multiple

cases Understanding

contextual generalizability Understanding

conceptual consistency

Iterative theory building

Literature review