32 DC VELOCITY JULY 2015 www.dcvelocity.com
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It may sound idealistic, but even after
30-some years in the profession, Deverl
Maserang truly believes that supply chain
management is not just about moving product but also about making the world a better
place. Given this point of view, Maserang
feels he has found the perfect professional
fit as executive vice president of the global
supply chain organization at Starbucks, a
company known for its focus on creating
opportunities for its people and the communities in which it operates.
Maserang’s own interest in logistics management was
sparked by his time in the Air Force ROTC in college,
where he studied industrial engineering. After graduating,
Maserang joined UPS and worked there during the trans-
formative days of the late 1980s and early 1990s, when
logistics management began to evolve into supply chain
management. At that time, UPS was working with many
large companies such as Dell, JC Penney, and Pier One on
large collaborative supply chain projects. Maserang also
spent 10 years working at Chiquita Brands
International Inc. and has held supply chain
management positions at Pepsi Bottling
Group and FreedomPay, a commerce tech-
nology firm.
Throughout his career, Maserang has
made an effort to give back to the profession. He has been actively involved in
industry associations like the Council of
Supply Chain Management Professionals
(CSCMP) and educational institutions such
as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Center for
Transportation & Logistics.
Q After 30 years in the profession, what keeps you excit- ed about supply chain management?
A I may be too biased, but I believe that all great compa- nies have to have great supply chains and that supply
chain is the enabler of growth and managing complexity
and volatility. That’s really what I fundamentally believe,
and Starbucks is a great example of that.
Deverl Maserang
When I took a leave of absence to finish my degree at the
University of Tennessee (UT), I discovered that the college
of business had a top-ranked transportation and logistics
program. The fit was obvious based on my work at ORNL.
But something else happened while I was at UT. I discovered that businesses were interested in leveraging both
areas—transportation and logistics—to create customer
value. After so many years of focusing on policy issues at
the federal and state level, it was very exciting to work on
answers to problems and issues that when implemented,
made a huge impact on a company’s performance. And I
didn’t have to wait years and years to see the effect.
Q Could you discuss your involvement in the “Trends and Issues in Logistics and Transportation” study and
how it has informed your research and teaching?
A The annual study is a key part of my research and teaching effectiveness. Logistics is an applied discipline. What that means is research, in addition to being
scientifically rigorous, must also be relevant to practice.
The annual study enables me to keep a finger on the pulse
of problems and issues in practice.
The gap between theory and practice must constantly
be examined with the goal of closing it. Scientific research
should enable us to predict what will happen when cer-
tain conditions exist. When it doesn’t (that’s the practice
side), we need to go back to theory to determine why. The
annual study is the perfect platform to collect and analyze
[data on] the outcomes from practice. If these outcomes
are explained by existing theory, that’s good. Often, how-
ever, the outcomes don’t fit the existing theory, and that
presents a great opportunity for future research. Without
the annual study, I’m not sure how I would have devel-
oped such a direct and deep conduit between practice and
theory.
Q What challenges do universities face in developing the next generation of supply chain leaders? As a teacher,
how do you ensure that you’re adequately preparing students for a fast-changing industry?
A This is a question about which I could write a book. With each new generation, we have to adapt and
adopt new ways of developing the next generation of
supply chain leaders. The traditional method of lecturing,
which primarily involved a one-way flow of information,
is gone—thank goodness. Students are very technologically
plugged in (if you’ll pardon the pun). They want to be an
active part of the learning process. Further, they want to
test their mastery of skills through means other than the
standard exam.
I find that experiential learning tools are a great way for
students at all levels to accomplish this objective. For example, a large-scale supply chain simulation enables a student
to better understand the complexity of global operations,
the need for integration across supply chain partners, and
how difficult it is to deal with uncertainty. Instead of listening to countless lectures on these topics, the students
become active participants in putting theory into practice.
