Inbound Logistics’ Summer Reading Guide 2012

Supply Management and Procurement: From the Basics to Best-in-Class

By Robert W. Turner

Written for C-level executive planners and procurement practitioners, Supply Management and Procurement contains proven tools, techniques, and information to help organizations attain best-in-class supply management performance and a competitive advantage. Through case studies and data analysis, Turner illustrates how value chain design and planning, benchmarking, and strategic sourcing methodology models can create more efficient supply management.

Key takeaways: Integrating new concepts and philosophies into current operations drives cost reduction, process improvement, and increased efficiency. Change is inevitable, but businesses that continually promote, implement, and manage changes can benefit from them.

For details: www.jrosspub.com

Managing Country Risk: A Practitioner’s Guide to Effective Cross-Border Risk Analysis

By Daniel Wagner

Wagner explains how to identify and manage risks associated with conducting business abroad, and anticipate the impact of change on business operations. Chapters include the foundation of country risk management and assessment; political risk insurance; company case studies; and an explanation of China’s place in the world.

Key takeaways: Managing Country Risk discusses how risk management contributes to organizational development, increased profits, and job creation. Every business transaction possesses its own unique risk profile, and requires a distinct set of data and analysis to accurately assess the risks associated with it.

For details: www.crcpress.com

Supply Chain as Strategic Asset: The Key to Reaching Business Goals

By Vivek Sehgal

This book provides an accessible, coherent road map to creating and implementing effective supply chain strategies to help your business sustain competitive advantages. Sehgal offers a step-by-step guide to designing a customized supply chain and executing fully integrated business strategies.

Key takeaways: Supply Chain as Strategic Asset illustrates how misalignment between business, functional, and technology strategies creates friction and inefficiencies that prevent an organization from reaching its full potential. Chapters discuss business strategies and alignment, alternative strategies, and real-world case studies. This book provides tools, guidance, and examples to maximize business performance and create a competitive advantage.

For details: www.wiley.com/business

Maritime Logistics: A Complete Guide to Effective Shipping and Port Management

By Dong-Wook Song and Photis M. Panayides

Maritime Logistics examines the latest developments, knowledge, and practices taking place in the shipping and port industry. A team of international academics and researchers presents insights on container shipping, international maritime trade, and port logistics.

KEY TAKEWAYS: Dramatic changes in world trade and cargo transportation, characterized by the prevalence of business-to-business and integrated supply chains, have spurred increased demand for value-added logistics service and mode integration.

For details: www.koganpage.com

The Shipping Point: The Rise of China and the Future of Retail Supply Chain Management

By Peter J. Levesque

A reference guide for anyone involved in retail supply chain management in China, The Shipping Point examines the country’s historical transformation from global manufacturer to global consumer marketplace, and discusses the impact of this change on the future of retail supply chain management.

Key takeaways: This book provides insight into the ascendancy of China’s economy; technology’s impact on traditional retail models; building successful transportation networks; and a tactical perspective on the fundamentals of logistics network design and supply chain execution in China.

For details: www.wiley.com

Strategic Supply Chain Management

By Carlos Cordón, Kim Sundtoft Hald, and Ralf W. Seifert

Through 20 real-world case studies involving corporations such as Nestlé, LEGO, and Hewlett-Packard, this book outlines strategic decision-making and execution processes that turn supply chain threats into strategic opportunities and value. From designing supply chain response strategies to fast-tracking project management with suppliers, the authors explain specific tactics that make a difference in logistics operations.

Key takeaways: The supply chain provides the infrastructure for a corporation’s business model, determining its profitability and future. Increased logistics outsourcing has actually increased the supply chain’s importance within companies, making it more crucial than ever that businesses address logistics operations as part of their vision and global strategy.

For details: www.routledge.com

Cargo Theft, Loss Prevention, and Supply Chain Security

By Dan Burges

This book provides a comprehensive methodology for establishing supply chain security and cargo theft prevention programs. Burges, senior director of intelligence for FreightWatch International, explains the threat cargo theft poses to the national economy, along with the impact to individual supply chain stakeholders—from the manufacturer all the way back to the consumer.

Key takeaways: In addition to product loss, cargo theft’s downstream costs include efficiency loss, customer dissatisfaction, and product recalls. Shippers can reduce cargo theft by taking steps to decrease risks both in facility and in-transit operations; adopting policies designed to secure cargo from origin to destination; and implementing technologies that prevent theft and increase cargo recovery.

For details: www.elsevier.com

A Supply Chain Management Guide to Business Continuity

By Betty A. Kildow, CBCP, FBCI

In the logistics sector, just one weak link can jeopardize the whole organization, so no company can afford to ignore its business continuity planning. Kildow covers each phase of business continuity program development and maintenance, focusing on the supply chain, to help logistics professionals create, test, document, refine, and manage workable business continuity plans.

Key takeaways: Through a combination of exercises, strategies, and tactics, this book offers insight and tools to identify and reduce risks; break down business continuity silos; evaluate and select the most-qualified and best-suited suppliers; and coordinate supply chain continuity requirements. Additional features include a macro-level self-assessment to measure the current level of supply chain business continuity preparedness; a checklist to review existing business continuity plans; and a list of specific management steps to prepare for future disruptions.

