Service supply chain management: generalised and applied framework perspective

Despite service supply chain is emerging as a new research hot topic, the systematical theoretical framework of service supply chain management still remains unexplored. The intent of this research is to examine the research progress of service supply chain management, address some key problems of service supply chain management and propose new thinking and new ideas about service supply chain management research. Considering the feature of SSCM, a generalised conceptual framework model of service supply chain management (SSCM) based on multi-discipline theoretical perspective is first developed, The framework integrates service operations and service marketing activities, reflects the customer-oriented value creation based on four components (information flow, customer flow, cash flow and work flow) and four processes (service sourcing, service innovation and design, service network configuration and service delivery). Key activities of implementing SSCM derived from the framework model are discussed. As an application of the generalised framework, applied framework of tourism supply chain management (TSCM) is further studied. Research agenda, methods of TSCM are proposed. Finally, future research directors of SSCM are presented. The systematical managerial ideas and methods described in this paper will be very helpful for boosting the progress of service supply chain research.