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Vol 32 - No 06 - September 2006 Book review : The Relationship-Driven Supply Chain When Julie Tayler e-mailed me to ask me to review this book I agreed enthusiastically. After all, collaborative supply chain management is definitely “in” at the moment and to get an authoritative book on the subject would be really good. Indeed, I was pleased with it but not as pleased as I had hoped I would be. I appreciate that the objective of writing a book on “creating a culture of collaboration throughout the chain” is very challenging and potentially requires a lot of work, research and thought. The book by Emmett and Crocker does deliver quite a lot of that but in my view could have delivered more. I did like the initial chapter “The Supply Chain Reviewed”. It presents an excellent description of the modern supply chain, the issues and how to manage them. In particular I liked the discussion of the “five key aspects for supply chain management”, i.e. To me these topics cover all the key strategic supply chain issues. The subsequent collaboration chapters were preceded by a lot of background material on culture and behaviour. An understanding of these topics is, of course, essential to be able to comprehend the formidable human issues of collaboration. Unfortunately the authors rely too much on tables and lists and, whilst it makes for quick reading, I’m not sure how much will be retained by the reader. Reliance on tables was, to my mind, a real failing of this book. It is something we unfortunately see a lot these days, probably because we increasingly present – and possibly even formulate - our thoughts in terms of PowerPoint presentations. Whilst PowerPoint offers an excellent and succinct way of presenting the essence of an argument as bullet points it still needs the words to “flesh out” and explain the bullet points to ensure understanding. Emmett and Crocker focus very much on the people aspects of collaborative supply chain management but perhaps should have taken a slightly broader brief. There are a number of topics which they mention in passing but do not explain properly or give the attention which the topics deserve: For example, they largely ignore the substantial IT opportunities. Information and Communication Technology gets a mention in places but I would have liked a deeper discussion of the ICT opportunities in creating an effective infrastructure for collaboration - something that strikes me as very important within the context of this book. I harbour a suspicion that the authors may not know that much about ICT – a suspicion corroborated by the authors referring to APS as “Automatic planning and scheduling” rather than the “proper” term “Advanced Planning & Scheduling”. Maybe that was just a slip of the mind… but it did find its way into the index as well. There is, quite properly, some discussion of lean and agile considerations but, once again, it is in my view a bit superficial and doesn’t really get to the essential issues. Supply chain strategy should be strongly driven by a proper regard of lean and agile operations (and indeed the different drivers of collaboration in lean and agile operations). The authors missed the opportunity when they introduced the useful and highly relevant business classification within a complexity/uncertainty matrix. That should have been expanded to introduce the emphasis of lean and agile in different quadrants of the matrix and how it drives collaborative supply chain requirements and behaviour. It would also have been nice if the source of the concept (John Puttick and the Puttick Grid) had been acknowledged. Another example is their mention of the impact of the bullwhip effect on supply chains. I suspect that anyone not familiar with the concept of “bullwhip” will not benefit from the comments in the book. I was also slightly bemused by the spurious introduction of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs and its application to company maturity. Relevant? Possibly! Properly presented and explained? No! Without explanation the application came across as rather contrived and forced. The book focuses largely on supplier relationships. Whilst I realise that supplier relationships are the flip side of customer relationships and that the same rules generally apply I do see many practical differences which are not addressed in this book. For example, I would ask myself “How can I get CPFR (Collaborative Planning, Forecasting and Replenishment) to work with my key customers?” or “How do I get into a meaningful collaborative relationship with Asda?” Still, I don’t want to be too critical. Overall it is a highly relevant book on a topic which hasn’t had a lot of exposure in the literature but one which is of interest to many people in manufacturing, retail and distribution (and service organisations, for that matter). In that respect it fills a gap which needed to be filled urgently. There is a lot of good “soap box” stuff here which is essential to generate a passion for collaboration and explain the commercial imperative. It probably could have been done a bit better but that can be said about most books, I guess. Readers need to take on board that this is first and foremost a book about people issues in collaborative supply chain management. That topic is covered in considerable depth. Everything else is a bit patchy. Providing readers see it in that light it’s a good read and a useful guide to managers and directors on issues to be considered in the design and sustainment of an effective collaborative supply chain. On balance I would therefore recommend this book to readers; the good and important bits outweigh the not so good ones. Dr. Günther Kruse Scope Management Limited Related Topics:
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