Abstract
M.Comm.
Much has been done and developed both in theory and practice in terms of
advancing the science of logistics since its early days as an area of management
focus. Great leaps have been made alone in the past decade regarding the
integration of logistics into the broader management philosophies and to
subsequently define the now widely referred to concept of integrated supply chain
management. Although many industries have embraced this concept and
spearheaded initiatives in this field, many traditionally established companies and
industry sectors have yet to embed and operationalise its concepts more fully and to
reap the potential rewards.
The healthcare industry has been under pressure – amidst increasing competition,
supplier costs and patient’s increasing awareness to seek improved value for
treatment offered – to explore whether opportunities exist to make further savings in
terms of its operating cost and total cost profile by taking a different approach to
managing the healthcare and service provision supply chain – namely in a more
integrated and holistic manner. In the healthcare context, the supply chain includes,
amongst others, the capability and ability to plan, forecast, source, supply, process,
distribute and ultimately deliver and execute all necessary services, goods and
information.
In order to investigate current supply chain practices at a selected private healthcare
provider in Gauteng, an integrated generic supply chain model was defined – for
which industry-acknowledged current supply chain practices from the wider domain
of supply chain management were identified per component.
As primary objective this descriptive research established to what extent a private
healthcare provider in Gauteng, as a role player in the wider South African private
healthcare industry, has knowledge and understanding of some current supply chain
practices, as well as to what extent this private healthcare provider has adopted and
applied recognised practices and concepts of integrated supply chain management.
This was done using the defined generic supply chain model for a private healthcare
provider as the roadmap along which knowledge and application of supply chain
practices could be tested for the selected organisation.
For this research an interview-based experience survey was used that deployed
specific questions in a non-probabilistic sampling manner to respondents across the
functional management chain, to measure both the level of assumed or explicitly
attributed knowledge of supply chain practices in relation to the companies’ ability for
the application, implementation and utilisation of these industry best-practices as
pertaining to supply chain management, as seen in the context of the selected
private healthcare’s competitive operations in the Southern African healthcare
industry. The output of the analysis to determine the primary research objective was
subsequently plotted on a supply chain evolution matrix postulated as part of this
study.