The importance of supply chain management has increased over the last few decades. Today, entire supply chains are competing with each other instead of individual companies. As such, supply chain management has become a way for companies to set themselves apart from competing companies and their supply chains. Interestingly, supply chain management mainly focuses on efficiency-oriented topics rather than effectiveness-driven issues, in particular the design of supply chains from manufacturing sites downstream, instead of upstream from the customer. The Supply Chain Differentiation Guide offers a modern approach to supply chain management. While for many years “one-size-fits-all” approaches to supply chain management were very common, the current efforts of managers and academics alike focus on the simultaneous management of multiple supply chains. Despite the interest of the business sector in the management of multiple supply chains, academia has largely neglected this topic to date. The Supply Chain Differentiation Guide addresses this shortcoming, introducing both established and cutting-edge management methods to the context of supply chain differentiation and providing inspirations for how to improve corporate operations.

Financing the End-to-End Supply Chain provides readers with a comprehensive understanding of the financial synergies across the supply chain. It demonstrates the importance of the strategic relationship between the physical supply of goods and services and the associated financial flows. The book provides a clear introduction, demonstrating the importance of the strategic relationship between supply chain and financial communities within an organization. This book links together treasury, banking, supply chain, systems, IT, and key stakeholders. Financing the End-to-End Supply Chain will help senior supply chain practitioners to build collaboration, improve relationships and enhance trust between supply chain partners. With its combination of theory and practice it tackles vital issues including physical, information and financial flows, and tailoring supply chain finance to individual organisations' circumstances. Recognizing that supply chain finance means different things in different countries, the authors also consider various initiatives to harmonize and develop cross-border financing as well as including an agenda for national and international policy makers. The new edition features interviews from SCF platform providers on how ecosystems are involved in supply chain finance, additional learning activities for students and new examples on working capital management.

The Supply Chain Handbook brings together a team of 23 experts from management, engineering, technology, consulting, and academic backgrounds. These experts share proven operations methodologies, evaluate technologies and offer practical how-to instruction on topics impacting today's supply chains. Each topic is explored in-depth to provide readers with greater understanding and the ability to put the ideas presented into action. Innovative concepts and state-of-the-art technologies such as leaning the supply chain, logistics outsourcing, RFID, and supply chain execution software are explored in-depth helping you evaluate these solutions for your supply chain. The Supply Chain Handbook also covers fundamental topics such as warehousing operations, space layout and planning, distribution network planning and design, transportation, manufacturing strategies, material handling systems and integration, inventory management and more.

Viewing transportation through the lens of current social, economic, and policy aspects, this four-volume reference work explores the topic of transportation across multiple disciplines within the social sciences and related areas, including geography, public policy, business, and economics. The book’s articles, all written by experts in the field, seek to answer such questions as: What has been the legacy, not just economically but politically and socially as well, of President Eisenhower’s modern interstate highway system in America? With that system and the infrastructure that supports it now in a state of decline and decay, what’s the best path for the future at a time of enormous fiscal constraints? Should California politicians plunge ahead with plans for a high-speed rail that every expert says—despite the allure—will go largely unused and will never pay back the massive investment while at this very moment potholes go unfilled all across the state? What path is best for emerging countries to keep pace with dramatic economic growth for their part? What are the social and financial costs of gridlock in our cities? Features: Approximately 675 signed articles authored by prominent scholars are arranged in A-to-Z fashion and conclude with Further Readings and cross references. A Chronology helps readers put individual events into historical context; a Reader’s Guide organizes entries by broad topical or thematic areas; a detailed index helps users quickly locate entries of most immediate interest; and a Resource Guide provides a list of journals, books, and associations and their websites. While articles were written to avoid jargon as much as possible, a Glossary provides quick definitions of technical terms. To ensure full, well-rounded coverage of the field, the General Editor with expertise in urban planning, public policy, and the environment worked alongside a Consulting Editor with a background in Civil Engineering. The index, Reader’s Guide, and cross references combine for thorough search-and-browse capabilities in the electronic edition. Available in both print and electronic formats, Encyclopedia of Transportation is an ideal reference for libraries and those who want to explore the issues that surround transportation in the United States and around the world.

