Oddly enough, most Britons have lied about the books they’ve read in order to impress others; with a study revealing the “top ten list” of books people have lied about. The authors should be happy, even though they are not read, they are regarded as socially worth while reading. A lovely case of social desirability bias – sthg ethics scholars and corporate social responsibility researchers are quite familiar with. Apart from indirect questioning etc., one way to check for social desirability bias in a business setting is to see what a company does in an economic downturn – now it’s a good time for social desirability bias research, I reckon 
Gyöngyi
Categories: Corporate Social Responsibility · Research & Methodology · Sustainability
Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow. Christmas carrolls are full of wishes for snow – alas, anyone living in the UK now doesn’t think of a white Christmas. (Nor did anyone in China a year ago.) Why is it that snow comes such a surprise that all(!) transportation modes come to a halt? It’s the same thing at Milan airport, the first snowfall of the year leads to a complete shutdown, and to infinite disruptions in any supply chain that involves companies from Milan. Hope it doesn’t affect fashion week 
What I do not understand is the “surprise” effect of snow; it snows there every year at least once! Or have we got used too much to the effects of global warming that we have forgotten about snow?
What is more, what ever happened to dynamic vehicle routing models that could be used to avoid such disruptions? Or maybe we should ask Emmett Lodree for advice how to incorporate weather forecasts in supply chain modelling? (see his latest article in Computers and Operations Research)
Well, I certainly hope that the supply chains of “snow chains” don’t suffer from snow!
Gyöngyi
BTW, according to IBM, “SNOW” will make your supply chain greener
Categories: Socks and sandals · Supply Chain Management · Sustainability
Is everything you do with your suppliers automatically supply chain management? In that case you could just outsource everything (as this article discusses). Or does it suffice if you introduce green aspects to everything you have under control? (i.e. your own operations only? or your own distribution network?) (On this note I just love GRI’s stance of boundaries to reporting defined by control and influence. Does this mean ownership is the only thing that counts in the reports on the SC indicators?)
It seems that the “ethical purchasing” / ethical procurement, ethical sourcing, you name it / community dominates the field of green supply chain management. It is in itself a positive development that ethics has entered purchasing so strongly (now being discussed related to emerging markets, or even in Ghanaian online news); yet, this is just a part of green supply chain management, not to speak of sustainable supply chain management… A look at SCM definitions might help before adding on the green aspect.
Gyöngyi
Categories: Supply Chain Management · Sustainability
The International Journal of Physical Distribution and Logistics Management calls for papers on “The sustainable agenda and energy efficiency: logistics solutions and supply chains in times of climate change”. Deadline Mar 31, 2009; Until it’s not on the Emerald website contact the special issue editors Árni Halldórsson and Gyöngyi Kovács to receive the CFP
Gyöngyi
Update on Sep 15: now it is on the website – you can access the CFP here.
Categories: Academic journals · Call for papers · Carbon management · Logistics · Supply Chain Management · Sustainability
Green is the new black in SCM…and similar conversion has taken place in Harvard Business Review.
Apparently, “no facet of doing business remains untouched”.
Where? How?
This has not been translated in many (all) of the textbooks I teach in Logistics and Operations Management.
Árni
Categories: Socks and sandals · Supply Chain Management · Sustainability
New SCM journals pop up all the time; the latest one taking an ops mgmt view again. Here’s the link to Operations and Supply Chain Management – an International Journal (OSCM). One could also dubb it the “open access SCM journal” as downloads (as for now) are for free, printed copies only obtainable for a fee. I particularly like Benita Beamon’s opening article on “Sustainability and the future of SCM” that does for a change not only look at green SCM, but broadens the scope to diverse societal implications of SCM. Quite in vein of Árni’s “SCM for societal impact“.
And we are still in search for a good name for our textbook on that topic… Any suggestions?
Gyöngyi
Categories: Academic journals · Humanitarian supply chains · Operations management · Supply Chain Management · Sustainability
The sustainable agenda has yet to find its way into textbooks within SCM. Besides sporadic paragraphs, and a occasional chapter (very rare!), most textbooks are centered around traditional performance objectives followed by related strategies and structures. Even titles of the textbooks contain more or less the same wording but in different order; operations, logistics, management, strategic, supply chain, planning, production………
Gyöngyi and I (Árni) want to do something about that.
We want to bring the sustainable agenda into the class-room in a format other than of journal articles. We want to experiment with disintermediation and the idea of open access.
More to follow on…..SCM for societal impact.
Árni
Categories: Education & Management Development · Supply Chain Management · Sustainability
Wow, the research group (and quite an impressive one) on green logistics has caught up! It’s not that long time ago it has been established, and now you can already find several reports and working papers on their website. Definitely worth while to check it out!
Gyöngyi
Categories: Academic publications · Sustainability
