Supplier Partner Dependency from the Perspective of Social Exchange: The Moderating Effect of Partner Power

Based on the social exchange theory, this research uses partner power as the moderating variable to explore the relationship between the trust, commitment, and mutual dependencies among organizations. This research proposes an integrated conceptual framework and conducts empirical research on procurement personnel of medical institutions. There are 321 valid questionnaires. The research results show that: 1. The higher the medical institution's awareness of social exchange characteristics, it will have a higher attitude of trust and commitment to its suppliers, and deepen its dependence on suppliers. 2. The relationship among trust, commitment and dependency. After the medical institutions trust their suppliers, they must first establish and maintain the commitment of long-term relationship, and then the trust to the supplier will generate dependency through commitment. 3. In the buying and selling relationship, social exchange characteristics often show a positive relationship with the partner dependency. Once the medical institution feels that the partner has high power, the higher the communication and partner reputation, the medical institution will instead try to reduce the dependency on partners and get rid of the disadvantage of being controlled. 4. In the case of high partner power, the power of the supplier can affect the decision or behavior of the medical institution, and high power dependency will also make social exchange characteristics (anticipated benefits, communication, partner reputation) have an inhibitory effect on dependency.