Exploring the impact of logistics and supply chain management scholarship: Why pursue practical relevance and are we successful?

Abstract

This study explores the level of relevance of logistics and supply chain management research and probes underlying motives prompting scholars to value and pursue managerial (vs. purely academic) contributions. At its core, the concerns over rigor and relevance of higher education comprise a crisis of trust and credibility that appeared decades ago and continues to provoke concern from the field's thought leaders. While exploratory in nature, the results suggest both practitioners and academics agree at differing levels that logistics and supply chain management research is relevant, but pressure to chase indices and rankings has influenced behavior of academics. Consequently, the academic peer-reviewed process no longer seems to focus on managerial implications. The article begins with theories pertinent to human motivation, namely, self-determination theory (SDT), and employs qualitative interviews of academics to help develop surveys of both academics and logistics and supply chain management practitioners. It then presents the methodologies of quantitative data collection and analysis—combined with interviews of deans and editors—to explore the research questions to offer discussion, implications, future research directions, and conclusions.