📈 economics

E-Logistics Effectiveness in Bangladesh’s RMG Sector: A Combined NCA–fsQCA Study

This study employs a combined NCA–fsQCA approach on Bangladesh's RMG sector to demonstrate that while top management awareness is a necessary condition for high e-logistics effectiveness, it must be configured with specific combinations of technological, international, and organizational factors to achieve sufficient outcomes.

Original authors: Jesmin Akter, Md. Amir Hossen

Published 2026-10-23

📖 5 min read🧠 Deep dive

CC BY 4.0

Original authors: Jesmin Akter, Md. Amir Hossen

Original paper licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). ✨ This is an AI-generated explanation of the paper below. It is not written or endorsed by the authors. For technical accuracy, refer to the original paper. Read full disclaimer

In the modern world of making things, the journey of a product is just as important as the product itself. For industries that build clothes for global markets, getting a package from a factory floor to a shipping container on time requires a complex web of coordination. This is the realm of logistics, the art and science of moving goods. Today, this field is increasingly digital. Companies use computer systems to track inventory, manage shipments, and talk to customers. The hope is that these digital tools make everything faster, clearer, and more reliable. However, a simple truth has emerged in business research: buying expensive software does not automatically make a company better. A factory can have the most advanced tracking system in the world, but if the people running it do not understand how to use it, or if the company culture does not support it, the technology sits idle. The real question for researchers is not just whether a company has technology, but what specific mix of factors turns that technology into actual success.

This question is particularly urgent in Bangladesh, a country that produces a massive share of the world's ready-made garments. In this industry, factories operate under tight deadlines and strict demands from international buyers. To survive, they must be incredibly efficient. A team of researchers set out to understand why some Bangladeshi garment factories seem to get great results from their digital logistics systems while others struggle, even when they have similar tools. They wanted to move beyond the old way of asking, "Does technology help on average?" and instead ask, "What specific combination of conditions is required for a factory to succeed?" They focused on five key areas: how advanced the technology is, whether top managers truly understand the value of these systems, how big the company is, whether the company sells mostly to international markets, and how much pressure they feel from outside buyers to adopt these tools.

To find the answer, the researchers surveyed sixty professionals working in the industry, asking them about their daily operations and the results they saw. They used a sophisticated method of analysis that looks for patterns in how different factors combine, rather than just measuring them one by one. Their investigation revealed a surprising and clear hierarchy of importance. The most critical factor, the one that acts as a non-negotiable foundation for success, is the awareness and understanding of top management. The data showed that no matter how advanced the technology is, or how large the company, if the leaders do not grasp the goals of the digital system, the factory cannot achieve high levels of effectiveness. It is not enough for managers to simply approve a budget; they must deeply understand the process. Without this leadership awareness, the ceiling for success is low, and high performance is simply not possible.

However, having a knowledgeable leader is not a magic wand that guarantees success on its own. The researchers found that there are two distinct paths, or recipes, that successful factories follow once that leadership foundation is in place. The first path belongs to factories that may not have the most cutting-edge, expensive software. These companies succeed because they have strong leadership, they feel pressure from their international buyers to perform, and they focus on their local or regional markets. In this scenario, the technology does not need to be the most advanced; the human element and the external pressure drive the results. The second path is for larger factories that sell heavily to international markets. These companies also have strong leadership and feel that same external pressure, but they succeed by combining these factors with their large size and global reach. In this case, the specific type of technology matters less; whether they use a basic system or a complex one, the combination of size, global focus, and leadership drives the success.

The study also clarified what does not work. It proved that there is no single "best" technology that fits every factory. A factory with a simple system can outperform one with a complex system if the human and environmental conditions are right. Conversely, having the best technology in the world cannot save a factory where the leadership is disengaged. The researchers also noted that the reasons for failure are not simply the opposite of the reasons for success. A factory that fails is not just a successful factory with the ingredients removed; it is a different situation entirely, often driven by a lack of leadership combined with specific structural issues. This means that fixing a struggling factory requires a tailored approach, not just a generic checklist.

The findings offer a clear guide for the future of the industry. The most important lesson is that digital transformation is not a technology problem; it is a management problem. Before a factory invests in new software or upgrades its tracking systems, it must ensure its leaders are fully on board and understand the vision. Once that foundation is secure, the factory can choose the path that fits its size and market. They can succeed with simpler tools if they are driven by customer demands, or they can leverage their large scale to navigate global markets. The technology is a tool, but the hand that wields it and the context in which it is used determine whether it builds a better future or remains just another piece of equipment on a shelf.

Technical Summary: E-Logistics Effectiveness in Bangladesh's RMG Sector

Problem Statement
While digital logistics promises improved visibility, coordination, and reliability in supply chains, technological sophistication alone does not guarantee organizational value realization. Existing research on Bangladesh's Ready-Made Garment (RMG) sector has predominantly relied on symmetric, net-effect oriented approaches (e.g., Structural Equation Modeling) to estimate average relationships between factors like IT adoption and performance. These designs fail to address two critical gaps: (1) whether specific conditions are strictly necessary (indispensable) for high e-logistics effectiveness, and (2) whether multiple, distinct combinations of conditions (configurations) can lead to the same favorable outcome. The study addresses the lack of respondent-level evidence in the Bangladesh RMG context that separates practical necessity from configurational sufficiency.

