Impact of JIT, TQM and circular economy practices on sustainable performance

Manufacturing companies need to comply with the demands of customers and government regulations (Machingura et al., 2024b). Since this demand encompasses sustainability, companies need to adjust their activities to satisfy the customers and remain competitive. Some customers now demand that products supplied to them should be made in an environmentally friendly manner (Mansour et al., 2025). Governmental regulations are also pushing companies to adopt improvement methodologies to reduce environmental waste and gas emissions (Govindaraj et al., 2026). Also, there is a need to reduce excessive reliance on virgin raw materials, as they are becoming scarcer (Mansour et al., 2025). In response to this, organisations are exploring how to integrate circular economy practices (CEP) into the already implemented just in time (JIT) and total quality management (TQM) environment. However, it is not clear how best companies can achieve this, as the integration of CEP by manufacturing companies is relatively newer. There is no clear standard model that manufacturing organisations can apply to integrate JIT, TQM and CEP. As a result, chaotic implementations may occur, leading to failure of the implementation process.

This study links these issues to the natural resource-based view (NRBV) theory, which holds that a company’s competitive advantage increasingly depends on how well it manages its interactions with the environment (Hart, 1995). NRBV focuses on three capabilities, which are pollution prevention (reducing waste), product stewardship (managing life-cycle impacts) and sustainable development (reducing environmental footprint) (Farrukh and Sajjad, 2025). JIT and TQM have the potential to reduce waste, but there is a research gap on how these approaches might be adopted to suit the circular economy. It has been discussed that JIT improves operational performance (Maware and Adetunji, 2019a) and TQM enhances organisational performance (Hassan and Jaaron, 2021), but their relationship to CEP has not been clearly examined. Current systems often prioritise linear manufacturing, leading to inefficiencies in handling reverse logistics and incorporating recycled materials. To provide a framework for better resource management, this study tackles the dichotomy between circular sustainability and linear efficiency (JIT/TQM). To the authors’ best knowledge, no research has clearly investigated the relationship between these variables. Hence, this gap needs to be addressed to provide a basis for researchers and organisations wanting to integrate these practices.

It is also critical to identify essential antecedents for the successful adoption of CEP. Hence, a study that identifies and examines the role of the antecedents to CEP is necessary. In this research, the authors assessed the joint impact of JIT and TQM, the two elements of Lean that are referred to as the main Lean Manufacturing (LM) bundles and CEP on sustainable performance. More specifically, we ask if the ability of organisations to eliminate waste (JIT) and the capability to make products according to customer specifications (TQM) can have an impact on the ability of organisations to successfully implement CEP, leading to improved sustainable performance. The authors shall develop and examine a model comprising JIT, TQM, CEP and sustainable performance variables using data from the Zimbabwean manufacturing industry.

The study focused on the Zimbabwean manufacturing industry, which is important, as Zimbabwe was once a breadbasket of Africa. However, changes in some economic policies, such as currency policy, have introduced instability into the economy. According to The World Bank (2026), from 2017 to 2024, the GDP of Zimbabwe has been fluctuating due to inconsistent economic policies. These economic challenges are not peculiar to Zimbabwe only; they are also encountered in various developing countries, especially those in SADC region. Thus, although this research was conducted in Zimbabwe, it is also applicable to many SADC countries, hence they can also benefit. Compared with other countries, such as South Africa, where data collection is regulated by numerous laws, such as the Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013 (POPIA), data collection in Zimbabwe is easier, enabling authors to gather substantial data. According to the Zimbabwe Statistical Agency (ZIMSTAT) (2025), the manufacturing industry is the largest contributor to Zimbabwe’s gross domestic product (GDP), and it deserves significant attention.

