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supply chain management (SCM)

​In commerce, supply chain management (SCM), the management of the flow of goods and services,[2] between businesses and locations, and includes the movement and storage of raw materials, of work-in-process inventory, and of finished goods as well as end to end order fulfillment from point of origin to point of consumption. Interconnected, interrelated or interlinked networks, channels and node businesses combine in the provision of products and services required by end customers in a supply chain.[3]

Supply-chain management has been defined as the "design, planning, execution, control, and monitoring of supply-chain activities with the objective of creating net value, building a competitive infrastructure, leveraging worldwide logistics, synchronizing supply with demand and measuring performance globally".[4][5] SCM practice draws heavily on industrial engineering, systems engineering, operations management, logistics, procurement, information technology and marketing,[6] and strives for an integrated, multidisciplinary, multimethod approach.[7] Marketing channels play an important role in supply-chain management.[6] Current[when?] research in supply-chain management is concerned with topics related to sustainability and risk management,[8] among others. An important concept discussed in SCM is supply chain resilience. Some suggest that the “people dimension” of SCM, ethical issues, internal integration, transparency/visibility, and human capital/talent management are topics that have, so far, been underrepresented on the research agenda.[9] Supply chain management (SCM) is the broad range of activities required to plan, control and execute a product's flow from materials to production to distribution in the most economical way possible. SCM encompasses the integrated planning and execution of processes required to optimize the flow of materials, information and capital in functions that broadly include demand planning, sourcing, production, inventory management and logistics -- or storage and transportation.[10]

Although it has the same goals as supply chain engineering, supply chain management is focused on a more traditional management and business based approach, whereas supply chain engineering is focused on a mathematical model based one.[11]