Searching for the ‘Monday Blues’ in Order Fulfillment and its Cure

Abstract:     
The “Monday Blues” effect – poorer performance on Mondays compared to other workdays – (shortened to the Monday effect hereafter) has been documented for investor returns, worker productivity, and employee accidents. Using order and fulfillment records from the U.S. government’s General Services Administration, we assess whether the Monday effect exists in supply chain performance, and quantify the effect. Furthermore, we assess whether information technology can be used to reduce or mitigate the Monday effect. Performance is measured by order cycle time, complete orders fulfilled, and short shipment percentage. Our findings show that there exists a significant Monday effect; that is, Mondays tend to have poorer performance than other days of the week on all three performance metrics, even after accounting for differences in the workload on Mondays. We calculate the potential Monday effect and find that performance on Mondays is up to 27% worse, on average, than for other weekdays. Further, we find that the Monday effect is significantly reduced, (from 35% to 75%) on all three performance measures when an electronic market, as opposed to traditional paper-based systems, is used for order fulfillment. These findings point to important implications for supply chain management; that is, efforts can be taken to improve performance on Mondays, including using information technologies to manage supply chain functions.

Number of Pages in PDF File: 29

Keywords: Electronic Markets, Supply Chain Performance, Monday Effect, Behavioral Operations

JEL Classification: C13, M11

working papers series