Blog Archives

Posts inspired by whatever else I find interesting

Finding academic articles without academic journals

Many management or supply chain related websites provide the same articles for free (or sometimes at a prenium). Formatting and graphics is usually stripped out, but the content is till there.

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The ISCRiM Newsletter 1/2009

As a researcher within supply chain risk, I find the ISCRiM Newsletters a valuable source of information, particularily for academia-related news. The International Supply Chain Risk Management Network (ISCRiM) is a network of academians interested in how to handle different types of risks in the supply chain. The main purpose of the ISCRIM-network is to speed up, and improve, the research within “Supply Chain Risk Management”

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Risk Avoidance – is that all there is?

The opposite of risk avoidance is risk ignorance. More often than not businesses simply accept that they are exposed to risks and do not bother to spend much effort on assessing and mitigating these risks.

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The IRM Risk Management Standard

Good corporate governance requires that companies adopt a methodical approach to risk management, and the IRM Risk Management Standard provides the toolbox. The Institute of Risk Management (IRM) published a Risk Management Standard in 2002.

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The 2009 Nordic Business Continuity Symposium

I guess this will be THE gathering of who’s who in the Nordic Business Continuity commuity, and I wish I could be there, listen to the speakers, exchange ideas and simply, be inspired.

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Book Review: Transportation Systems Security

This book, Transportation Systems Security by by Allan McDougall and Robert Radvanovsky is not what I thought it would be, but it’s not the books fault, I have to admit that much. It’s the classic misunderstanding of the difference of the terms “safety” and “security”.

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Transportation reliability and vulnerability

This is a philosophical essay on transportation vulnerability, where three fields or subjects are brought together : engineering (reliability and vulnerability), economics (cost and benefits) and politics (decision making).The research essay aims at taking reliability and vulnerability into the realm of cost-benefit analysis to serve as decision support.

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The Business Continuity Institute

The Business Continuity Institute (BCI) was established in 1994 to enable individual members to obtain guidance and support from fellow business continuity practitioners. I came across this website while searching for this book on Managing Risk and Resilience in the Supply Chain.

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Managing Supply Chain Risk

Did you know that the Supply Chain Council (SCS) has extended their renown SCOR-model to Supply Chain Risk Management? This presentation from the the SCS website will detail the changes to the SCOR model to account for Risk Management and how it integrates with the SCOR model risk enablers.

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D-Day for Norway’s Transport Infrastructure

Norway’s transport infrastructure is way behind much of Europe, but today Norway’s government is presenting it’s development plans for the Norwegian transport infrastructure for 2010 to 2019 (Nasjonal Transportplan 2010-2019).

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Magnified Risk in Multi-Enterprise Supply Chains

Supply chain owners need to view their supply chain as a community, because supply chains are interconnected, and thus, magnify risk in multi-enterprise supply chains. Even if the manufacturing takes place out-house, product design should be kept in-house.

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Call for papers – MITIP 2009

The factory of the future is calling for a shift in strategic vision. Where do we go from here and what does the future hold?

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Supply chains and barcodes

Have you ever thought about how barcodes are a major factor in performance of supply chains? How can you keep track of all the items flowing through the supply chain?Using a barcode scanner and inventory control software it is easy to check where any item is at any given moment.

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The curse of being oil-rich

Ah…the complacency of being oil rich. So complacent, in fact, that we forget about our infrastructure.

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Fewer suppliers mean fewer choices for consumers

The financial crisis has created an supply chain crisis, says The Economist. What used to be a banking crisis is now a manufacturing crisis and may soon be a supplier crisis.

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The effects of brand reputation on supply chain risk

One of the major fallouts from the current finical crisis is the loss of brand reputation, and it may not even be the company’s fault. SAAB owes money to some 1400 debtors, and rumors have it that some suppliers have stopped deliveries because of delinquent payments.

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How to count money spent on road investments

Norway spent less money on road investments in 2007 than in 1995, that is, if you count in % of GDP. Is that a correct way of looking at it? Is that a correct way of looking at it?

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The worst roads in the world’s richest country

It is not the planning authorities or the central government who decides infrastructure development in Norway, but the local politicians. To put it simple, what in the US is known as “pork barrel spending” is what rules many of Norway’s infrastructure development projects. Why?

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7 out of 10 businesses without a continuity plan

Is ICT forgotten in supply chain risk management? I hope not. ICT is an integral part of any supply chain. In my humble opinion, not having an ICT contingency plan show how little businesses understand (or care) about their supply chain.

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Economists versus Technocrats – who wins?

In the current financial downturn, much pressure has been on the government (here in Norway, and I bet elsewhere too) to initiate public works projects or other public investment projects in order to create or save jobs.

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ARTICLES and PAPERS
Supply Chain Risk: Culture Shock
Is culture shock the reason why so many global and cross-culture business relationships fail? When i[...]
How to secure your supply chain - 1/7
This the first post in a series that reviews and translates into English some of the content in the [...]
BOOKS and BOOK CHAPTERS
What are Logistics Clusters?
This is a guest post by Professor Yossi Sheffi, Director, MIT Center for Transportation & Logist[...]
Appetite versus Attitude
Finally, and long overdue, another review in the Gower Short Guide to Business Risk book series. Thi[...]
REPORTS and WHITEPAPERS
Saving Norway's crumbling infrastructure
NTP 2010-2019
Following up my post this morning called "D-Day for Norway's Transport Infrastructure", the numbers [...]
Managing supply chain risk
In September and October 2009 the Economist Intelligence Unit surveyed 500 company executives with r[...]
from HERE and THERE
A crisis is NOT an opportunity
Time to debunk one of biggest and most persistent myths that has plagued crisis management for more [...]
The reliability and vulnerability of transportation lifelines
How can we assess how reliable or vulnerable the transportation is, and which parameters can we appl[...]