Global Supply Chain Management
Global Supply Chain Management
Task 1 (Max 1000 Words) (40% Mark)
You are a global supply chain analyst and you are going to critically analyse a fresh food supply chain against a car manufacturing supply chain, both with global and national supply network. You will critically evaluate the current issues, challenges and expected future of these supply chains nationally and globally in relation to meeting four key performance indicators (KPIs) of quality, time, cost and CO2 emission. Organisations are obliged to meet objectives associated to these four KPIs in a synergic and integrated approach to achieve competitive advantage. You are expected to critically compare and contrast these two supply chains about how to achieve the objectives pinpointing the current issues, challenges and strategies and expected future strategies. These strategies, theories or tools are expected to be critically analysed to promote a top quality, responsive, fast, efficient and environmentally friendly supply chain.
The critical analysis includes underpinning theories and strategies extracted from sufficient up to date peer reviewed academic journal articles as theoretical background and analysing real world examples and cases (minimum one example of each supply chain). The theories and strategies must be referred but not limited to those that have already been taught during this semester. You are expected to create an argumentative discussion by comparing and contrasting these supply chains and adding your own insight and analysis.
Please, note that ALL four KPIs of quality, time, cost and CO2 emission must be critically analysed in this analysis.
Task 2 (Max 1000 Words) (30% Mark)
You are part of a European Conference advisory team to organise a Conference about “Contemporary issues and strategies in Global Supply Chain Management (GSCM)”. You could refer to the examples in lecture and research – enriched seminar discussions to find more information. You have been asked to suggest FIVE different themes for this Conference. Themes are the main criteria that Conference papers and presentations must be relevant to and must be related and beneficial to GSCM and crucial for both researchers and practitioners (refer to the provided marking guide or tips). Conference delegates are university academics and post graduate students and also some executive business leaders of global organisations around Europe. You will critically justify the selection of these themes, which could represent current contemporary issues and research and business hot topics in GSCM with the support of up to date peer reviewed academic journal articles. As part of justification, you will critically analyse these themes and importance of them to be part of this European Conference both theoretically (research and literature – support) and practically (Business – support). You are expected to present these FIVE themes very clearly. The themes do not have to be only limited to the Europe and could be a broader global theme
Task 3 (Max 1000 Words) (20% Mark)
You have already read and discussed seven journal articles during seminar activities. You will provide a summary of your understanding and analysis of these articles in the form of critical evaluation. You are required to underpin your views using seminar activity discussions, these journal articles and other related academic journal articles. Your analysis must refer to a cross-article review (compare and contrast articles about their approach to the global supply chain issues and strategies and also future agenda) and be an integrated view, NOT an analysis of each individual paper separately. Your critical evaluation could be about how theories and strategies of these articles can inter-face to support an efficient, competitive, green and global supply chain.
- 10% of the marks are assigned to the presentation of the assignment and also to referencing (references must be minimum 30 and good quality journal articles and books). It is strongly advised to use references appropriately in the text by using them where required. Also consider that some references may be used more than once in the text. Therefore, it is not just the matter of the quantity, it is also the matter of the quality of the references that are used and how you used them).
Please, make sure you answer these 3 questions separately under a specific heading and explain the issues by using underpinning academic theories and examples for all of these questions. You are expected to use all material from lectures, seminars and also use an appropriate number of academic relevant resources including text books from the recommended reading list and also peer reviewed academic journal papers from NORA and other data bases such as “Emerald”, “Science Direct” and “Business Source premier”. .
In addressing and critically analysing the case, you will need to consider global Supply Chain strategies such as (but not limited to):
SCM Processes
– Supply Chain structure
– Purchasing and Strategic Procurement
– Logistics management
SC Excellence, efficiency and Improvement
– Quality Management in SC
– Six Sigma and TQM
– Lean and Agile Supply Chain
– Performance Measurement
– Forecasting
SC Partnership and IT
– Cross-functional activities and integration in SC
– Collaborative Supply Chain
– Information Technology
Global SC Challenges
– Sustainability in Global Supply Chain
Your assignment will be 3000 words in length report (plus or minus 10%). This includes the main body (3 tasks) and all in-text citations and direct quotations. Reference list and front page are not included in word count.
Your report will include (at least) a title page, table of contents, contents page, and references. You may also include an appendix for relevant supporting material but main arguments must be included in the body of the report. Your report must follow a standard report structure. For more details of report writing, you can refer to:
To gain a basic pass, your analysis will be supported by evidence from at least 30 good quality, peer reviewed journals. You may also use text-books and journal sources available on the Internet as well as in the university library but you must NOT use other material from the Internet.
Referencing your work
The APA method of referencing uses the author’s name and the date of the publication. In-text citations give brief details of the work you are referring to in your text. References are listed at the end of the text in alphabetical order by the author’s name. The general format of an electronic journal reference in the APA style is shown below:
Coutu, D. (2009). Why Teams Don’t Work. Harvard Business Review, 87(5), 98-105. Retrieved 29th April 2012 from EBSCO http://searchebscohost.com
Author/s name and initials are listed first, followed by year of publication in brackets. Then there is the title of article and the journal where the article appears, which is in italics. Then state the volume and issue number (in brackets) along with the pages where article can be located. Finally add the date the article was retrieved and then the name of the database, followed by the web address. Wherever possible use the homepage URL rather than the full and extended web address.
For further information on why it is important to reference accurately go to the Referencing and Plagiarism topic in Skills Plus available from the Library website:
www.northumbria.ac.uk/skillsplus
You will find other useful help guides on Skills Plus to help you with the skills involved in writing your assessments and preparing for exams.
For further information on the APA style of referencing see the Concise Rules of APA style and the APA website http://www.apastyle.org/learn
Late submission of work
Where coursework is submitted without approval, after the published hand-in deadline, the following penalties will apply.
For coursework submitted up to 1 working day (24 hours) after the published hand-in deadline without approval, 10% of the total marks available for the assessment (i.e.100%) shall be deducted from the assessment mark.
For clarity: a late piece of work that would have scored 65%, 55% or 45% had it been handed in on time will be awarded 55%, 45% or 35% respectively as 10% of the total available marks will have been deducted.
The Penalty does not apply to Pass/Fail Modules, i.e. there will be no penalty for late submission if assessments on Pass/Fail are submitted up to 1 working day (24 hours) after the published hand-in deadline.
Coursework submitted more than 1 working day (24 hours) after the published hand-in deadline without approval will be regarded as not having been completed. A mark of zero will be awarded for the assessment and the module will be failed, irrespective of the overall module mark.
For clarity: if the original hand-in time on working day A is 12noon the 24 hour late submission allowance will end at 12noon on working day B.
These provisions apply to all assessments, including those assessed on a Pass/Fail basis.