Definitions definitions… this is a never-ending story about buzzwords and their use in academia. Supply chain management is one of them – “invented” in the 80s by two consultants, embraced by academics, and criticised ever since. Only three of the three words used in the term are criticised – the use of “supply” instead of “demand”, or “demand-supply”, the use of “chain” instead of “network”, “matrix”, “loop”, and the use of “management” – after all, who can manage a supply chain? But what about all these criticisms, aren’t they just newer and newer buzzwords we create? And what is a supply chain anyway?
SCM has been embraced by many (perhaps too many) fields. And the definition of a supply chain varies… a lot. The most common one is the one by CSCMP, but even that is “updated” every couple and odd years. Then there is one by Mentzer et al. from 2001 – which is in fact setting a standard even for journals, as e.g. Supply Chain Management – an International Journal doesn’t accept articles using a different definition of a supply chain any more. I.e. don’t even try to send in articles that do not consider a supply chain to consist of at least three independent entities… But entities of what? Are we talking about business units that “supply” to each other, independent companies, or just several steps in the manufacturing process?
But let’s start with “supply”. The discussion has long embraced the notion of the customer being the king, and demand setting the rules. This has gone as far as for Bradley Z. Hull to write a paper on academics neglecting supply-driven chains (in 2005) – which, en large, are still the rule rather than the exception in manufacturing. But of course, Nokia invented the term demand-supply chains, and went over to demand-supply networks…
About networks, chains, loops and the such. Customers assuming the role of suppliers, companies being situated simultenously on several echelons increases the complexity of supply “chains” and breaks through the chain logic. My favourite buzzword (unfortunately also to be found in scientific articles) is that of the “supply chain network”. So what is it? A chain, or a network? A network of chains? A chain of networks? Luckily, more than just a mere buzzword, supply networks are nowadays also discussed in terms of the different logic they follow – see Håkansson’s and Persson’s (2004) article on chain vs. network logic in supply chains. Is the buzzword actually starting to make sense?
And last, to “management” – probably the most difficult part of SCM. US universities even started to call their major “supply chain” instead of SCM. It just sounds funny when someone explains her/his field as “I’m into supply chain…” But honestly, who manages a supply chain? Yesterday I found a blog posting on “offshoring your supply chain“. Just how is that possible?
The discussion is going on, about power, trust, control mechanisms etc. Let it go on! Buzzwords are and will be embraced by academics. After a while, they might actually start to make sense. Till then, you can always visit Word Central for your “daily buzzword“.
Gyöngyi