Some researchers, such as Green et al. (2019), Le et al. (2024) and Gopalakrishna Pillai et al. (2025) examined the individual impact of TQM, JIT and CEP on organisational performance. None of these studies has examined the combined impact of JIT, TQM, CEP on sustainable performance. The circular economy methodology is complementary to JIT and TQM; hence, it is important to investigate their joint impact on sustainable performance. The authors’ contribution is to examine the joint influence of JIT, TQM and CEP towards improvement in sustainable performance by constructing a model where JIT and TQM are essential antecedents to CEP and sustainable performance. The results will contribute to sustainable performance by informing organisations of the advantages of adopting these management practices. Also, organisations that have already implemented lean manufacturing can take advantage and easily adopt CEP, relying on the results of this study. Thus, the research questions are as follows:

Following the introduction is the literature review, which outlines the conceptual model and hypothesis formulation. This is followed by the methodology, which outlines how the questionnaire was prepared and used for data collection. The results follow next, which seek to answer the questions related to important antecedents to the adoption of CEP. The discussion and conclusion are outlined in Sections 5 and 6, respectively.

The study is grounded in the NRBV theory introduced by Hart (1995), which builds on the conventional resource-based view. It contends that firm-level competencies that tackle environmental issues are becoming increasingly important for sustainable competitive advantage. According to the NRBV theory, organisations progressively develop environmentally embedded capabilities, progressing through three stages: pollution prevention, product stewardship and sustainable development (Farrukh and Sajjad, 2025). These capabilities enable companies to simultaneously improve economic performance while minimising environmental harm and improving social responsibility (Hart and Dowell, 2011). However, these capabilities are not deployed incrementally, but simultaneously to achieve an ultimate goal of improved sustainable performance. JIT, TQM and CEP are closely linked to these three capabilities. JIT is better aligned with preventing pollution through reduced inventory and overproduction; TQM is more linked to product stewardship; and CEP is better aligned with sustainable development. The overall result of these environmentally embedded organisational competencies is sustainable performance.

JIT is viewed through the NRBV lens as both an operational efficiency and a pollution prevention practice. It reduces waste at its source by minimising overproduction, extra inventory, waiting time and wasteful resource use (Mweshi et al., 2025). Thus, it improves environmental performance by reducing emissions, energy use and material waste. It creates organisational procedures that improve resource efficiency and operational transparency by implementing process discipline, synchronised supply flows and real-time problem identification (Burawat, 2025). JIT creates the fundamental capacity required for more sophisticated sustainability measures, which is why in our model it is the exogenous variable influencing TQM, CEP and sustainable performance.

JIT is a lean method in which products are received from the suppliers exactly when they are needed, thus reducing the need for large inventories and lowering the inventory holding costs (Ghobadian et al., 2020). It is associated with the reduction of waste, emissions and pollution, thereby supporting circularity (Sajan et al., 2017). JIT advocates that companies should produce the right quantities at the right time (Belekoukias et al., 2014). By reducing waste and resource consumption and increasing overall efficiency, JIT can positively impact the circular economy and support its objective of extending the useful life of resources. Various studies have investigated the relationship between JIT and TQM. A study by Kannan and Tan (2005) found a correlation between JIT and TQM, and that both influence organisational performance. A study in Chinese manufacturing firms also indicated that when organisations adopt JIT practices, they are likely to improve TQM performances (Chen, 2015). Zelbst et al. (2010) concluded that effective adoption of TQM is enhanced by JIT adoption, with the ultimate objective of fulfilling or surpassing client demands. Therefore, we contend that implementing JIT would enable a company to identify the quality enhancements (TQM) required to restart the process at a lower inventory level. Several studies have also noted that JIT improves organisational performance; for instance, Phan et al. (2019) reported improvements in flexibility performance, Green et al. (2019) reported improvements in environmental performance, and García-García-Cutrín and Rodríguez-García (2024) reported improvements in sustainable performance.

Therefore, we can hypothesise that:

Some studies, however, yielded results that diverged from those we reported earlier. Huson and Nanda (1995) indicated that JIT led to increased costs and reduced profit margins. Another study in the US manufacturing companies showed that JIT does not have a direct impact on operational performance, but the relationship is indirect through environmental performance (Zelbst et al., 2014). These sentiments contradict what other researchers have reported. As a result, it becomes difficult to comprehend the advantages of JIT; therefore, the appropriate stance can only be developed through further research.

