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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

Cass Business School, London EC1Y 8TZ, United Kingdom
Cass Business School, London EC1Y 8TZ, United Kingdom
Anderson School of Management, University of California, Los Angeles, California 90095-1481
m.sodhi{at}city.ac.uk
b.g.son{at}city.ac.uk
ctang{at}anderson.ucla.edu

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.

Key Words: personnel; data analysis; inventory/production; education systems; operations; forecasting; manpower planning; professional