PhD defence: Structuring Warehouse Management: Exploring the fit between warehouse characteristics and warehouse planning and control structure, and its effect on warehouse performance
In her dissertation ‘Structuring Warehouse Management: Exploring the fit between warehouse characteristics and warehouse planning and control structure, and its effect on warehouse performance’, ERIM’s Nynke Faber studies the management processes that plan, control, and optimize warehouse operations. The inventory in warehouses decouples supply from demand in a supply chain. As such, economies of scale can be achieved in production, purchasing, and transport. Developments such as global competition, production off-shoring, and e-commerce have put warehouses in pole position in the supply chain to satisfy customer expectations. Consequently, warehouses face increasing demands with respect to costs, productivity, and customer service. At the same time, warehouse operations have become more complex due to developments such as value added services (e.g., labelling or assembling sets of different products into kits), e-fulfilment (i.e., processing large numbers of small orders), and up-scaling warehouses. Consequently, planning, controlling, and optimizing warehouse operations, defined as warehouse management in this dissertation, have become a distinguishing factor for supply chain performance.
Nynke Faber defended her dissertation in the Senate Hall at Erasmus University Rotterdam on Thursday, 17 September 2015 at 13:30. Her supervisors were <link people rene-de-koster>Professor René de Koster and <link people ale-smidts>Professor Ale Smidts. Other members of the Doctoral Committee were Professor Bert Balk (RSM), Professor Paul van Fenema (Netherlands Defence Academy), and Professor Sander de Leeuw (VU Amsterdam).
About Nynke Faber
Nynke Faber was born in Arnhem, the Netherlands on 14 November 1959. She attended secondary school in Paramaribo (Surinam), and in Utrecht and Dongen in the Netherlands. She graduated in Industrial Engineering at Eindhoven University of Technology in June 1987. Her Master’s thesis was on production planning and control. From 1987 to 1995, she worked as a technical and functional designer, and as a project manager to develop and implement business information systems at Royal Dutch Shell in the Netherlands. In 1995, she switched to teaching and started working as an Assistant Professor of Management Information Systems at the Netherlands Defense Academy in Breda and has been an Associate Professor of Logistics and Supply Chain Management at this academy since 2005. In 1999, she became an external PhD candidate at the Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University Rotterdam and has conducted research on structuring warehouse planning and control processes. She has presented her research at international conferences in Belgium and in Switzerland. Two of her articles have been published in academic journals and several have appeared in professional journals. Nynke is married and has two daughters and a son.
Thesis Abstract
This dissertation studies the management processes that plan, control, and optimize warehouse operations. The inventory in warehouses decouples supply from demand. As such, economies of scale can be achieved in production, purchasing, and transport. As warehouses become more and more vital for the success of many companies, they are facing increasing demands with respect to costs, productivity, and customer service. At the same time, warehouse operations have become more complex due to developments such as value added services, e-fulfilment, and up-scaling warehouses. Consequently, planning, controlling, and optimizing warehouse operations, defined as warehouse management in this dissertation, have become a distinguishing factor for supply chain performance. This dissertation explores warehouse management by studying the effects of the characteristics of a warehouse (i.e., context) on the structure (i.e., design) of warehouse management. In addition, the match (i.e., fit) between characteristics and structure is researched as an important driver of warehouse performance. By conducting empirical research using a multiple case study and a survey study, an overall theoretical model on structuring high performance warehouse management has been developed.
· View and download Nynke's dissertation
Photos: Chris Gorzeman / Capital Images
