Meta-analysis applied to Operations Management: summarising the results of empirical research

The writing of every new management study should include an enquiry into previous, related investigations. This approach helps to build up a comprehensive picture of the phenomena being considered. Researchers working in isolation tend to repeat past mistakes and rarely achieve much progress. Progress in management sciences comes from building on the efforts of those who have already worked on the subject. Research synthesis is therefore an important task in the theory building/theory testing process. In recent years, quantitative research synthesis (meta-analysis) has gained increasing acceptance. Meta-analysis offers a powerful set of tools for extracting quantitative information from a body of related research. It has already been applied in the fields of archaeology, astronomy, chemistry, education, geophysical science, psychology and public policy. However, it seems suitable even for management researchers since quantitative research is becoming more accepted in management disciplines. The aim of this study is to identify the conditions of applicability of quantitative methods in summarizing past research by drawing overall conclusions from many separate studies. Meta-analysis will be applied to a specific topic of operations management (OM): the link between JIT levers and manufacturing performance with particular reference to time performance. More specifically, an application of meta-analysis will be made with reference to two of the main steps towards the development of an empirically-tested theory: testing the adequacy of the measurement of variables and testing the linkages between the variables. The preliminary application of meta-analysis to OM has revealed distinct potential. However, in order for this potential to be fully exploited, a set of conditions should be established when publishing empirical research in operations management, in order to simplify the comparison of different studies which are related to the same issue. This recommendation is presented together with the final results of the present study.