CARISCA achieved “a huge victory” this spring, in the words of executive director Dale Rogers, with a publication in one of the world’s leading supply chain journals. The Journal of Business Logistics published a paper by a CARISCA research team online May 1. It will be in the June print edition.
The article, “In search of operational resilience: How and when improvisation matters,” advances understanding of the determinants of resilient operations and supply chains. Lead author Dominic Essuman, a CARISCA research faculty member, presented an early version of the paper at the 2022 Supply Chain Research Summit.
“Improvisation is a topic that is intensely important in times of new opportunity as well as disruptive crisis,” says Glenn Richey, the journal’s co-editor in chief. “Dr. Essuman and his team’s timely and timeless work will enrich emerging theoretical perspectives toward explaining operations and supply chain resiliency. Perhaps we will see a new stream of research on improvisation?”
As noted in the article, improvisation refers to the degree to which firms engage in spontaneous and creative actions to find new ways to achieve an objective. The researchers examined whether different dimensions of improvisation may have different effects on operational resilience under varying firm situations.
“Creative improvisation provides novel solutions, while spontaneous improvisation provides speedy responses,” explains Essuman. “Our results reveal that creative improvisation is more helpful to operational resilience when supply chain disruption is high.
“Spontaneous responses are prone to mistakes,” Essuman adds. “This dark side of spontaneous improvisation may cancel out its contribution to operational resilience.”
A long-time goal met
Essuman says it has been his goal to publish in the Journal of Business Logistics since shortly after he earned his MBA degree from KNUST in 2015. But he wondered how it was possible, considering the journal accepts only 5% to 10% of the article submissions it receives.
When he submitted the paper, Essuman included a cover letter explaining how his work addresses issues Richey had identified for further research in his own papers. Essuman believes that improved his odds.
Essuman also credits CARISCA for some of his success. He says his involvement with the center has played a significant role in enhancing his research and publication skills.
“CARISCA has provided a platform where I can receive advice and guidelines from top-tier journal editors,” he says. “I also often receive feedback on my work from experienced CARISCA team members. My association with CARISCA has been a blessing.”
Essuman’s co-authors on the paper are CARISCA director Nathaniel Boso and fellow research faculty members Henry Ataburo, Emmanuel Anin and Listowel Awusu Appiah.
One of CARISCA’s top objectives is to strengthen KNUST’s capacity to apply global best practices for research in emergent supply chain management research topics. Getting an article published in a top-ranked journal is evidence the center’s efforts are bearing fruit.
The Journal of Business Logistics has a two-year impact factor of 7.875, a measure of how often it is cited, and is ranked 42nd out of 226 management-related academic journals. It is published in affiliation with the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals.
“Dr. Essuman and his team from Ghana do excellent work that we are proud to publish in the Journal of Business Logistics,” says Richey. “We look forward to future submissions.”