The managed flow of goods and information from raw material to final sale also known as a "supply chain" affects everythingâ€"from the U.S. gross domestic product to where you can buy your jeans. The nature of a company's supply chain has a significant effect on its success or failureâ€"as in the success of Dell Computer's make-to-order system and the failure of General Motor's vertical integration during the 1998 United Auto Workers strike. Supply Chain Integration looks at this crucial component of business at a time when product design, manufacture, and delivery are changing radically and globally. This book explores the benefits of continuously improving the relationship between the firm, its suppliers, and its customers to ensure the highest added value. This book identifies the state-of-the-art developments that contribute to the success of vertical tiers of suppliers and relates these developments to the capabilities that small and medium-sized manufacturers must have to be viable participants in this system. Strategies for attaining these capabilities through manufacturing extension centers and other technical assistance providers at the national, state, and local level are suggested. This book identifies action steps for small and medium-sized manufacturersâ€"the "seed corn" of business start-up and developmentâ€"to improve supply chain management. The book examines supply chain models from consultant firms, universities, manufacturers, and associations. Topics include the roles of suppliers and other supply chain participants, the rise of outsourcing, the importance of information management, the natural tension between buyer and seller, sources of assistance to small and medium-sized firms, and a host of other issues. Supply Chain Integration will be of interest to industry policymakers, economists, researchers, business leaders, and forward-thinking executives.

‘I have never seen such a book about management consulting before: this sets a new standard. This book is extremely thorough and addresses all of the relevant topics.’ - Sander van ′t Noordende, Group Chief Executive Products Operating Group, Accenture Whether you are looking to build on your management studies or experience of working in business, you are likely to have come across management consultancy and will need a clear and concise introduction to this area to help you understand its practices and techniques in order to hire and implement management consultancy in the future. This text provides you with these essentials for success in your studies and later industries when working with and not just for consultancy firms. The text is built around learning objectives to empower your understanding of the ′what′, ′how′, ′when′ and ′why′ at macro and micro levels of management consultancy and its stakeholders, and provides you with engaging real life examples and extra web materials for study. As well as full courses on management consultancy, this text will be invaluable to your management knowledge and skill-set across strategy, change, analytics, problem-solving, solution implementation and decision-making as applied by the world′s top management consulting firms, such as McKinsey & Company, The Boston Consulting Group, and Bain & Company. Lecturer’s resources Lecturer’s guide Teaching notes per chapter Answer guidance to end-of-chapter questions in book Suggested discussion questions Suggested small group assignments Suggested small group field project Lecture slides Option 1: provide all figures of the book on PowerPoint slides Option 2: create complete PowerPoint presentations for each chapter Exercises Exam questions Discussion forum Student resources Templates for developing logical structures Web resources Consultancy publications Consultancy web site, career page Job application preparation services Consultancy institutions

In recent years, purchasing performance measurement have steadily gained in importance in theory and practice. Yet, in many cases, the focus still remains on cost items, especially savings. Moreover, reported performance ratios in purchasing are frequently called into question in terms of their amount and efficacy. Most of the time, there is no tie-in at all with staff compensations. To meet these and other challenges, this book presents a holistic approach for purchasing performance measurement and the incentive systems associated with it. The following topics are dealt with in detail: • Purchasing performance measurement on the level of commodity groups and the procurement organization • Supplier evaluation and performance measurement on the level of the buyer-supplier relationship • Comprehensive systems for purchasing performance measurement, such as the procurement value added and the purchasing balanced scorecard • Performance-oriented incentive systems and bonus payments for buyers, procurement organizations and suppliers Readers are thus provided with comprehensive guidelines for the implementation and realization of sustained performance measurement and incentivization in purchasing.

For more than 20 years, Network World has been the premier provider of information, intelligence and insight for network and IT executives responsible for the digital nervous systems of large organizations. Readers are responsible for designing, implementing and managing the voice, data and video systems their companies use to support everything from business critical applications to employee collaboration and electronic commerce.

This book provides the fundamentals of asset management. It takes a practical perspective in describing asset management. Besides the theoretical aspects of investment management, it provides in-depth insights into the actual implementation issues associated with investment strategies. The 19 chapters combine theory and practice based on the experience of the authors in the asset management industry. The book starts off with describing the key activities involved in asset management and the various forms of risk in managing a portfolio. There is then coverage of the different asset classes (common stock, bonds, and alternative assets), collective investment vehicles, financial derivatives, common stock analysis and valuation, bond analytics, equity beta strategies (including smart beta), equity alpha strategies (including quantitative/systematic strategies), bond indexing and active bond portfolio strategies, and multi-asset strategies. The methods of using financial derivatives (equity derivatives, interest rate derivatives, and credit derivatives) in managing the risks of a portfolio are clearly explained and illustrated.