Supply and Demand Chain Executive Magazine recently covered a research done by CAPS Research which simply wanted to figure out the answer to this question:

Are companies turning the promise of supply chain management into real competitive advantages or missing the opportunity to drive real transformation through greater collaboration?

Interestingly, the research found out that managers are spending more time evaluating supply chain-enabled business models, but most have not fully grasped the nature of collaboration or the concept of what it takes to achieve a true collaborative capability.

To help companies better understand the forces that are driving changes in supply chain collaboration, the authors provide a three-step process:

- Introspection - the company's orientation and philosophy that consists of two building blocks: customer orientation and systems thinking orientation.

- Supply chain design - consists of five steps: scanning, mapping, costing, competency/outsourcing management and rationalization.

- Supply chain collaboration - practices employed to drive the transformation include relationship alignment, information sharing, performance measurement, people empowerment and collaborative learning.

You can download this study (registration required) at http://www.capsresearch.org/publications/pdfs-protected/fawcett2007.pdf.