In an increasingly multifarious economic environment, organizations move violently between the design of value-adding strategic actions and the selection of accurate measures to evaluate the degree of achievement of their goals. From a business perception, competitiveness is a multidimensional construct and scholars have fueled the debate on how to model the competitiveness function for evaluation purposes. Competitive performance is much more than the mere growth of quantitative metrics, and businesses need to accommodate different aspects that affect the functioning of their operations (at all levels) if the full realization of the potential of their resources and capabilities is the desired goal (Ketchen et al., 2007). This argument is not necessarily news and it has been taken into account directly and indirectly in many studies on business competitiveness. In our view, instead of focusing on canonical quantitative approaches to evaluate the individual contribution of different resources /capabilities to business competitiveness, scholars should acknowledge the multi-dimensional nature of competitiveness. This way, the analysis of how businesses can effectively orchestrate their resources and capabilities and of how to evaluate the outcomes of their competitive-led efforts constitutes a challenge to researchers interested in evaluating the business competitiveness from a more holistic, systemic approach. We propose this feature topic to help both academic and industrial research communities understand the recent research progress in manufacturing sector to improve operational performance and competitiveness.

1. Advances in manufacturing systems
2. Manufacturing strategies and competitiveness
3. Knowledge Management
4. New manufacturing process technology

Aims and Scope:

1. Manufacturing systems and Management
2. Supply chain management and inventory system
3. Lean, Green, Six Sigma, Agile manufacturing
4. Environment and energy
5. Ergonomics and human factors
6. Productivity, Quality and Reliability