Identifying the pathways through digital transformation to achieve supply chain resilience: an fsQCA approach

The manufacturing industry has placed a greater emphasis on digital transformation, especially under the impact of COVID-19. However, the influence mechanism between digital transformation and supply chain resilience is still a topic of discussion. Resource orchestration theory indicates that a firm not only need to emphasize the investment of resources but also pays attention to the allocation of resources. Therefore, based on the resource orchestration theory, this study divides the digital transformation into digital transformation breadth and digital transformation depth and combines R&D spending (R&D intensity and R&D employee) and contingency factors (firm size) to construct a theoretical path of “digital transformation-supply chain resilience.” This research uses fuzzy sets qualitative comparative analysis to explore how to configure the digital transformation to achieve high supply chain resilience based on data from 193 listed manufacturing firms. Using the fsQCA software, it was discovered that there were no necessary conditions for achieving high supply chain resilience; sufficient condition analysis revealed that there are six paths to achieving high supply chain resilience, four of which can be summarized as digital transformation driven and the other two as R&D spending driven. These several approaches highlight the complicated causal relationship between digital transformation and supply chain resilience, as well as give theoretical and practical recommendations for firms looking to implement digital strategies and enhance their supply chains.