Supply Chain Leadership

Developing a People-Centric Approach to Effective Supply Chain Management

Peter W. Robertson

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2022
• ISBN:
  9781000570038
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Operations
• Index: Business

Supply chain leaders are key to achieving sustainable supply chain excellence and long-term competitive advantage. This book addresses 'big-picture' supply chain leadership and provides a roadmap and practical advice to help supply chain leaders to successfully navigate this challenging social and technical environment.

The book describes crucial leadership characteristics and explains the actions necessary to develop and appraise the skills in both new and existing leaders. It presents a socio-technical framework, which includes the key aspects of supply chain relationships, the supply chain business environment, overall supply chain competitiveness, supply chain sustainability, and supply chain risks. The book works through the recruitment, training, and development of leaders as well as obstacles and risks, to offer a fresh, people-centred approach. Pedagogy to aid learning is incorporated throughout, including an introduction to each chapter explaining the key learnings; tables, diagrams, and equations to help visualise the concepts and methods covered; real-life case studies and examples; and end of chapter review questions and assignment tasks.

This textbook should be essential reading for advanced undergraduate and postgraduate students of supply chain, logistics, and operations management. The practice-based and applied approach also makes it valuable for operating supply chain leaders and those studying for professional qualifications.

Online resources include chapter-by-chapter PowerPoint slides, a test bank of exam questions, and suggested tutorial topics.

1Introduction to Supply Chain Leadership

DOI: 10.4324/9781003084044-1

1.1 What You Will Learn in This Chapter

This chapter starts with an overview of supply chain leadership (SCL) and the identification of eight socio-technical factors that supply chain (SC) leaders need to be aware of, competent in, and able to apply in order to achieve SCL excellence.

Next, the details of the eight main socio-technical factors are presented and described.

The relationships that exist between SCL, SC process excellence, SC performance excellence, and SC competitive advantage are then illustrated in graphic form.

An SCL framework is then presented illustrating how such an approach can be used to define necessary sub-factor content and performance metrics for the purpose of SCL improvements.

Because SC leaders are so crucial to overall SCL performance, an SC leader mastery framework is then presented and briefly discussed. A full description of SC leaders’ mastery is presented in Chapter 4.

The context, objectives, and value-add of this book are then described.

Lastly, a chapter case study is presented comprising the SC features and characteristics displayed by the top companies in Gartner’s SC Top 25 listing for 2021.

The chapter concludes with a series of review questions, written assignment topics, and chapter references.

1.2 Overview of Supply Chain Leadership (SCL)

SCL is a multi-faceted and involved topic for both study and real-life application. By default, this implies that any attempt at SCL that seeks sustained success will require relevant knowledge-building from professional training and real-life SC experience.

Unfortunately, much of the research that has been undertaken in trying to understand SCL has focused only on subsets of the multitude of factors involved. While this has no doubt advanced the knowledge of these studied sub-sets, there is much about SCL that is yet to be uncovered. Building on the research that has been undertaken, as well as utilising decades of empirical evidence gained from working in actual SCs, a complete SCL approach, such as illustrated in Figure 1.1, is presented in this book along with a specific framework for SC leaders to use in dealing effectively with the many factors involved. Such methodologies, applied competently, will assist SC leaders in the development and maintenance of real competitive advantage for their particular SC.

Like so much to do with supply chain management (SCM) overall, SCL is very much a gestalt, that is, an overall socio-technical system of factors and relationships. In order to undertake SCL well, therefore, it is vital that all of the eight major SCL factors shown in Figure 1.1 be progressed and improved in concert. Focus on the technical factors alone or the social factors alone will result in performance gaps on the unattended set. Similarly, focus on the top three “most broken” factors (technical and/or social) risks misadventure on the five uncared for factors.

The purpose of this book therefore is to describe the eight major factors in some detail including provision of an extended multi-dimensional SCL framework. Additionally, such descriptions are presented in such a way that students and SC practitioners can make sense of them.

The next section provides further clarification of each of the eight major SCL factors.

Figure 1.1 Supply Chain Leadership – Eight Key Socio-Technical Factors

1.3 Multi-Dimensional Nature of Supply Chain Leadership

1.3.1 SCL Factors and Their Sub-Factors

The eight key SCL factors and their sub-factors can be expanded as illustrated in Figure 1.2.

Taking the social set of factors shown in Figure 1.2 first, an introductory description of each is now provided:

