The Practice of Supply Chain Management: Where Theory and Application Converge.

Figure 1 : Components of Supply Chain Management

Supply chain management, as both a key functional area for business and a thriving academic field, has clearly emerged over the past decade and shows no signs of slowing down. Supply chain as an academic field continues to draw interest from neighboring academic areas with longer standing as disciplines. Multiple fields have moved into the supply chain terrain. The field of logistics and transportation has evolved naturally into a supply chain orientation; indeed, most traditional academic programs in logistics and transportation have morphed into a supply chain management approach. 

However, a number of other disciplines have maneuvered for a piece of the supply chain pie. Management science and operations research have applied traditional modeling techniques in areas such as inventory management and the supply chain field. Empirical operations management scholars and programs have also gravitated to the supply chain space. The field of marketing, particularly the sub-field of marketing channels, has also jumped on the supply chain bandwagon. And linkages are present in other academic disciplines that provide a nexus to the supply chain area. For example, I am currently conducting a research project reviewing and summarizing literature in strategic management with applicability to the supply chain field. The strategy field is replete with research contributing to supply chain, including such topics as the make-or-buy decision, organizational modularity, boundaries of the firm, networks, alliances, and supply chain relational management. Theories such as the resource-based view of the firm and transaction cost perspective have been applied to these questions within strategy, and have great relevance to supply chain research in fields such as logistics and transportation. 

While many academic disciplines are conducting research in supply chain, there is an unfortunate lack of communication and cooperation amongst the various disciplines regarding supply chain research. Each academic area tends to be a silo, with building over time and integration of supply chain research in that functional area, but little integration or even acknowledgement of the supply chain work on similar questions in other academic areas. This is unfortunate, as each field offers contributions to the whole of the cross-disciplinary world of supply chain management. 

The recently published book reviewed here is no exception to this general trend. The authors collect together nineteen articles on supply chain management with a distinct management science/operations research orientation. There are three sections to the book. The first focuses on Core Concepts and Practices, including general supply chain principles, the role of inventory, and supply chain performance metrics. The second section addresses Emerging Supply Chain Practices. This section includes articles on sourcing strategy, leveraging of information, e-business, high technology supply chains, and supply chains with differentiated service. 

The third section of the book addresses Supply Chain in Action and includes information based on experience at specific companies. Articles in this section include a postponement example at Lucent Technologies, aerospace supply chain dynamics, and a fabless semiconductor setting, along with analysis of combinatorial auctions in procurement and agent models of supply network dynamics.

To its credit, the volume brings together authors from many leading business schools, along with practitioners from companies such as Boeing, DaimlerChrysler, LogicTools, Hewlett-Packard, and Accenture. The volume is a component of Kluwer's International Series in Operations Research and Management Science, and should prove a valuable addition to the supply chain literature in this academic area. As such, the volume is recommended to supply chain researchers in operations research and practitioners with a strong OR background. 

Two limitations could be noted with regard to the volume: First, the volume is a collection of articles and as such is not as well integrated or organized as would be a stand-alone book or text in the area. The book is thus most appropriate for readers who already have a solid grounding in the supply chain area. Second, the volume, as typical in supply chain writing, has a distinctly management science/operations research orientation. As such, it does not incorporate to any great degree supply chain perspectives from marketing or logistics, and is likely to be of minimal interest to researchers outside the OR domain.