| Competitive advantage in a market is attained through the demanding task of providing the right product, in the right package, at the right location, at the right time. Companies have invested significant resources to improve supply chain performance. New concepts such as lean manufacturing, agile manufacturing, six sigma, theory of constraints, mass customization, and postponement have been tried to improve performance, often without significant results. Supply chain strategies based on a 'one-size-fits-all' approach have not proven effective. Most supply chains have not been able to achieve the desired level of success using traditional supply chain techniques.; In 1997, Marshall Fisher published an article in the Harvard Business Review suggesting the reason that improvement efforts had not produced the desired results in supply chain performance was due to the misalignment of product types with supply chain strategy. Fisher proposed there are two types of products, functional and innovative, and two types of supply chains, physically efficient and market responsive. He suggested that the appropriate supply chain for functional products is a physically efficient strategy and a market responsive strategy is the best fit for innovative products. The idea was quickly adopted and the concept of alignment research moved into expansion and modification of Fisher's framework. The problem is that the original notion, which Fisher clearly stated was based upon his personal experience, has not been quantitatively validated, leaving a vital gap in the knowledge base. The purpose of this research is to determine quantitatively if the performance of an enterprise is enhanced by the alignment of the appropriate supply chain strategy with product characteristics.; Modeling was the method chosen to test the plausibility of Fisher's framework. It is possible to model the framework by creating a series of theoretical functional and innovative products and investigate the effectiveness of different supply chain strategies in satisfying product demand. Staying true to Fisher's framework, physically efficient and market responsive supply chain strategies are used in this research. The tool employed for the model is Inventory Analyst(TM), a supply chain/inventory optimization and analysis tool developed by LogicTools, Inc. The use of a commercial supply chain optimization and analysis tool to model Fisher's framework was a novel approach to this research.; The results produced in this study indicate that Fisher's framework indeed holds true and that the decision as to the appropriate supply chain strategy to employ is driven by the product characteristics and nature of its demand. This research also validated the direction of research into the Hybrid Solution Space, where the next generation of supply chain management concepts will be tested and validated. |
