Investigating and modeling interactions among manufacturing barriers due to Covid-19 pandemic: an interpretive ranking process

PurposeThe manufacturing industry is one of the most disrupted systems as a result of the global spread of the Covid-19 pandemic. Manufacturing firms are looking for strategies and policies to deal with the situation while also meeting customer demands. This study aims to discuss and analyze the barriers that have impacted manufacturing systems during this period.Design/methodology/approachThe barriers and performance measures were extracted from the extant literature and further discussed with academic and industry experts. Based on the response of experts, a list of ten barriers and five performance measures were selected for further analysis. The interpretive ranking process (IRP) is applied to analyze the inter-relationship among the barriers with respect to performance variables. The cross-interaction matrices and the dominance profile are created to prioritize the barriers. Based on dominance value, an IRP-based manufacturing barrier evaluation model is developed for validation.FindingsThe impact of the pandemic on the manufacturing industry is analyzed through the list of barriers and a structured ranking model is proposed. The research findings of the study indicate that “Financial constraints” is the most influential barrier to manufacturing due to the outbreak of Covid-19, followed by “Government imposed restrictions” and “Setbacks in logistics services.”Practical implicationsThe ranking of barriers and developed interpretive ranking process model would be helpful for practitioners and policymakers to formulate strategies for manufacturing organizations to deal with the pandemic situation. The finding can be beneficial as it promotes similar studies in other sectors.Originality/valueThis study contributes to the manufacturing sector by developing a contextual relationship among the set of identified barriers against various performance measures. As per the author's knowledge, this is the first study that provides a relationship and ranking of manufacturing barriers due to the outbreak of Covid-19.