Within NRBV, TQM can be viewed as a product stewardship enabler. Businesses must take environmental impacts into account throughout the entire product lifecycle to practice product stewardship. TQM facilitates this by integrating customer focus, cross-functional collaboration, error prevention and continuous improvement into organisational procedures (Alsmairat et al., 2024; Gomaa, 2025). TQM reduces material losses, extends product longevity and improves process reliability through quality control and lifecycle-oriented thinking. The company’s capacity to shift to circular economy practices is strengthened by these processes, which support circular design concepts like recycling, remanufacturing and reuse.

TQM’s aim is to help organisations succeed through customer satisfaction. It represents a foundation for continuous improvement among organisations (Hassan and Jaaron, 2021; Alsmairat et al., 2024). Organisations adopting TQM seek to improve the quality of their products and services and reduce defects, leading to customer satisfaction (Shafiq et al., 2019). TQM seeks to meet customer requirements by improving flexibility, competitiveness and effectiveness (Hassan and Jaaron, 2021). Mohsin et al. (2025) revealed that TQM positively influences economic and environmental performance. Ali and Johl (2021) also concluded that TQM improves sustainable performance. By incorporating CEP into TQM, products designed for disassembly and reuse can be created, thereby reducing the negative environmental impacts of manufacturing processes (Komakech et al., 2024). By encouraging waste reduction, resource efficiency, continuous improvement and improved product quality; TQM strengthens circular economies and fosters a mutually beneficial partnership that stimulates innovation and sustainability. Therefore, we can hypothesise that:

Some studies have concluded that although TQM has an impact on sustainable performance, not all three sustainable performance measures are enhanced. The research by Mohsin et al. (2025) indicated that there is no positive relationship between TQM and social performance. In addition, the study by Chen (2015) found that TQM and operational performance are not related. Although these studies did not find a positive association, we believe that TQM is key in implementing improvement methodologies; thus, the implementation of JIT and CEP is likely to be successful when done simultaneously with TQM. TQM advocates for the involvement of all employees, from shop floor workers to top management, which makes it easier for the implementation of new ideas and to attain performance improvement.

Circular economy represents an advanced sustainable development capability under the NRBV theory. It necessitates the systemic integration of reduce, reuse, recover and recycle concepts, in contrast to linear production methods (Chowdhury et al., 2022). Reverse logistics, product redesign, closed-loop supply chains and interorganisational cooperation are all part of circular economy (Musari et al., 2025). CEP expands upon the possibilities for product stewardship and pollution control created by JIT and TQM. Circular projects may not be operationally feasible without fundamental waste-reduction and quality-control capabilities. As a result, CEP is viewed as an enhanced sustainability capability enabled by earlier operational capabilities (Hedlund et al., 2020).

Many countries around the world have set targets to reduce their carbon footprint and emissions. Circular economy is a newer method that enables organisations to achieve such goals. It changes from linear take-make-dispose to regeneration, waste reduction, pollution reduction, resources and energy conservation (Turchetta et al., 2026). It prioritises material reuse and recycling, waste reduction and reduced environmental impact (Komakech et al., 2024). Le et al. (2024); Gopalakrishna Pillai et al. (2025) indicated that CEP positively impacts sustainable performance. The Qatar service industry study also concluded that CEP positively influences sustainable performance (Obeidat et al., 2023). Hence, it can be hypothesised that:

Sustainable performance refers to the financial advantage businesses gain by considering their environmental and societal impacts (Maletic et al., 2015; Machingura and Muyavu, 2024). It is often represented by three dimensions, which are economic, social and environmental. The economic dimension is connected to financial gains, while the social dimension is connected to the impact of operations on society and workers and the environmental dimension is linked to the environmental effects of products and operations.

