A consequence of business specialization is the implementation of weak processes that cross departmental and corporate boundaries. Supply chain management (SCM) addresses this issue by requiring a process view that reaches across these confines. Due to globalization and a competitive environment, those within the retail supply chains are particularly vulnerable. New ways of managing require an understanding of the entire chain by participants at every level-retailer, distributor, manufacturer, and service provider. Demonstrating the link between markets, products, and product strategies in the supply chain, Retail Supply Chain Management provides the knowledge and skills required to thrive in this environment. It demonstrates the connection between the processes involved in manufacturing, distribution, warehousing, and transportation, and how to use these connections to their best advantage. The book offers fresh insights into the financial and operational tools that are available and how to use these tools in order to deliver quality products in the most cost efficient manner. The authors' collaboration brings together expertise from both operations and retail business management, matching the solutions available from SCM with the challenges and opportunities that arise in the retail industry. The text also includes case studies and experiences from leaders in SCM as well as hard lessons learned by those trying to lead. These examples illustrate specific solutions to common situations in a retail supply chain.

Retail supply chain consists of multiple segments from sales to distribution to finance. Retail manufacturers rely on a complicated web of suppliers. Customer demand and market competition today requires extreme efficiency from end to end. This book offers the retail supply chain executive with the tools needed for full strategic advantage. The new edition gives special attention to recent challenges, such as vast technological change, higher levels of customer personalization, and more global supply chains.

Any supply chain improvement project, even if well conceived, has a good chance of failing, unless the accompanying information technology enables the design. Being prepared, understanding the risks and how to reduce them, will give you the edge you need. Combining a technology focus with practical advice, Making Supply Chain Management Work: Design, Implementation, Partnerships, Technology, and Profits gives you the tools to not only design new supply chains, but to design them effectively.

The book begins with an introduction to SCM. It identifies and describes the five management tasks that are changing as organizations increasingly compete as parts of supply chains rather than standalone entities. Doing well in all five is a prerequisite for success. These tasks are:

· Designing supply chain for strategic management
· Implementing collaborative relationships within the organization
· Forging supply chain partnerships with other organizations
· Managing supply chain information
· Making money from the supply chain

The book provides insights into the special requirements for improving supply chains, and consequently improving competitiveness. The chapters show you how to streamline the supply chain change implementation process, including systems changes, reducing the risk of wasting your time and money on an effort that is going nowhere in an area vital to the survival of your business. Making Supply Chain Management Work: Design, Implementation, Partnerships, Technology, and Profits highlights what can go wrong and more importantly, gives you the tools to make it go right.

Supply chain management (SCM) disciplines have produced a flood of new concepts, methods, and tools; if applied wisely, they will improve results. A resource that weeds out and consolidates this new information will lower the business risk of implementing change. Interpreting models and viewpoints from many fields into a supply chain context, Handbook of Supply Chain Management, Second Edition recommends a plan for acting on these insights, reducing confusion and making the work of supply chain managers both faster and more on target with the needs of their companies. This volume introduces or emphasizes the supply chain management topics that have grown in visibility or prominence since the publication of the first edition. These include: drivers of supply chain change; project management approaches for executing supply chain change; globalization and supply chains; the importance of spheres (businesses within a business) in designing supply chains; the contribution of backbone/enabling processes within an organization; and the "lean" and six sigma movements and their implications for SCM. Divided into four parts, this volume begins by providing an overview that traces the evolution of concepts that define SCM. It then establishes the role of SCM in improving operations and the ability of businesses to compete. Section II confronts management with "The Supply Chain Challenge," made up of five tasks that enable management to find solutions to problems and generate ideas for implementing a supply chain improvement project. Section III describes how to perform critical supply chain improvement tasks, including activities that create a plan as well as tasks needed to implement the plan. The book concludes with chapters devoted to case studies; each adds reality to theoretical frameworks. They illustrate successful and not-so-successful endeavors across the supply chain spectrum.

Improving supply chain efficiency, especially in an unsettled business climate, requires that managers go beyond doing business as usual. They must apply inspiration and perspiration in a structured, collaborative, and measurable approach that blends project management with supply chain management knowledge and practice.

Supply Chain Project Management, Second Edition offers the supply chain practitioners and project managers of today with a fully updated guide for implementing strategic supply chain improvements. It covers how to implement project management best practices in ways that will encourage continual improvement of the supply chain. Focusing on improving competitiveness, the book describes the benefit of applying proven project management skills to improve collaboration and communication among one's own company and its suppliers and customers. It explains how to achieve company-wide agreement for developing and directing strategies that will lower risk in undertaking difficult supply chain change.

Exceptionally well-organized to provide quick reference, as well as in-depth background where needed, this comprehensive work:

• Covers SCM execution and the foundation concepts relevant to the current international business climate, describing the challenges managers face and the skills needed to deal with ongoing change
• Explores the ways supply chain and supply chain management might be defined, offering multiple viewpoints and definitions from supply chain and project management perspectives
• Details effective SCM project processes, offering the tools and project templates needed to implement change

A highly respected authority on supply chain implementation and management, James Ayers is a member of the Project Management Institute and the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals. Offering a unique perspective, augmented by anecdotes garnered from his years of experience, this book goes beyond conventional tools and methods to help managers tap the creative inspiration needed to distinguish their organization in these highly fluid and competitive times.

Contributing Authors Include Mrs. Francis F. Brooks, Mrs. Robert S. Edwards, Mrs. George C. Marsden, And Others.

Contributing Authors Include Mrs. Francis F. Brooks, Mrs. Robert S. Edwards, Mrs. George C. Marsden, And Others.

Retail supply chain consists of multiple segments from sales to distribution to finance. Retail manufacturers rely on a complicated web of suppliers. Customer demand and market competition today requires extreme efficiency from end to end. This book offers the retail supply chain executive with the tools needed for full strategic advantage. The new edition gives special attention to recent challenges, such as vast technological change, higher levels of customer personalization, and more global supply chains.