Meeting the Challenge of Supply Chain Management

One of the most important topics in the study of the management of contemporary manufacturing and distribution is Supply Chain Management (SCM). Over the past decade, the business literature as well as the popular press have been filled with books and articles describing the dramatic changes occurring in productive processes and organizational structures emanating from the radical breakthroughs taking place in management methods, the implementation of business process reengineering techniques, the globalization of the marketplace, and the explosion in information and communication technologies. Today, academics, consultants, and practitioners alike have begun to explore how these often divergent threads can be woven together to form compelling new strategies, providing companies with exciting marketplace opportunities and the capability to uncover whole new competitive regions in the search for marketplace advantage.