I was delighted to receive a shipment of my new book, "Labor and Supply Chain Networks," yesterday. The book was published by Springer Nature and contains 12 chapters, with Acknowledgments, Preface, and an Appendix.
Writing this book was a true labor of love. The book is dedicated to: essential workers and to those fighting for freedom in Ukraine, with gratitude for your heroism. It is the result of many years of research and writing, accompanied by adrenaline during the COVID-19 pandemic and now the war on Ukraine.
Springer has produced both hardcopy and online versions, with more information available on the Springer website for the book. I am indebted to Elizabeth Loew of Springer for her outstanding shepherding of this book project with publication even ahead of schedule!
The front matter for the book, with the Preface and the Acknowledgments, is available for free download. In the Acknowledgments, I thank the great Isenberg School Dean Anne P. Massey, the two Operations and Information Management Department Chairs: Professors Bob Nakosteen and Senay Solak, over the period that this book was written, as well as the Vice Provost for Global Affairs at UMass Amherst Kalpen Trivedi, for his leadership of international programs. With the war in Ukraine still raging, and with my service for the Kyiv School of Economics (KSE) in Ukraine a very important part of my life, both professionally and personally, I also thank the President of KSE Tymofiy Mylovanov and Rector Tymofii Brik plus KSE colleagues Oleg Nivievskyi and Nataliia Shapoval, who have done extraordinary work on documenting the impacts of the war.
Collaborators throughout this challenging time have made work fascinating and enjoyable. I am indebted to Professor Ladimer S. Nagurney of the University of Hartford, Professor Patrizia Daniele of the University of Catania in Italy, Professor Tina Wakolbinger of the Vienna University of Economics and Business, Professor Deniz Besik of the University of Richmond, Professor Sara Saberi of WPI, Professor Pritha Dutta of Pace University, and Professor Mojtaba Salarpour of Texas A&M Commerce. All are Center Associates of the Virtual Center for Supernetworks that I founded in 2001 and continue to direct. Acknowledgments are also extended to my long-time collaborators on Dynamics of Disasters conferences and co-edited volumes: Professor Panos M. Pardalos of the University of Florida and Professor Ilias S. Kotsireas of Wilfrid Laurier University in Canada. I also thank my PhD student Dana Hassani.
Of course, writing a book requires a great deal of focus and time and dedication, and I am so thankful to my family for their support. And, in the pandemic, having a professional society such as INFORMS that helped us to stay connected and informed and also advocated our work to the media and government, was incredible supportive and sustaining.
Workers need to be valued, supported, recognized, and paid for their contributions. Supply chains would collapse without them, as we have seen. I hope that my book, which contains chapters on both profit-maximizing firms and non-profits, including blood service organizations and those in emergency response and disaster management, helps in decision-making as well as policy-making. I believe that students will also appreciate and gain value from the material therein.
I hope that this book will inspire further research as well as implementation in practice of results therein from wages that should be paid to laborers to the productivity investments that should be made for the benefit of workers, consumers, firms, and organizations.
After all, as I wrote in my ORMS Today invited essay (thank you, INFORMS): In the End, It's All About People!
Posts
