new book takes supply chain management
to the “X-treme”

Extremely complex, extremely dynamic, and extremely unpredictable: All of these describe today’s supply chains. For those who must manage under these challenging conditions, the recently published book X-SCM: The New Science of X-treme Supply Chain Management offers tools, in-depth analysis, and advice.

Edited by Sandor Boyson, Thomas Corsi, and Lisa H. Harrington of the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business, X-SCM contains expert-contributed articles addressing how to manage supply chain risk and volatility. They cover such topics as insourcing vs. outsourcing, multichannel demand and supply, and managing physical, virtual, financial, and services supply chains in times of volatility and high risk.

In addition to the written material, the book includes an online “tool kit” with a supply chain risk simulation, a real-time global supply chain simulation game, and analytic tools for assessing total logistics costs and emerging risks. It is the first supply chain book to make such tools available to readers.

The book, produced by the Robert H. Smith School of Business, Sterling Commerce, and the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals (CSCMP), is available through CSCMP’s online bookstore for $59.95 for CSCMP members and $69.95 for non-members. For more information, visit http://cscmp.org/resources/x-scm.asp. ;

the seven (supply chain) sisters

This magazine’s August 2010 cover story looked at the strides women have made in assuming logistics leadership roles. In that article, we cited several examples of women who have made it into the upper echelon of the supply chain ranks. But as we recently learned, perhaps no company has achieved as much in this regard as the retailing giant Best Buy Co.

At Best Buy, Daniel Currie runs the show as senior vice president, global supply chain. But Currie’s seven direct reports are all women. Five hold vice president positions, with four having the words “supply chain” in their titles. (The fifth is vice president of business information.) The remaining two women reporting to Currie hold senior director titles—one in finance and the other in human resources. ;

inbound

West Coast port
performance: Have
your say!

Do you import or export via U.S. West Coast ports? If you do, researchers for the Port Performance Research Network, chaired at Nova Scotia’s Dalhousie University, want to hear from you.

The organization is seeking feedback from the ports’ customers and stakeholders about their experiences using the ports. Researchers want to understand how users choose ports, what aspects of port services are most important to them, and how they evaluate the performance of the ports they use.

Participants will be asked to rate the importance of various performance criteria and then to apply them to ports they actually use. When the research is completed, the results will be used to design a port effectiveness survey that will be used throughout the world.

If you’re interested in participating and have shipped via a U.S. West Coast port in the last year, go to the study’s website and fill out the anonymous survey. The 20 minutes it takes will be time well spent: The survey ultimately will help to guide ports in improving the quality of their services, which will be a significant benefit to the ports’ customers.