Retail Supply Chain Management

Retailers lie at the end of the supply chain, interfacing with the ultimate consumer as well as with suppliers. This course appeals to students with varied interests: retailing management, suppliers to retailers (or any business selling inventory), entrepreneurs, retail services, real estate, e-commerce, and finance. You will become familiar with all of the major decisions retailers make, including developing strategies, buying, financing, and locating stores.

Supply chain management (SCM) is an integrated approach to managing the flow of goods and services, information, and financials from the raw materials to the consumer. Demand Chain management (DCM) takes a more customer-focused approach to SCM. This course is designed to provide you with an integrated perspective of SCM and DCM to develop the capability to analyze current supply chain operations, to reconfigure the structure of supply chain, and to develop competitive supply chains. You will identify major barriers to effective supply and demand chain management, recognize best practices in supply and demand chain management, and assess the effect of advanced technologies on supply chain implementation.

Learn about how organizations and their employees can successfully collect, evaluate, and apply information to become better decision makers. This course starts with basic concepts regarding business data needs and ends with hands-on experience using Business Intelligence (BI) tools. At the end of your study, you will be able to become an intelligent gatherer and user of data in your chosen field.

Drawing on research from sociology, psychology, strategy, and economics, this course focuses on the factors that shape consumer needs and influence buying behavior. You explore individual behavioral variables (needs, motives, perceptions, attitudes, personality, and learning) and group influences (social groups and culture) as they affect the consumer decision-making process. The objective is to help you understand how to analyze marketing programs, especially the communications mix and market segmentation, to improve consumer satisfaction.

This course explores the ways individuals think about and practice conflict resolution. You will have a chance to learn more about your own negotiating preferences and the consequences of the choices you make. The course requires both intensive involvement in negotiation and mediation simulations/exercises and thoughtful application of theory through class discussion and written analysis. Class materials will reflect a variety of contexts from the workplace, including interpersonal, global, and cross-cultural interactions.