CHEVAL Céline, DBA

Céline Cheval-Calvel has two master’s degrees in purchasing and supplies (2004) and in the supply chain (2012). She began her career in the purchasing function in 2005 in the railway industry, then in 2014 she oriented her career towards the luxury sectors (wines and spirits and watchmaking). Nowadays, she holds the position of commodity purchasing manager in the watch and jewelry industry and has been proactively involved since 2019 in the transformation of the responsible supply chain at the heart of this industry.

In September 2022, she will defend her Executive Doctorate in Business Administration (EDBA), on the theme “Perceptions and effects of responsible purchasing approaches in an upstream supply chain. Case of Swiss watch & jewelry houses and their suppliers” under the direction of Professor Olivier Lavastre, Professor of Management Sciences at Grenoble IAE. Her works are based on the deployment of responsible purchasing approaches in an upstream supply chain as well as on their effects in the buyer-supplier relationship.

Pr Olivier Lavastre

Perceptions and effects of responsible purchasing in an upstream supply chain: The case of Swiss watch and jewellery companies and their suppliers

The watchmaking industry and jewelry sector, like many sectors before it, is experiencing its Copernican revolution. Such a revolution pushes watch and jewelry companies to be more transparent in the supply of rare materials, such as gold and precious stones.
For less than a decade, this environment has tended to integrate responsible, societal and environmental approaches in response to sustainable development (SD). While the terms of corporate social responsibility and sustainable development have become common, their understandings within watch and jewelry companies diverge and vary even in their applications.
Our study will analyze inside upstream supply chains (SC), in what ways SC adapt to the managerial infusions of their management committee in terms of CSR (corporate social
responsibility) and how they communicate CSR approaches within their ecosystem of watch and jeweler suppliers.
Our research is based on the foundation of neo-institutional theory (DiMaggio and Powell, 1983) and on the effects of mimetic isomorphism in the luxury watchmaking sector as well as on the transposition of organizational hypocrisy according to Brunsonn (1985) towards commercial
hypocrisy. These theories will be complemented by the concept of “Purchasing Social Responsibility” by Carter and Jennings (2002 ; 2004) and on the way in which purchasing
managers get involved in the responsible management of their supply chain by distributing in a “messianic” way. (Quairel, 2007) their responsible purchasing initiatives.
We will analyze, through interviews with buyers and suppliers from the same dyad, the effects that these approaches have on their relationship and their performance. Our study will be based on their methodologies and their daily actions in the field of responsible purchasing approaches.
The aim is to demonstrate that supplier commitment is strengthened through these approaches.
Since SD and CSR are still poorly understood notions, we wish to provide to the players in the
sector, such as purchasing managers or upstream supply chain managers, with a clarification of these concepts. Finally, we will highlight, thanks to the cross-reference between buyers and suppliers, the perception of each party on the deployment of responsible purchasing approaches.