Managing Operational Tensions in Scaling Emerging Technologies
DETAILS
Call for Papers
Managing Operational Tensions in Scaling Emerging Technologies
Journal: International Journal of Operations & Production Management
Publisher: Emerald Publishing
Special Issue
Manuscript Submission Opens: 8 January 2027
Manuscript Submission Deadline: 8 April 2027
The International Journal of Operations & Production Management invites submissions for a Special Issue examining the operational tensions that arise when emerging technologies are scaled across organizations, supply networks, platforms, and wider operational systems.
About the Special Issue
Emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) and blockchain offer significant opportunities to improve operational efficiency, forecasting, coordination, transparency, and decision-making. However, as these technologies move beyond pilots and are scaled across functions and organizational boundaries, they can create persistent tensions involving efficiency versus flexibility, autonomy versus control, centralisation versus decentralisation, and sustainability versus profitability.
This Special Issue seeks to advance operations and supply chain management research by examining how technology scaling generates, amplifies, and reshapes these tensions. Particular attention is given to their implications for operational performance, governance, resilience, cybersecurity, sustainability, resource allocation, and coordination.
Topics of Interest
Submissions may address three interconnected levels of analysis:
Intra-Organizational Level
Technology scaling and operational processes
Changes in organizational routines and decision rights
Resource allocation during technology adoption
Performance measurement systems
Human-technology interaction
Experimentation versus operational reliability
Organizational learning during technology scaling
Managerial practices for managing operational tensions
Integration and maintenance of legacy technologies
Technology transition and phase-out strategies
Inter-Organizational, Network and Platform Level
Technology scaling across supply networks
Supply chain coordination and collaboration
Trust, power, and dependency relationships
Data sharing and governance
Transparency versus confidentiality
Decentralisation versus strategic control
Local optimisation versus network-wide performance
AI-enabled ecosystems
Intelligent intermediaries and algorithmic brokers
Digital platforms and ecosystem collaboration
Technology-enabled supply network orchestration
Digital maturity differences among partners
Digital exclusion and inequality
Technology governance across supply chains
Wider Operational-System Level
Technology scaling and operational resilience
Cybersecurity and system-level risk
Regulatory constraints
Infrastructure capacity
Energy consumption
Sustainability implications of emerging technologies
Technology-enabled redistribution of risks and costs
Impacts on workers, suppliers, customers, and operational locations
Technology scaling during disruptions and crises
Resource-constrained operations
Healthcare and humanitarian operations
Speed versus control
Improvisation versus standardisation
Risk-taking versus accountability
Local responsiveness versus system-wide coordination
Research Focus
The Special Issue particularly encourages research explaining how organizations identify and manage persistent operational trade-offs created by emerging technologies as adoption expands in scale and complexity.
Research may examine AI, blockchain, digital platforms, and other emerging technologies while considering how their scaling changes governance structures, decision authority, resource requirements, infrastructure dependencies, cybersecurity exposure, sustainability outcomes, and relationships between organizations.
Studies addressing resource-constrained, disruption-prone, recovery-oriented, healthcare, humanitarian, or other complex operating environments are also particularly relevant.
Submission Information
Manuscript Submission Opens: 8 January 2027
Manuscript Submission Deadline: 8 April 2027
Manuscripts should be submitted through the International Journal of Operations & Production Management ScholarOne Manuscripts system.
Authors must select “Managing Operational Tensions in Scaling Emerging Technologies” from the Special Issue options during submission.
Submitted manuscripts must follow the journal's author guidelines, be original, and must not have been previously published or be under consideration for publication elsewhere while under review.
Guest Editors
Dr Minhao Zhang
University of Bristol, United Kingdom
Email: minhao.zhang@bristol.ac.uk
Dr Yuanzhu Zhan
University of Birmingham, United Kingdom
Email: y.zhan@bham.ac.uk
Dr Iana Jackson
University of Arkansas, United States
Email: ijackson@walton.uark.edu
Professor Zhijun Yan
Beijing Institute of Technology, China
Email: yanzhijun@bit.edu.cn
Posted on ServiceSetu Academics — Premier Platform for Academic Opportunities & Research Collaboration.
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