Sustainable performance was operationalised as a higher-order model made up of three lower-order variables, namely, economic, social and environmental performance. This was important to clearly analyse how JIT, TQM and CEP influence each of these variables. Organisations pay different attention to these performance criteria depending on their priorities. The same is true even for researchers, as some studies have assessed the impact of improvement methodologies on different performance criteria. For instance, Maware and Adetunji (2019, 2020) focused on operational performance, Green et al. (2019) focused on environmental performance and Inman and Green (2018); Machingura et al. (2024a) focused on environmental and operational performance. Thus, such information is also important for new adopters who are unsure of the impact of JIT, TQM and CEP on specific performance measures. This will help them decide which practices to implement and understand the benefits of such implementation on their target goal. This will help craft policies that can help organisations improve. Furthermore, researchers will benefit from such an understanding as they can visualise the independent performance improvement (economic, environmental and social), unlike bunching them into one (sustainable performance). This can also help them further research and answer some important questions that might have been omitted in this research. Figure 1 shows the theoretical model developed from the proposed hypotheses.

Integrating JIT, TQM and CEP is not a walk in the park; there are some conflicts encountered during the process. To implement such a model, organisations need to understand these conflicts and potential trade-offs that may be required to address them. Circular economy aim is a regenerative, long-term environmental sustainability, while TQM and JIT are known to target immediate efficiency, waste reduction and quality control in a linear manufacturing setup. Also, JIT’s aim is to maintain very low levels of inventory. Contrary to the JIT mindset, a circular economy frequently necessitates keeping inventory of discarded goods or recycled resources for future remanufacturing. Dües et al. (2013) and Machingura et al. (2024a) indicated that JIT increases gas emissions due to the frequency of delivery, which tends to contradict circular economy’s aim to lower air pollution. JIT increases replenishment frequency because the right amount of raw material is ordered, whereas the circular economy reduces it because some materials are recycled and reused in the manufacturing process. To resolve these conflicts, these studies advocated trade-offs such as combining deliveries, supplying materials to customers at the same location, using heavy-duty trucks that can carry large quantities, optimising vehicle routes and using sea transport or a combination of road and sea.

A quantitative research approach was used since it provides accurate, dependable and repeatable results crucial for making data-driven decisions and establishing relationships between variables. The method is used to test hypotheses and generalise findings across large populations. Sadan (2017) grouped quantitative data collection methods into three, including self-report. This method includes collecting data through questionnaires and Likert scales. Such data can be analysed using structural equation modelling (SEM). SEM is a quantitative research method for examining complex interactions between variables using statistical techniques like factor analysis, structural modelling and measurement analysis (Machingura et al., 2025). The research is based on a correlational research design as it is able assess the associations between variables (Curtis et al., 2016). This method can measure the impact of one variable on other variables. The advantage of it is the inability to manipulate data, and it suits this study as the variables are not directly measured but observed through different measurement items in the questionnaire (Seeram, 2019).

When developing a questionnaire, it is often advised to adopt questions used by previous scholars to increase the questionnaire’s validity. Hence, the authors used similar questions to those used by other authors, as shown in  Appendix. Our questionnaire consisted of four sections. The company’s general information was the main emphasis of section 1. The extent of JIT and TQM implementation was described in Section 2. The degree of CEP adoption was discussed in Section 3. The effect of applying specific JIT, TQM and CEP on sustainable performance was the main topic of Section 4. Pretesting of the questionnaire was conducted by industry professionals and academics to enhance its validity (Machingura et al., 2024a). Four managers in the manufacturing industry and three professors from academia with experience in lean-green were requested to give their opinion on the contents of the questionnaire. This allowed some questions to be added, some to have their wording changed and others to be eliminated, thereby improving the content and semantic validity.

