Value Creation Through Integration of Supply Chain Management and Marketing Strategy

-- Pankaj M Madhani

This paper aims to investigate the renewed emphasis on and interests in integration of Supply Chain Management (SCM) and marketing and relatively very few recorded cases of successful implementations. The paper reviews the prior literature on SCM and marketing integration, and presents a framework which shows the relationship between SCM and marketing integration along with the overall performance improvement. It provides a basis for further empirical validation and suggests that SCM and marketing integration may have positive impact on the overall performance of the organization. This paper expands the concept of SCM and marketing interdependence in enhancing customer value proposition and provides a direction for further studies on SCM and marketing integration. Finally, the paper supports the importance of SCM and marketing integration for the overall better performance of the organization.

© 2011 IUP. All Rights Reserved.

Strategic Planning Through Complexity: Overcoming Impediments to Forecast and Schedule

-- Rajnandan Patnaik

Strategic planning1 is an exercise to visualize or anticipate or project the future and act accordingly (Terry, 1953; Allen, 1958 and 1973; and Strong, 1965), keeping in sync the organizational resources and objectives. Hence, visualizing the future and making adequate provisions to deal with the same to meet organizational objectives can be termed as strategic planning. Moreover, strategic planning is an intellectual process, the conscious determination of course of action, the basing of decisions on purpose, facts and considered estimates (Weihrich et al., 1986). Strategic planning involves decision making through alternative courses of action, with a view to implementing the same in future to synchronize with the changing external environment. It is important to note that strategic plans should exist to show directions, not to prophesize by rigidly fixing unalterable boundaries for any action in future. Future remains unpredictable and forecasting remains an effective way to counter the same. However, it is seen that forecasting sometimes misses its mark completely. The reason for this radical miss is explained through the complexity of the elements that affect the whole planning process. The strategic planning process, after the cerebral stage, asks for scheduling to form an action-plan necessary for implementation. Therefore, forecasting and scheduling can be seen as the essential elements of strategic planning and a framework is essential for the successful implementation of the same. The framework proposed in this paper is scenario-planning with the help of complexity theory that holds the potential to aid strategic planning overcome strategic planning impediments as well as to indicate the arts, science and technology involved in achieving the objectives generated from experience and expertise.

© 2011 IUP. All Rights Reserved.

Business-to-Business Marketing Strategies in the Knowledge Processing Industry

-- Sindhu G

KPO Experts India has indicated that Knowledge Process Outsourcing (KPO) is a step ahead of Business Process Outsourcing (BPO), referring to it as a process chain consisting of high-value-added activities. The fulfillment of business objectives in a KPO engagement model depends to a large extent on domain knowledge, analytical and execution skills, and experience and business expertise. Traditionally, the strongest talking point for marketing the KPO concept was the price advantage that India offered. Cost-benefit used to be the primary value proposition in almost every KPO marketing strategy in earlier times, and was considered to be the major advantage, based on which India was likely to constitute the $17 bn global KPO market, as forecast by the National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM). However, the cost advantage is seen to be waning in recent times. Labor costs are increasing due to rising salaries and real estate rates are formidable, despite the recession. Hence, KPO firms have moved away from projecting the cost advantage as their primary value proposition to prospects, even as a whole new range of benefits from outsourcing have emerged, such as access to high-quality manpower on demand, subject matter expertise, scalable infrastructure, objective perspective in analytical services and streamlined processes. This paper explores some of the ways in which KPOs in India are presently marketing their services, whether and how their marketing techniques have changed in view of recession-induced challenges, and how KPOs are differentiating themselves vis-ŕ-vis competition.

© 2011 IUP. All Rights Reserved.

Comparison of Traditional and Online Travel Services: A Concept Note

--Chakravarthi J S K and Venu Gopal

The influence of technology in transforming our lives needs no mention. It has been overwhelming and transformational in more ways than one. The comparison is starker when we observe how Information and Communications Technology (ICT) in general and Internet technology in particular has enabled the consumer to communicate with the outside world without any boundaries or scope. The Internet is a 24 × 7 virtual world that never rests. This technology has improved over time and has gone a step further—it has opened up immense possibilities for a flourishing e-commerce business. Buying and selling on the Internet today has reached ubiquitous proportions. This concept note explains how the traditional travel services model changed with the advent of Internet, resulting in disintermediation, and forced traditional service providers, Global Distribution Systems (GDS) and others to migrate to the new model. Today, the consumer is increasingly looking at convenience and comfort at no cost/burden. The change is not without a price for the sellers though. Initial investments in the business are high, but experts suggest that the long-term gains are immeasurable. Not everything is smooth even for a medium like the Internet. Experts and researchers opine that although the scope of technology is immense, it has its own limitations. This note is a part of a larger study that covers online travel and as such is very introductory and descriptive in nature. It is a deliberate attempt because the objective here is to inform the general reader about two travel service delivery models—one, traditional, and another, technology-based—compare and contrast them, highlight the role of the service provider, the intermediaries, the travel agents and the consumer. The note concludes with suggestions that the field of travel services research is vast and an open area in India where industry and academic researchers can collaborate and benefit.

© 2011 IUP. All Rights Reserved.