The theory of concurrent engineering is based on the concept that the different phases of a product lifecycle should be conducted concurrently and initiated as early as possible within the product creation process. Concurrent engineering is important in many industries, including automotive, aerospace, shipbuilding, consumer goods and environmental engineering, as well as in the development of new services and service support. This book presents the proceedings of the 21st ISPE Inc. International Conference on Concurrent Engineering, held at Beijing Jiaotong University, China, in September 2014. It is the first volume of a new book series: 'Advances in Transdisciplinary Engineering'. The title of the CE2014 conference is: 'Moving Integrated Product Development to Service Clouds in the Global Economy', which reflects the variety of processes and methods which influence modern product creation. After an initial first section presenting the keynote papers, the remainder of the book is divided into 11 further sections with peer-reviewed papers: product lifecycle management (PLM); knowledge-based engineering (KBE); cloud approaches; 3-D printing applications; design methods; educational methods and achievements; simulation of complex systems; systems engineering; services as innovation and science; sustainability; and recent research on open innovation in concurrent engineering. The book will be of interest to CE researchers, practitioners from industry and public bodies, and educators alike.

Strategic Sourcing Management examines procurement and supply management in detail, covering the three dimensions of competitiveness, effectiveness and efficiency. Written by Olivier Bruel, Professor Emeritus HEC Paris, and a team of contributing experts from academia, consulting and industry, the book is organised into four parts: strategic decisions; operational management of procurement and related supply chain; management of human resources and dedicated information systems; management of performance and change. This book has been written with a comprehensive global and coherent approach but the chapters are self-standing, enabling the reader to dip into different sections according to need. Strategic Sourcing Management considers both tactical and strategic perspectives that link with a corporate strategy and it includes dedicated chapters on how to set up a Strategic Sourcing function. The text is enriched with clear graphics and solid examples of best practice. Strategic Sourcing Management is a robust text based on both research and experience, so an essential reference for practitioners and academics working in or studying procurement and supply management. It is suitable for anyone involved in procurement and supply management at a senior level but also for general management enabling them to understand the mechanisms of value creation through Strategic Sourcing.

In today’s developing world, international trade is a field that is rapidly growing. Within this economic market, traders need to implement new approaches in order to satisfy consumers’ rising demands. Due to the high level of competition, merchants have focused on developing new transportation and logistics strategies. In order to execute effective transportation tactics, decision makers need to know the fundamentals, current developments, and future trends of intercontinental transportation. The Handbook of Research on the Applications of International Transportation and Logistics for World Trade provides emerging research exploring the effective and productive solutions to global transportation and logistics by applying fundamental and in-depth knowledge together with current applications and future aspects. Featuring coverage on a broad range of topics such as international regulations, inventory management, and distribution networks, this book is ideally designed for logistics authorities, trading companies, logistics operators, transportation specialists, government officials, managers, policymakers, researchers, academicians, and students.

Now in its fourth edition, this bestselling guide to modern management techniques is the ideal companion for all managers, as well as an essential reference for business students. A Handbook of Management Techniques boasts over 100 systematic and analytical methods used by managers to assist in decision-making and to improve efficiency and effectiveness. The techniques contained in this weighty tome (over 700 pages) cover all fields of modern management. Diagrams support the text throughout and, as always, the acclaimed author, Michael Armstrong writes in an accessible and easy-to-read style.

This comprehensive and richly illustrated book explains how to create a differentiation strategy—a strategy for being different in a way that causes customers to prefer your products and services to those of your competitors. Filled with frameworks, tools, and templates, this book will enable you to create a compelling answer to your customers’ most fundamental question: Why should I buy from you instead of your competitors? What makes you different? The first half of the book provides an in-depth analysis of the concepts and principles that underlie the practice of differentiation, including the meaning of competitive advantage, competitive strategy, and customer-perceived value. The second half of the book explains how to create a differentiation strategy by identifying the target of your strategy, using customer research and creative problem-solving to design a unique offering, devising a value proposition that emphasizes a key benefit and the reasons to believe you will deliver the benefit, and designing the activity system that will implement your differentiation strategy. Business leaders in companies large and small, business students, and leaders in government, higher education, and the non-profit sector will gain a deep understanding of all that goes into creating a successful, difficult-to-copy differentiation strategy.