I am often astounded by the fact how many great articles I haven’t read yet. A good scientific paper contains an comprehensive description of the methodologies used, a theoretical foundation and literature review from which hypothesis are drawn, which are then confirmed or rejected in the course of the paper. And of course, it is always a plus to actually find some results in the course of the analysis.
The Bullwhip Effect was first discovered and analyzed in the 1950s. It triggered more intense research on the supply chain system (even though the term supply chain was not yet coined).
Starting in the early 1980s, this research finally lead to significant changes in real supply chains as well.
This article does a follow up on these developments and evaluates the relative improvements of each of the strategic stages.
I am a huge fan of Open Access in research and a while ago I was made aware of a book on supply chain management, which has recently been published under an open access license. The full book can be downloaded on the web site of the publisher.
Today I introduce you to the process of measuring agility in a supply chain. Agility is a major concept in the research of the last 10 years or so. I already have written some articles on this topic:
If you think about it. Postponement is one of the more involving strategies available in supply chain management. At least from a design perspective, postponement requires changes to the value-generation process, which may comprise several echelons within the supply chain.
The paper I review today analyzed the implementation of postponement strategies in China and suggests factors to help with the decision which kind of postponement to select.
Today I picked a special article on corporate risks. “How Risky is your Company?” by Robert Simons of the Harvard Business School. Its a more business oriented view on how companies should handle risks, internally. But since internal risk management can be seen as a part of supply chain risk management, I also include it here.
Risk exposure
This article is about how risky one company is. About the internal risk. And by these risks, the author does not so much refer to the production processes, but the softer risks of managing a company.
One of the most published supply risk researchers is George A. Zsidisin. In his 2003 article he describes the characteristics of inbound supply that affect the perception of risk.
An ongoing debate in supply chain management is about the degree to which companies should collaborate with their supply chain partners. In business and research the concept is called supply chain integration and may also be a useful strategy for reducing certain risks. And of course it is an often used strategy in supply chain management in general
Analyzing the effect of supply chain integration on performance therefore is an important issue in SCM research.
There are many obstacles to information sharing in a supply chain. Confidentiality is probably one of the biggest issues, but there are others not so obvious like antitrust regulations, the timeliness and accuracy of the provided information, differing technologies between the supply chain partners or a mismatch in the alignment of incentives. Therefore trust and cooperation become critical ingredients in a supply chain partnership.
