Institutional pressures, top management commitment and social sustainable procurement in Uganda

Abstract

This study investigated the mediating role of top management commitment in the relationship between institutional pressures and social sustainable procurement in manufacturing firms in Uganda. A cross-sectional survey and descriptive design survey were used obtain data from 200 out of 458 manufacturing firms selected using simple random sampling. The Partial least square structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was used to analyze data using SmartPLS 4.0.9.0. The findings revealed that all study variables institutional pressures, top management commitment and social sustainable procurement have a significant positive association. Further results show that top management commitment partially mediates the relationship between institutional pressures and social sustainable procurement within manufacturing firms with a variance accounted for (VAF) of 23%. We therefore conclude that institutional pressure directly relates with social sustainable procurement as well as top management commitment so institutional pressures alone can cause the manufacturing firm to adapt social sustainable procurement but also top management commitment is also necessary. We recommend that manufacturing firms comply with institutional pressures in their bid to implement social sustainable procurement and this achieved by adhering to suppliers' operational processes, incorporating particular practices/activities utilized by external suppliers in our procurement methods, and making sure we satisfy customer requests to prevent them from terminating contracts. We also recommend top management commitment is necessary in the bid to implement social sustainable procurement and this is achieved by engaging in supply chain partnering.