Methodology
The study employs a quantitative, cross-sectional, exploratory configurational design using a combined Necessary Condition Analysis (NCA) and fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fsQCA) approach.

Data Collection: A survey was administered to 70 RMG professionals in Bangladesh (Chattogram, Gazipur, Narayanganj, Savar) between May and June 2026. 60 usable responses were retained (85.7% response rate). The unit of analysis is the individual professional's report on their organizational context.
Variables: Based on the Technology-Organization-Environment (TOE) framework, five conditions were analyzed:
- Technological: Digital system sophistication (TECH).
- Organizational: Top-management awareness (MGT) and organizational scale (SIZE).
- Environmental: International market orientation (INTL) and external adoption pressure (EXT).
- Outcome: Perceived e-logistics effectiveness (BENEFIT), measured as a four-item composite (profitability, customer interaction, security/reliability, visibility).
Measurement & Calibration: The BENEFIT composite showed strong empirical coherence ( $\alpha = 0.936$ , $\omega = 0.937$ ). Calibration was theory-anchored, using specific thresholds for fuzzy-set membership (e.g., BENEFIT crossover at 3.75). TECH was coded from open-ended descriptions using a conservative, reproducible rubric.
Analytical Strategy:
- NCA: Used the Ceiling Envelopment Free Disposal Hull (CE-FDH) technique with 10,000 permutations to identify conditions that place a "ceiling" on the outcome (necessity).
- fsQCA: Used Boolean minimization to identify sufficient configurations. The analysis focused on the "complex solution" (based on observed data) with thresholds of frequency $\ge 2$ , consistency $\ge 0.80$ , and PRI $\ge 0.65$ .
- Robustness: Extensive checks were performed, including varying thresholds, alternative coding for technology, and exclusion of straight-line/repeated response profiles.

Key Results

Necessary Conditions (NCA):
- Top-management awareness (MGT) is the only condition identified as both practically meaningful ( $d = 0.433$ ) and statistically significant ( $p < 0.001$ ). It acts as a bottleneck: achieving high benefit levels (e.g., BENEFIT $\ge 4.5$ ) requires MGT scores of at least 4.
- Other conditions (TECH, SIZE, INTL, EXT) showed small or non-significant necessity effects and are not individually indispensable.
Sufficient Configurations (fsQCA):
- The analysis identified two distinct pathways (equifinality) leading to high perceived e-logistics effectiveness, both sharing MGT and EXT as core conditions:
  - Pathway 1: High Management Awareness * Absence of Explicit Advanced Technology * Absence of International Orientation * External Pressure ( $MGT * \sim TECH * \sim INTL * EXT$ ).
  - Pathway 2: High Management Awareness * Large Organizational Size * International Orientation * External Pressure ( $MGT * SIZE * INTL * EXT$ ).
- The complex solution achieved high consistency (0.963) and coverage (0.595).
- Causal Asymmetry: A separate analysis for low outcomes yielded different configurations, confirming that the conditions for high effectiveness are not simply the inverse of those for low effectiveness.
Robustness:
- MGT remained present in every high-outcome term across all robustness checks (varying thresholds, coding, and case exclusions).
- The specific structure of peripheral conditions (TECH, SIZE, INTL) showed sensitivity to coding choices and case exclusions, suggesting these pathways are context-dependent rather than invariant.

Key Contributions and Significance
The paper claims four primary contributions:

Contextual Evidence: It provides specific evidence from Bangladesh's RMG sector focused on benefit realization rather than mere technology adoption, moving beyond symmetric net-effect models.
Methodological Integration: It demonstrates the utility of combining NCA and fsQCA to separately evaluate necessity (constraints) and sufficiency (configurations), clarifying that a condition can be necessary without being sufficient, and vice versa.
Theoretical Refinement: The findings challenge technology-deterministic views. They show that high e-logistics effectiveness does not require universally advanced technology; rather, it emerges through context-dependent combinations where managerial readiness is the critical anchor.
Managerial Implications: The study offers a bounded, diagnostic explanation for practitioners. It suggests that while management awareness is a non-negotiable prerequisite, firms can achieve high effectiveness through different strategic routes (e.g., a smaller, domestic-focused route vs. a large, international route) depending on their specific organizational and environmental context.

Limitations and Scope
The authors explicitly frame the findings as "bounded" and "exploratory." Limitations include the cross-sectional nature (precluding temporal causality), the respondent-level sampling (without verified firm-level independence), the use of a study-specific composite for benefits, and the reliance on free-text coding for technology without a second independent coder. The authors caution that the exact peripheral pathways should be replicated in larger, longitudinal, firm-level studies with objective performance data.

Technical Summary: E-Logistics Effectiveness in Bangladesh's RMG Sector

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