Impact of knowledge management capability on supply chain agility and disruption mitigation performance of U.S. fashion retailers

Abstract

The fashion retail supply chain is one of the most severely affected areas during the global pandemic, and effective mitigation of this sudden disruption is of utmost importance. However, little research has been conducted on how knowledge management capabilities, i.e., knowledge infrastructure capabilities and knowledge process capabilities, could aid in achieving supply chain agility of a fashion retail company and subsequently improve its disruption mitigation performance. Therefore, this research investigated the relationships between knowledge management capabilities, supply chain agility, and disruption mitigation performance by collecting online survey data from 320 U.S. fashion retail industry professionals. Results of structural equation modeling showed that there are significant positive relationships between knowledge infrastructure capabilities and knowledge process capabilities; knowledge process capabilities and supply chain agility; and supply chain agility and pre and post disruption mitigation performance. There are several important theoretical, industrial, and educational contribution of this research to the current body of interdisciplinary literature. Most importantly, this research will inform fashion retail companies on transforming their organizational dimensions through digital escalation and imperative innovation to establish an agile and sustainable supply chain to mitigate future market disruptions.