The research targeted manufacturing companies in Zimbabwe. Hence, 782 questionnaires were randomly sent to manufacturing companies registered with the Confederation of Zimbabwe Industries (CZI). Random sampling was used to give each company an equal chance of being selected. Manufacturing companies registered with CZI were used to ensure data quality, relevance and validity. To reduce individual bias, more than one questionnaire was sent to each organisation (Machingura et al., 2025). Telephone calls, WhatsApp and emails were used to follow up with the target population. Higher-ranking staff members, including quality, operational and environmental managers, were requested to take part. 313 responses were obtained and vetted; 11 were deemed incomplete and discarded. As a result, 302 responses were used in data analysis, which satisfies the 10 times rule in the minimum number of responses recommended for SEM by Hair et al. (2017). Since there are six structural paths in the model, applying the 10-times rule means that the minimum sample size is 60. Hence, 302 responses are well above this threshold. Also, 302 responses are much more than 173 responses used by Chen (2015) in the Chinese manufacturing industries, and 182 responses used by Inman and Green (2018)US manufacturing companies, hence considered satisfactory.

SPSS v. 27 and SMART PLS v. 4 were used for data analysis. SPSS was used for Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and descriptive statistics of the demographic information, where the frequencies obtained provided details about the general information of the respondents. SEM in SMART PLS v. 4 was used to test the proposed relationship and hypotheses among variables.

Table 1 shows how the companies are distributed. The food and beverage industry had the most responses with 89, followed by the plastic and rubber industry with 33. Ceramic and automotive industries contributed the least number of respondents with five each.

According to Magaisa and Matipira (2017) organisations with number employees lower than 41 are classified as small and those with 41–75 are categorised as medium while those with greater than 75 employees are grouped as large companies. In this study, 39 respondents were working in small organisations, 37 for medium organisations and 226 for large companies. Combining the respondent from small and medium companies means that the total number of employees in small and medium enterprises (SMEs) is 76.

Employees in high managerial positions completed the questionnaires. Of the respondents, 21 were lower managers, such as production supervisors, 178 were middle managers, like operations and quality managers, while 103 were top managers, such as managing directors. Of the respondents, 7.3% indicated that they had 0–5 years of experience in their positions, while the rest had more than five years. According to Huo et al. (2019), this experience is sufficient to address the questionnaire’s items.

The Bartlett’s test of sphericity was used to assess the data’s suitability for analysis. The obtained p-value was < 0.05, indicating that the data can be used for analysis. The Kaiser–Meyer–Olkin (KMO) was used to determine the sample adequacy. Jabbour et al. (2013) noted that if KMO values are closer to 1, the sample is adequate. The obtained KMO value is 0.903, indicating that 302 responses are adequate. EFA was used to determine the number of factors by selecting those with eigenvalues > 1. EFA confirmed that the data consists of four factors with a total variance of 63.4%.

Cronbach’s alpha was used in measuring construct reliability, and all the values were > 0.7, representing high internal reliability. Internal consistency was achieved since the composite reliability values surpassed 0.7 threshold (Hair et al., 2017). Convergent validity was measured using average variance extracted (AVE), and the results were above 0.5, hence satisfactory. Table 2 shows the AVE and reliability results.

Heterotrait–monotrait (HTMT) ratio was used to measure discriminant validity, where values should be < 0.85 (Hair et al., 2017). As indicated in Table 3, HTMT results were < 0.85, hence satisfactory.

Variance inflation factor (VIF) measures the collinearity of the latent variables. The results in Table 4 were less than 5 and greater than 0.2; hence, there was no collinearity problems (Hair et al., 2017).

R² values of 0.26, 0.13 and 0.02 are considered large, medium and small effects, respectively (Cohen, 1988). The results in Figure 2 exceed 0.26, indicating a large effect. An effect size (f²) of 0.02 is small, 0.15 is medium and 0.35 is high; while an f² less than 0.02 shows no effect (Hair et al., 2017). Table 5 shows that the relationships had medium and high effects. JIT, TQM and CEP effect sizes on sustainable performance are 0.151, 0.153 and 0.174; hence, they all have medium effects. This shows that these practices are all important for achieving improved sustainable performance; hence, organisations should strive to implement them simultaneously. The effect sizes of JIT and TQM on CEP are 0.219 and 0.201, respectively. This also shows that both JIT and TQM have almost equal effects, hence need to be integrated to gain maximum performance improvement.

