Strategic Supply Chain Management - Supply Chain Online

F O R E W O R D
In many ways this book is overdue. It is the book that we at PRTM wanted
to write almost a decade ago, and yet at that time we merely would have
been speculating about the future development of supply chain management
as a core management discipline. For instance, we very likely would have
underestimated the impact of information technology and ignored some
emerging best practices. This book is the result of a 15-year history of
research, benchmarking, and client results in this discipline at PRTM and an
equivalent level of experience by the authors, PRTM partners Shoshanah
Cohen (Mountain View, California) and Joseph Roussel (Paris, France).
In this book we set out to offer readers our understanding of the current
state of supply chain management theory and practice based on our
experience and observations from engagements on supply chain projects
at over 600 organizations. We also offer profiles of recent transformative
supply chain initiatives at major companies and the U.S. Department of
Defense (the largest supply chain in the world). Finally, we offer our perspective
on future challenges in the development of competitive, customerfacing
supply chains.
This book focuses rightly on the present and the future; it is here in
the Foreword that we hope to provide some historic perspective on how
supply chain management came to be the dominating management discipline
of the late 1990s and how it has become the root of huge investments
in enterprise resource planning (ERP) and advanced planning and
scheduling (APS) systems implementations in almost every major global
corporation.
We can trace the origins of good supply chain management discipline
to the late 1800s. The following extract dates from Bremner’s Industries of
Scotland (1869):
Gartsherrie Ironworks are the largest in Scotland. . . . More than 1,000
tonnes of coal are consumed every 24 hours; and, as showing how wellchosen
is the site of the works, it may be mentioned that 19/20ths of the
coal required is obtained within a distance of half-a-mile from the furnaces.
One coal-pit is situated close to the furnaces. . . . The coal from this
pit is conveyed to the furnaces by means of a self-acting incline. Most of
the ironstone was at one time obtained from pits in the neighborhood, but
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