Byung-Gak Son

ASP, The Art and Science of Practice: Skills Employers Want from Operations Research Graduates

We analyzed the text of more than 1,000 ads for operations research (OR) jobs. Our objective was to help industry employers benchmark the skills they are seeking in OR graduates with those that other employers are seeking. Educators can also compare their offerings against the skills industry employers seek. We found that employers of OR graduates consistently require modeling, statistics, programming, and general analytical skills in an operations management context as their primary requirements regardless of sector, function within company, and even degree type. These employers also require communication, leadership, project management, spreadsheet and database, and team skills in that order.

ASP, The Art and Science of Practice: What Employers Demand from Applicants for MBA-Level Supply Chain Jobs and the Coverage of Supply Chain Topics in MBA Courses

We analyzed the text of 704 online advertisements of supply chain management jobs for MBA graduates. The content analysis of these job advertisements provided us with a list of supply chain topics, such as inventory management and supply management, and general skills, such as communication and leadership; it also showed the proportion of advertisements requesting these skills. We measured the relative coverage of the same supply chain topics in MBA-level supply chain electives and operations management core courses in 21 of the top 50 business schools in the United States by analyzing the course descriptions and the cases used in these courses. This enabled us to compare the relative importance of supply chain topics to employers on the “demand” side with the relative importance of supply chain electives in MBA curricula on the “supply” side in these schools. Our analysis indicated that the supply usually matches demand; however, there may be an undersupply of practice- or process-oriented topics, such as forecasting, procurement, supplier and vendor management, and contracts and negotiation. In addition, there may be an oversupply of conceptual and strategy-oriented topics, such as product design, supply chain design, and emerging information technology and management information.

Factors affecting successful adoption of ubiquitous computing technology in supply chain contexts

Purpose – The principal purpose of this paper is to determine the distinguishing characteristics of the factors that affect the successful adoption of ubiquitous computing technology (UCT) in supply chain management (SCM) in different settings.Design/methodology/approach – Based on the relevant literature, this paper analyses the adoption of UCT in SCM operations, and describes the series of shaping processes. These processes are influenced largely by management and technical factors such as strong support from top management and by convenient user interfaces in global ubiquitous computing settings. These two factor types (management and technical) support the formulation of a theoretical framework that can be examined in two national environments (UK and Korea).Findings – The results highlight the key differences in terms of UCT adoption in supply chain contexts between the two national environments examined, and indicate that these differences are affected by the different national industrial foundation...

The relative emphasis on supply-chain/logistics topics by UK industry in hiring postgraduates and by UK universities in teaching and research

We examine how UK universities view different topics within supply-chain management as seen in their research output and their postgraduate curricula and whether this view matches the relative emphasis on these aspects by UK-based employers when hiring. Using content analysis, we analysed: (1) UK-based supply-chain/logistics job advertisements, (2) abstracts of research articles by UK academics in supply-chain/logistics journals, and (3) the description of the postgraduate-level supply-chain/logistics degrees in UK universities. Our findings show that the overall research output of UK universities is broadly in line with employers’ needs with regards to the relative emphasis on different supply-chain topics. However, their relative emphasis on these topics in their teaching programmes is quite different. We suggest that universities need to look into their provision of academic programmes in relation to employers’ needs and need to look into how to leverage their research output better for this purpose.

Exploring the link between IT systems and the outsourcing of logistics activities: a transaction cost perspective

This study explores the relationship between the expansion of information technology (IT) systems and the outsourcing of logistics activities. Transaction cost theory was adopted to explain this relationship. The research model for this study consists of the degree of IT as an independent variable, the degree of outsourcing of logistics activities as a dependent variable and different types of transaction costs as mediators. The results show that companies that utilise more IT tend to outsource their logistics activities more than those who do not transact electronically, as IT utilisation facilitates outsourcing through reductions in transaction costs.

Understanding of online hotel booking process: A multiple method approach

With the development of information technology, online travel agency has become an important information and communication source in the hospitality industry. The previous studies assessing the online hotel decision-making behaviours, however, mainly focused on behavioural intentions as well as identifying factors that directly influence the transactional behaviours, which rely on a static approach rather than employing the holistic viewpoints. Thus, this research adopted the choice-set model as a theoretical lens to explore online hotel booking behaviours by using multiple methods (i.e. observation and survey methods). The findings of this research shed light on the dynamic patterns of online hotel decision-making process and identify important factors (i.e. internal and external information sources) across sequential stages of the choice-set model. Therefore, this research provides useful implications to online hospitality marketers.

Math Modelling: What Skills do Employers Want in Industry?

We analysed 401 mathematical modelling-related job advertisements from Monster.com and OR/MS Today to find out what employers want from graduates from mathematical modelling related courses. We used content analysis to analyse job advertisements by tallying up relevant phrases and keywords and phrases in the advertisements regarding (1) skill requirements, (2) degree requirements, and (3) background disciplines requirements. Our analysis shows that many skills required for mathematical modelling jobs are “soft” skills pertaining to problem solving and to communication, which are not covered by ordinary mathematical modelling curricula. Educators can help students to obtain such soft skills by adopting innovative teaching methods such as team exercises, competitive exercises, group discussions, presentations, and case analysis.