Global operations management has become one of the defining strategic competencies of the 21st century — the capacity to design, manage, and continuously improve the complex international networks through which organizations create and deliver value to customers worldwide. DB8030 examines global operations from the doctoral perspective that DBA students require: not merely as operational managers who implement processes, but as scholar-practitioners who can analyze global operations challenges through theoretical lenses, generate evidence-based insights, and lead strategic change in organizations operating across borders, cultures, and regulatory environments.
Global supply chain management
Frameworks for managing complex international supply networks
- Supply chain theory and the resource-based view: DB8030 examines global supply chains through multiple theoretical lenses. The resource-based view (Barney, 1991) examines supply chain capabilities as potential sources of sustainable competitive advantage — how particular combinations of supplier relationships, logistics expertise, and information systems create value that competitors cannot easily replicate. Transaction cost economics (Williamson, 1975, 1985) explains the make-or-buy decisions that determine supply chain boundaries — why organizations outsource some functions to external suppliers and retain others in-house, based on the relative costs of market transactions versus hierarchical coordination. The relational view (Dyer & Singh, 1998) examines how inter-firm relationships themselves create competitive advantage — through knowledge sharing, complementary resources, and relationship-specific investments that create value neither party could generate independently
- Supply chain risk management: The COVID-19 pandemic exposed the vulnerabilities of globally extended, efficiency-optimized supply chains — the disruptions to semiconductor supply chains alone caused production shutdowns across automotive, electronics, and consumer goods industries worth hundreds of billions of dollars. DB8030 examines supply chain risk management frameworks: risk identification and mapping (supply chain mapping to identify nodes and links, risk categorization by probability and impact), risk mitigation strategies (supply base diversification, strategic inventory buffers, dual sourcing, nearshoring and reshoring considerations, supply chain visibility investments), and supply chain resilience (the capacity to anticipate, adapt to, and recover from disruptions — what Christopher and Peck [2004] distinguish from supply chain robustness, which avoids disruption in the first place)
- Sustainable supply chains: The course examines sustainability as a strategic supply chain imperative — driven by regulatory requirements (EU Supply Chain Due Diligence Directive, SEC climate disclosure rules, UK Modern Slavery Act), investor expectations (ESG criteria in institutional investment screening), customer demands (scope 3 emissions accountability in corporate climate commitments), and risk management (physical climate risks to supply chain infrastructure; transition risks from carbon pricing and regulatory change). The course covers the challenges of measuring and improving supply chain sustainability across multiple tiers of global suppliers
Global logistics and distribution
DB8030 examines global logistics — the physical movement, storage, and information flow that connects globally dispersed production to geographically distributed customers. The course covers international transportation management (modal selection trade-offs across ocean freight, air freight, rail, and road; carrier selection and rate negotiation; container shipping economics and the drivers of freight rate volatility); customs and trade compliance (tariff classification, rules of origin, trade agreement optimization, export controls, sanctions compliance, customs broker management); global warehouse and distribution network design (the location science of distribution center siting across global markets, balancing transportation costs, inventory carrying costs, and customer service requirements); and trade finance instruments (letters of credit, documentary collections, and the mechanisms that reduce payment risk in international transactions between parties without established relationships). The course also examines the technology systems that enable global logistics visibility: transportation management systems (TMS), warehouse management systems (WMS), global trade management (GTM) software, and the emerging role of blockchain in supply chain traceability and document verification.
Global quality management
DB8030 examines quality management as a global operations challenge — how organizations maintain consistent quality standards across geographically distributed, culturally diverse, multi-tier supply networks. The course examines the major quality management frameworks: Total Quality Management (TQM) and its foundational theorists (Deming's System of Profound Knowledge and 14 Points, Juran's Quality Trilogy, Crosby's Zero Defects), the ISO 9001 quality management system standard and its application to global supply chains, Six Sigma (the data-driven quality improvement methodology pioneered at Motorola and institutionalized at General Electric — using DMAIC cycles and statistical process control to reduce defects toward the 3.4 defects per million opportunities target), and Lean manufacturing (Toyota Production System — the elimination of muda [waste] through value stream mapping, standardized work, kanban pull systems, jidoka quality at the source, and kaizen continuous improvement). The course examines the specific challenges of maintaining quality in global manufacturing operations where cultural differences in quality attitudes, supplier capability gaps in developing markets, and the difficulty of transferring tacit quality knowledge across linguistic and geographical barriers create quality management challenges that domestic operations do not face.
Technology and human resources in global operations
DB8030 examines technology as both an enabler and a disruptor of global operations. Industry 4.0 technologies — industrial IoT (IIoT), advanced robotics, additive manufacturing (3D printing), artificial intelligence and machine learning, digital twins, and cloud-based manufacturing platforms — are transforming global operations by enabling higher levels of automation, mass customization, predictive maintenance, and real-time operational visibility. The course examines how these technologies change the economics of global production location decisions (automation reduces the labor cost advantage that drove decades of manufacturing migration to low-wage countries, potentially enabling reshoring to markets closer to customers) and the skills that global operations managers need to lead digital manufacturing transformation. The human resource dimensions of global operations receive particular attention: managing culturally diverse workforces across national operations, developing global operations talent pipelines, managing the workforce implications of automation and digitalization, and designing HR systems (performance management, compensation, talent development) that are coherent across global operations while remaining sensitive to local labor market and cultural contexts.
DB8030 assignments include supply chain analyses, operations strategy papers, case analyses, and research papers on global operations challenges
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Supply chain analyses, operations strategy papers, global operations case studies, research papers.
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Frequently asked questions
DB8030 equips students to analyze the complex forces shaping global supply chain configuration decisions — including the reshoring and nearshoring trends that have attracted significant attention since the pandemic supply chain disruptions of 2020-2022 and the geopolitical shifts driving supply chain "decoupling" from China in sensitive technology sectors. The forces driving reshoring and nearshoring are real but often overstated in popular business commentary. Labor cost convergence: wages in China and other previously low-cost manufacturing locations have risen substantially over two decades, reducing the labor arbitrage that originally justified global supply chain extension. Transportation cost volatility: the extreme freight rate spikes of 2021-2022 (ocean container rates that increased 10-fold in some lanes) exposed the cost vulnerability of globally extended supply chains. Supply chain resilience: post-pandemic priority on supply chain resilience is driving increased emphasis on supply base diversification, strategic inventory, and geographic risk reduction. Geopolitical risk: US-China trade tensions, technology export controls, and ESG scrutiny of labor practices in certain countries are increasing the risk cost of sourcing in geopolitically contested regions. However, forces limiting reshoring are equally real. Automation reduces but does not eliminate labor cost advantages where labor content remains meaningful. Product complexity and supplier ecosystem effects mean that manufacturing some products efficiently requires co-location with a developed supplier ecosystem that takes decades to build. Total landed cost analysis (including transportation, duties, inventory carrying costs, quality costs, and risk-adjusted costs) frequently still favors globally distributed supply chains even when simple wage comparisons do not. DBA analysis of reshoring trends should apply rigorous total landed cost and strategic risk analysis frameworks rather than accepting popular narratives uncritically.