Bootstrapping was used to evaluate the significance of the relationships. Five thousand runs were used for the bootstrap algorithm as suggested by Hair et al. (2017). For a relationship to be supported, the t-statistics should be above 1.96, and p-values should be less than 0.05 at 5% confidence interval. As indicated in Table 6, all the relationships are significant, as they have satisfied the t-statistic and p-value requirements.

This is a method used to determine the importance and performance of the predecessor latent variable on the latent variable of interest. The aim is to identify predecessor variables with high importance and low performance to create room for improvement (Hair et al., 2017). This will further enable the authors to determine which of the predecessor variables is of greater priority and requires significant investment. Variables with lower importance values are of lower priority in investment. IPMA was used to determine if JIT and TQM are necessary antecedents of CEP adoption. Figure 3 shows that JIT an importance of 0.55 and TQM has an importance of 0.302. This means that organisations should give higher priority to JIT, and more resources should be channelled towards JIT adoption. However, TQM had a greater performance (63.639) compared to JIT with 57.301. This shows that JIT and TQM complement one another as important antecedents to CEP adoption.

A further IMPA analysis was done with sustainable performance as the target variable. From Figure 4, JIT has the greatest importance (0.482), followed by CEP (0.281) and lastly TQM (0.228). This shows that JIT is the most important antecedent to the attainment of improved sustainable performance. Therefore, if one of these elements is improved by one unit, the sustainable performance will increase by the same amount as the factor’s importance. For example, if JIT increases by a single unit, sustainable performance increases by 48.2%.

Mediation analysis was conducted to determine the mediatory role of TQM and CEP on sustainable performance. This was achieved by assessing the total, direct and indirect effects as shown in Table 7. JIT has an indirect impact that is almost twice the direct impact of TQM. This shows that the impact of JIT is enhanced when it acts as an antecedent to TQM and CEP. Also, the total effect of JIT is double the direct effect, indicating its ability to double the sustainable performance. Thus, organisations should start by considering JIT adoption in the event that resources are not enough.

Bootstrapping was used to assess whether these indirect impacts are supported or not. The t-statistics obtained were all greater than 1.96, and the p-values are lower than 0.05; hence, the relationships are supported. This shows that both TQM and CEP mediate the relationship between JIT and sustainable performance. Thus, to attain improved sustainable performance through JIT implementation, organisations need to pay attention to the mediatory role of TQM and CEP. Table 8 shows the bootstrapping results for the indirect impacts.

A measurement model was developed to assist those manufacturing organisations that are keen to implement CEP. This model demonstrated that JIT and TQM are important antecedents to CEP adoption and also in improving sustainable performance. Thus, laying a foundation for those organisations that have already adopted JIT and TQM and are seeking ways to adopt CEP. This concurs with Green et al. (2019) who concluded that JIT and TQM are important antecedents to improve environmental performance. This is also supported by Phan et al. (2019) who determined that the impact of JIT on organisational performance is enhanced by TQM adoption. Since organisations that are willing to implement CEP might already have implemented JIT and TQM, they can leverage this, as they have already laid a strong foundation (Machingura et al., 2024a). It is easier for organisations that have already adopted JIT and TQM to implement CEP, thereby reducing implementation costs. Since organisations aim is to make profits, many are sceptical about implementing those methodologies that seem to focus more on improving environmental performance and not profit margins. However, the integration of CEP into the already existing JIT and TQM system makes the process easier and cheaper while attaining enhanced sustainable performance.