For details: www.amacombooks.org

The Procurement Game Plan: Winning Strategies and Techniques for Supply Management Professionals

By Charles Dominick and Soheila R. Lunney

The Procurement Game Plan simplifies complex concepts through real-life examples so readers can apply winning strategies and techniques to become successful procurement professionals. Topics range from the fundamentals of procurement and supply chain management to emerging trends likely to revolutionize corporate procurement strategies.

Key takeaways: Procurement can have a dramatic impact on an organization’s financial performance and internal operations efficiency. In companies of all sizes, procurement departments must take a total strategic approach to exceeding management’s expectations, embracing a broader supply chain role, and serving internal customers.

For details: www.jrosspub.com

Sustainable Operations and Closed-Loop Supply Chains

By Gilvan C. Souza

When making decisions, companies that want to be sustainable must consider the triple bottom line: economic (profit), environmental (planet), and social (people). Souza explains how closed-loop supply chains design products for multiple lifecycles, plan reverse logistics networks to handle used products, and develop remarketing strategies to ensure customers buy remanufactured products.

Key takeaways: The first step toward sustainability is reducing operational waste through tools such as Lean and Six Sigma programs. Next, companies must conduct a lifecycle assessment that measures the environmental impact of its main products and processes. Finally, the organization must close the loop through efforts such as designing efficient, toxin-free, recyclable packaging and products that last for multiple lifecycles.

For details: www.businessexpertpress.com

From A to B: How Logistics Fuels American Power and Prosperity

By David Axe

Societies depend on transportation and logistics for survival. Logistics solidified the United States’ global power and influence in the world wars and Cold War, and gave the current U.S. military the ability to fight two wars at once. From A to B tells the story of modern American logistics, which will continue to shape the nation’s role in this century.

Key takeaways: Axe describes the intricacy of logistics during war; the complex and colorful transportation culture; and the risk of falling behind as competition stiffens and national transportation infrastructure crumbles. From A to B presents the challenge of finding new ways to move resources and products more efficiently in order to prosper as a nation.

For details: www.potomacbooksinc.com

The Lean Sustainable Supply Chain: How to Create a Green Infrastructure with Lean Technologies

By Robert Palevich

Palevich introduces ideas, strategies, and technologies drawn from more than 30 years of supply chain experience. His best-practice implementation techniques and detailed guidance for scorecarding improvements in productivity, cost, and environmental impact help build more responsible and profitable supply chains.

Key takeaways: The Lean Sustainable Supply Chain breaks down the processes used by world-class companies, so any manager can implement the technological advances now available. The book explains lean technologies, such as warehouse management systems and enterprise resource planning solutions, and illustrates how to implement each improvement and measure success through increased company performance and improved sustainability.

For details: www.ftpress.com

 

Highly Competitive Warehouse Management: An Action Plan for Best-in-Class Performance

By Jeroen P. Van Den Berg

This book shares the warehousing secrets of best-in-class operations, and explains how they create a competitive advantage. Van Den Berg provides a systematic, yet flexible, action plan for improvement, which involves human behavior, process redesign, warehouse management systems, and supply chain alignment.

Key takeaways: Highly Competitive Warehouse Management explains the Warehouse Maturity Scan, a useful tool that analyzes the current state of supply chain operations. Other topics include warehouse management systems; process efficiency; resource utilization; synchronized planning; and service alignment.

For details: www.distributiongroup.com

Food Supply Chain: Economic, Social, and Environmental Perspectives

By Madeleine Pullman and Zhaohui Wu

Compiled for supply chain partners, policymakers, and researchers, this book provides a deep understanding of how food is created and distributed to American consumers. Topics addressed include unique traits of specific food type supply chains; food-focused regulations, manufacturing, logistics, and retailing; food packaging and transportation safety; and the future of food supply chain management.

Key takeaways: Growing populations, increasing demand, the need for new farming and food distribution methods, and corporate consolidation are challenging food supply chain managers to adapt their practices.

For details: www.routledge.com

Supply Chain Excellence: A Handbook for Dramatic Improvement Using the SCOR Model

By Peter Bolstorff and Robert Rosenbaum

This book provides a hands-on guide to executing supply chain improvement and achieving operational superiority. Supply Chain Excellence instructs supply chain professionals in avoiding misalignment, high inventory, unexpected costs, constrained growth and profits, and market share loss.

Key takeaways: Bolstorff and Rosenbaum offer a highly compressed timeline for using the Supply Chain Operations Reference (SCOR) framework to plan and execute supply chain improvement in an SAP environment, in global enterprises, and in a small business. Featuring examples and experience from roughly 100 projects, Supply Chain Excellence refines the use of the scorecard for better process analysis; extends the approach to encompass implementation and strategy; and quantifies the financial value of supply chain improvement to demonstrate its importance in achieving lasting competitive advantage.

For details: www.amacombooks.org

Supply Chain Management and Transport Logistics

By John J. Liu

Liu explains recent developments in supply chain management (SCM), such as the Walmart model and sustainability trends in the industry, and offers insights on the interrelationship between SCM and logistics.

Key takeaways: Chapters focus on topics such as logistics theories and methodologies; inventory and reserve systems; sourcing and outsourcing; supply chain maintenance; ocean and air transport logistics; environmental logistics; and the future of supply chain and transport logistics.

For details: www.routledge.com