For more than 20 years, researchers and practitioners claimed a transition from traditional purchasing to strategic supply management. However, very few companies actually have been able to make this transition happen. Given the fact that most of the actual practices applied by world-class companies are well known, the question remains why so many companies failed along the way. What does it take to overcome the barriers of purchasing evolution - and what are the benefits?

Based on more than 200 interviews with Chief Purchasing Officers around the world and statistical analyses, Michael Stolle presents a new perspective on the challenges of organizational change. The empirical results reveal a complex hierarchy of organizational factors that have to be developed to increase purchasing performance. "Visible" purchasing best practices are only the tip of the iceberg and are based on a profound shift of mindsets of the entire organization. The insights offered by this book will help to understand the mechanics and success criteria of purchasing evolution to supply management.

Autorentext
Dr. Michael Stolle promovierte bei Prof. Dr. Christoph Jahns am SVI-Stiftungslehrstuhl für Einkauf, Logistik und Supply Chain Management der European Business School Schloß Reichartshausen. Er ist als Unternehmensberater für McKinsey & Company, Inc. tätig.

Zusammenfassung
Supply management has received increased attention both in research and practice only recently. For decades, purchasing management was considered one of the least complex business functions. However, in a world of decreasing in-house value add in nearly all industries, it has become strategically critical for most companies to pay closer attention to purchasing spend. Many companies found that there is a lot more to have from suppliers than "the right goods at the right place at the right time". Several researchers investigating the transition from traditional purchasing to strategic supply management found a discrepancy between the general discussion of strategic supply management and reality in most companies. Given the well-known examples of high-performing purchasing organizations and the myriade of books both by researchers and practitioners on what good practices in supply management look like, this is an interesting observation. This dissertation investigates reasons for this discrepancy to help companies overcome the barriers of purchasing evolution. Michael Stolle combines organizational theories on organizational learning, resource-based view, and principal-agent conflicts to explain the challenges such a profound change of mindsets and culture presents. He develops a theoretical framework of purchasing evolution that shows the complex interactions of different driving factors that have to go together to make a successful transition possible. Finally, an interview-based empirical study is used to verify this framework empirically.

Inhalt
A brief overview of the status quo in PSM evolution research.- Organization theories perspectives on PSM evolution.- A new conceptual model of drivers of PSM evolution.- An empirical analysis of drivers of PSM evolution.- Summary and conclusions.