This study also demonstrated that JIT, TQM and CEP improve sustainable performance. Thus, organisations can implement them and enhance environmental, social and economic performances. Studies such as Green et al. (2019) and Rashid et al. (2025) failed to find a direct relationship between JIT and environmental performance. However, in this study, the results indicate that JIT has a direct relationship with sustainable performance, including environmental performance. Green et al. (2019) and Rashid et al. (2025) however found that the relationship is indirect, which agrees with our results when compared to the direct effect. The total indirect effect of JIT and environmental performance has a path weight of 0.385, t-statistics > 1.96 and a p-value < 0.05; hence, it is supported.

Mohsin et al. (2025) failed to establish a direct association between TQM and social performance, while Chen (2015) also failed to find a direct association between TQM and operational performance. This contradicts our results, which showed that TQM positively impacts economic and social performances. Through TQM implementation, organisations can improve their quality and reduce costs, leading to increased economic performance. This agrees with Ali and Johl (2021) who also found a positive association between TQM and financial, social and economic performance. Also, Wassan et al. (2022) results showed that TQM impacts three sustainable performance measures.

In this study, it was concluded that CEP has a positive association with sustainable performance, agreeing with Malhotra (2024) who concluded that CEP positively influences sustainable performance in Indian manufacturing companies. Another study in Vietnam concluded that small and medium enterprises can also improve their sustainable performance by adopting CEP (Chowdhury et al., 2022). Thus, JIT, TQM and CEP are complementary and can be combined to improve sustainable performance, as also supported by Maldonado-Guzmán and Garza-Reyes (2023). This enables organisations to provide quality products at the same time improving profit (economic performance), planet interaction (environmental performance) and people interaction (social performance). Thus, organisations keen to improve their sustainable performance should not consider JIT and TQM only, but CEP as well. Although improvements are obtained through JIT and TQM, the introduction of CEP enables organisations to enhance these improvements while adhering to government regulations and customer demands for environmental protection.

This aligns with the NRBV theory, which states that to achieve improved sustainable performance, three capabilities must be developed: pollution prevention, product stewardship and sustainability. JIT, TQM and CEP each contribute to the attainment of these capabilities. Although each of these practices tends to influence all three capabilities, the degree of influence varies across them. However, the total and indirect effects demonstrate that when JIT, TQM and CEP are combined, their impact on sustainable performance is greater than the individual impacts.

The study’s aim was to investigate the impact of JIT, TQM and CEP on the sustainability of manufacturing organisations using SEM. In addition, it investigated whether JIT and TQM are important antecedents in the adoption of CEP. Three hundred and two responses were analysed using SMART PLS 4 and SPSS v. 27. The results show that JIT, TQM and CEP have a positive impact on sustainable performance. Additionally, it was noted that TQM and JIT are important antecedents of the adoption of the circular economy. Although JIT and CEP tend to be contradictory in some areas, such as gas emissions, their combined impact yields enhanced results than their individual impacts.

The study has added knowledge on understanding the relevance and strength of CB as a mediatory factor for how JIT and TQM impact sustainable performance. The results indicated that JIT, TQM and CEP have a positive impact on economic, social and environmental performance. This is rooted in the NRBV theory, as the study has demonstrated how these practices affect the theory’s three capabilities which are pollution prevention, product stewardship and sustainable development (Hart, 1995). The study demonstrated that JIT is the initial and crucial phase in the implementation of CEP, resulting in pollution prevention through waste reduction, hence enhancing both direct and indirect sustainable performance. Most researchers have focused on the individual adoption and direct impacts of JIT, TQM and CEP on organisational performance improvement; hence, it seems the joint impact of these practices, and particularly the mediatory role of CB, is not well understood. This study adds knowledge by demonstrating how organisations can adopt these practices in an integrated manner. This also helps future researchers to exploit areas of future research, probably by integrating with other improvement methodologies.

The integration may, however, require organisations to be aware of possible conflicts between practices before they start the integration process. These conflicts are diverse, for example, the contradictions between gas emissions and small lot delivery (Dües et al., 2013). Hence, there is a need to manage trade-offs in manners that are suitable for each organisation when resolving such conflicts (Kumar and Rodrigues, 2020). This study has added to the existing body of knowledge by demonstrating how CEP can be integrated into Lean systems. Policy makers should concentrate on upstream changes in design, providing incentives for the reuse of material and creating regulatory frameworks for waste management.

