Tillmann Boehme

In the search for impact and relevance: a design science approach

In spite of more than 30 years of academic publications in (supply chain) management, a significant gap between theory and practice remains. Due to the increasing concern that research is not relevant for practice, scholars have started addressing the issue of academic relevance. On the hand scholars argue that the issue can be identified as a ‘knowledge transfer’ problem, thus research findings are relevant for practice but are not produced in a form that can be easily applied by practitioners. On the other hand scholars argue that it is a ‘knowledge creation’ problem, in other words research findings are not meaningful for practice due to the closed and autoreferential nature of the system of Science and the system of Practice. This paper argues for a third approach, namely ‘knowledge adaptation’ problem, to tackle the issue of impact and relevance via a well proven supply chain diagnostic methodology. The robust mixed-methods approach known as Quick Scan Audit Methodology can yield two results: (1) enhancing scholars’ understanding of how supply chain theories are (or can be) applied in practice which leads to the adaption and extension of management theory; (2) translating theories, supporting them in implementing improvement programs within their organisations.