A Simulation Exercise to Illustrate the Impact of an Enterprise System on a Service Supply Chain

Abstract

Jim.Dyer@mccombs.utexas.edu} I n this paper, we present a computer-based simulation exercise designed to help students understand the impact of an enterprise system on business performance in a service supply chain. The particular service supply chain simulated in the exercise is a wireless telecommunications firm. In this exercise, students perform simulations to experience managing the supply chain of the telecommunications firm with and without an enterprise system. The simulator tracks their business performance. Then the results are used as the basis of discussion in a subsequent debriefing session. We describe the educational goals of the simulation exercise and how the exercise can be structured in order to achieve these goals. The latter is illustrated by the use of the simulation exercise in a master's level supply chain management course in the Red McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas at Austin. The simulator includes realistic details. In fact, it is based on the extensive consulting experiences of the first author with two North American telecommunications firms. We describe the simulator in detail under the various scenarios, explain how it was validated, and provide the simulator equations in system dynamics format in Appendix B.

A system dynamics‐based simulation experiment for testing mental model and performance effects of using the balanced scorecard

“…The business simulator was built by incorporating the same system dynamics model that had been used in previous research (Ritchie-Dunham, 2001Ritchie-Dunham et al, 2007). This study uses the same business case, model structure, game interfaces and initial conditions that were defined by RitchieDunham (2002).…”

“…A more detailed description of the business case and simulator model can be found in Ritchie-Dunham (2002) and Ritchie-Dunham et al (2007).…”

Simulated business effectiveness: learning and performance outcomes

“…The online pairwise comparison questionnaire had 23 pairings of the 10 simulated business performance measures and 4 decision variables. These represented concepts important in understanding the simulated business (Ritchie-Dunham, 2002; Ritchie-Dunham et al , 2007; Capelo and Dias, 2009). To avoid influencing their responses, participants were not informed that all pairings were causally linked.…”

“…The experimental task was adapted from case materials and simulated business, developed and validated by Ritchie-Dunham (2002) and also used by Ritchie-Dunham et al (2007) and Capelo and Dias (2009). Participants became the CEO of a wireless telecommunications company (simulated business) which they ran for 5 simulated years making decisions every six months (i.e.…”

“…In accord with the comprehensive discussion on system dynamics presented by Sterman (2000), a stock and flow model shows the interrelationships between critical resources and variables underlying the simulated business (Capelo and Dias, 2009). The stock and flow models and equations underlying this study’s simulated business were the same for PIF and NIF and were based on the original simulation in Ritchie-Dunham (2002) and Ritchie-Dunham et al (2007). However, as the initial performance information was different for PIF and NIF, the rate of gaining customers (business recovery) relative to the rate of losing customers (going out of business), was different for PIF and NIF both at task commencement and duration, depending on how resources were used (decisions made) which influenced the simulated business performance variables.…”