Moreover, given the importance of CEP as a strong mediating factor in amplifying the contributions of JIT and TQM, one wonders why many organisations that have already implemented JIT and TQM have not followed up with the implementation of circular economy practices. A plausible assumption is the probable lack of awareness of how much they stand to benefit from this progression, and hence, the importance of this work. This conclusion is in line with the theory of bounded rationality, which argues that people seek to maximise their benefit, but only to the extent of the knowledge they have (Simon, 1955). Hence, knowledge of what is possible is important in order for management to make informed decisions, and that is why the dissemination of this findings is important as it makes them to consider circular economy practices as a sequel to JIT and TQM, and not a mere compliance issue or another necessary inconvenience, but a veritable source of advantage for competitiveness and long-term sustainability of their organisations. This observation also has managerial implications, as every manager is supposed to seek out the best for their organisation.

This research established the impact of JIT, TQM and CEP on sustainable performance; hence, managers now have information on the benefits of adopting these practices. Managers have been equipped with information on how these variables improve sustainable performance. This study also demonstrated that JIT and TQM play an important role in the adoption of CEP; therefore, they now understand that JIT and TQM can make it easier to attain circularity since they are complementary. Instead of treating JIT, TQM and CEP as competing priorities, managers should leverage the available frameworks to drive circularity and improve their sustainable performance. Rather than concentrating on the direct impacts that are witnessed through JIT and TQM implementation, organisations should also pay attention to the indirect impacts, as the indirect impacts may even have the greater influence in certain instances.

The IPMA showed that JIT has high importance compared to TQM and CEP. Hence, those companies seeking to improve their sustainable performance through CEP adoption should consider implementing JIT first. Now managers know which variables to prioritise based on their impact on the target variables. Thus, avoiding wasting resources on improving those variables that have little impact on the target construct.

Manufacturing organisations are associated with negative environmental impacts, which include energy consumption, waste production and carbon footprint. Nowadays, these socio-environmental issues are important due to the changes in customer requirements. Therefore, the adoption of CEP, known to minimise environmental harm, enhancing community relations and increasing the workers’ safety and health may become a strategic advantage. Companies that have already adopted JIT and TQM now understand how they can take advantage of adopting CEP and further achieve sustainable performance. However, organisations should know that such implementation comes at a cost. Although the overall benefits surpass the initial implementation costs, it may be challenging for organisations to raise that initial capital. Also, implementation is hindered by many barriers, such as lack of knowledge, fear of change and lack of government support. Therefore, organisations need to understand these barriers and devise ways to address them before starting the implementation process. The implementation process is also hindered by risks such as failure to properly address conflicts between practices, and this may cause organisations to fail to achieve their intended goal.

This study focused on investigating the importance of JIT and TQM in improving sustainable performance in the Zimbabwean manufacturing industry. Our results might differ from those in other countries, especially developed ones. These countries might require further research before adopting these results. Our focus was on manufacturing industries only. Since the variables under investigation also apply to other industries, further research can be conducted in these industries. Also, this research bunched larger companies and small and medium enterprises. However, these companies face different challenges and have different ways of operating. García-Cutrín and Rodríguez-García (2024) concluded that the benefits of JIT are most noticeable for larger companies and stable economic situations. For finer details, there is need to distinguish between these two so that they can be guided accordingly.

This is to confirm that the research has adhered to all applicable ethical standards and guidelines throughout the research process. This research was approved by the University of Pretoria on 9 June 2021, and the Ethics Approval Number is EBIT/81/2021.

Before commencing data collection, the participants were provided with detailed information about the research and fully informed about the purpose of the research and the study’s aims, their rights as respondents (including the right to refuse participation) and the measures were taken to ensure their confidentiality and anonymity. Informed consent was obtained from the participants before taking part in the study.