• SC Relationships – Any SC (or supply network) is made up of multiple participants or cast members. This includes SC partner organisations (customers, suppliers, service providers upstream, and/or downstream of the focus organisation), SC bosses, SC leaders, SC leaders’ peers, the SC leadership team, SC followers, and importantly all external SC stakeholders such as governments, representative bodies, shareholders, and communities. It is vital that appropriate and working relationships are established and maintained with all of these groups. Building such effective relationships requires an attitude of openness, honesty, respect, listening, and collaboration for each of the parties so involved. Oftentimes, this is much easier said than done as will be discussed in Chapter 2.
• SC Leader’s Mastery – As many authors have noted (Epitropaki and Martin, 2004; Lord et al., 2020), a leader is only acknowledged as a genuine leader if the leader’s followers so believe. Simply being in a position of authority does not automatically make one a leader. SC leader mastery thus is to do with the SC leader’s competence, trustworthiness, and ability to act as a source of inspiration. Importantly, SC leader mastery includes not only an ability to perceive a believable and sensible future desired state but, in addition, includes the energy and organising ability required to ensure that future desired state is actually achieved. Fortunately, and building on the exceptional work of Kouzes and Posner (2002), a leader’s mastery framework exists and is presented in detail in Section 1.5.
• SC Followers’ Mastery – Skilful leaders, high on the leader mastery scale, will, over time, be trusted by their followers and respected by them. Only then can the leader grow the levels of follower commitment, competence, diligence, and accountability necessary for followers to perform at an “above-and-beyond” level of performance.
• SC Culture – Undoubtedly, one of any SC leader’s greatest challenges is to grow a positive and supportive SC culture. An even greater challenge is to attempt to change an existing negative culture into a positive one. Negative SC cultures are typified by attributes such as:
  1. Toxic behaviour – For example, favouritism, bullying, dishonesty, in-fighting, disrespect, malicious compliance, grandstanding, back-stabbing, white-anting, spiteful revenge, and active resistance to any sort of change.
  2. Illegal behaviour such as assault, theft, fraud, defamation, and false accusations.
  3. Intense political behaviour including sycophantic treatment of bosses, fierce and nasty competition between peers and dominating manipulation of subordinates.
  4. Silo mentality – Rigid and isolationist organisational functions.
  5. “Not invented here” syndrome – Resistant to any fresh external ideas or methods.
  6. Poor work ethic – Indolence, malingering, and underworking; the achievement of job goals is treated as optional.

Figure 1.2 Multi-Dimensional Supply Chain Leadership

Positive SC cultures on the other hand are typified by safe, inclusive, helpful, supportive, respectful, and motivational workplaces. In such workplaces, both leaders and followers are committed, competent, and highly motivated, and take personal responsibility for the full delivery of their job goals. While usually not easy, just how to go about attempting to achieve such a positive SC culture is described in Chapter 4.

Next are the technical factors shown in Figure 1.2 and are described as follows:

• SC Business Environment – Modern-day SCs are confronted with ever increasing levels of volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity, otherwise referred to as a VUCA operating environment. Volatility shows up, for example, as fluctuations to demand levels, supply availability, prices paid for inputs and services, working capital levels, and conversion costs. Uncertainty is felt in numerous ways including that the COVID-19 pandemic may or may not diminish naturally, mass vaccinations may or may not result in the reopening of international borders for travellers, or virus variants may or may not be an ongoing future risk. Complexity increases, for example, as SCs lengthen, involve more partners, and the number and variety of products and services offered increases. Ambiguity can exist, for example, when the level of individual SC partner commitment to sustainability, along any given SC, is unknown and/or conflicting evidence exists. How to deal effectively with such SC business environment characteristics is presented in Chapter 6.
• SC Competitiveness – Many would argue that SC competitiveness is the main reason for studying and actively applying SCM concepts and practices in the first place. Essentially, SC competitiveness means offering and delivering a value-proposition to customers that is superior to that offered and delivered by competitors. A superior value-proposition is usually underpinned by the offer of attractive and fit-for-purpose products and/or services to customers, at prices they can afford to pay, with short-order cycle times, reliable delivery, and error-free quality. In delivering such a value-offer, it is crucial that the SC also has effective control (for example, bottom quartile comparative performance) of working capital (especially inventories) and full costs. Other competitive factors include the ease of doing business with the SC, responsiveness (to customer enquiries and changed demand levels), flexibility (in meeting changing customer requirements), order lot size, packaging, and presentation, recyclability, return process, and sustainability considerations (such as environmental and social impacts of the SC’s operations). Such competitiveness is achieved by having superior SC strategy processes, SC design processes, SC execution processes, and SC people processes. These latter attributes and how to develop them are described in detail in the author’s other two SCM textbooks, that is, “Supply Chain Analytics” (Robertson, 2021a) and “Supply Chain Processes” (Robertson, 2021b).
• SC Sustainability – The word “sustainability” means the ability to maintain some action or activity at a certain rate or at a certain level. This maintenance of action or activity can only be achieved of course if the effects of conducting the action or activity do not impede its continuation. SC sustainability thus is the maintaining of SC operations in such a way that does not restrain or threaten its continuation. Any action taken by the SC, or output from the SC (product or by-product), that causes internal or external damage beyond a sustainability limit will interfere with the SCs continuation, and indeed, may well lead to its discontinuation.

Stated specifically, SC sustainability can be defined as the fulfilment of customer requirements via management of SC processes to manage the flow of materials, services, information, value-add, and money effectively and efficiently in both forward and reverse directions along the end-to-end SC while attaining target levels of performance on the three key goals of social, environmental, and economic performance.

The whole issue of SC sustainability and how to manage it are covered in detail in Chapter 6.

SC Risks – SC risks arise from a wide range of events, situations, decisions, attitudes, and responses. For example, a tsunami event has put SC supplies at risk and because of a lackadaisical attitude, key supply officers decide not to pursue alternate supply arrangements. The end result is stock outs, failed deliveries, and burnt careers. SC risks can affect up to every single SC partner and their employees. Management of SC risks is therefore a true mission-critical activity, one that, unfortunately, has not been conducted very well. A good example of SC risk exposure occurred in May 2021 when Russian “Darkside” ransomware hackers launched a cybera...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of Acronyms
• Acknowledgements
• About the Author
• Foreword
• Preface
• Pedagogy
• 1 Introduction to Supply Chain Leadership
• 2 Supply Chain Leadership – Cast of Players
• 3 Supply Chain Excellence
• 4 Supply Chain Leaders’ Mastery
• 5 Supply Chain Competitive Leadership
• 6 Supply Chain Imperative Leadership
• 7 Supply Chain Leadership and Politics
• 8 Envisioned Supply Chain Leadership Future
• Index