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Online Master of Supply Chain Transportation & Logistics

Course Descriptions

SCTL 500: Leadership in Logistics

Instructor: Amelia Regan

Credits: 5

In this class, we will examine current issues and emerging technologies in the supply chain transportation and logistics industry as seen through the eyes of industry leaders. You'll hear perspectives about the role of logistics and supply chain management in the national and global economy, essential qualities for a logistics leader, current challenges for the industry, and technologies and trends that could impact the industry in the near- and long-term. In small groups and individually, you will investigate emerging issues, challenges and technologies and deliver short-form research reports and executive summaries, as well as short videos detailing your findings.


SCTL 501: Introduction to Supply Chain Transportation & Logistics (Residency Weekend)

Instructor: Amelia Regan

Credits: 1

This course is designed to introduce you to the fundamental, foundational building blocks you'll use throughout the program and beyond. Through traditional sessions and online networking opportunities, you'll interact with other students in your cohort, the SCTL faculty and staff, the Advisory Board and guest speakers from industry. You'll learn about the opportunities, technologies and trends that are shaping the field of supply chain transportation and logistics, and what you'll need to become successful SCTL leaders for your organizations.

This Residency Weekend course can be completed in-person in Seattle (strongly recommended) or online, if needed.

Course Themes

  • Critical Thinking: Practice your critical thinking skills by working in teams to tackle an unstructured supply chain problem.
  • Data-Driven Decision Making: Explore data-driven trends affecting supply chain transportation and logistics through readings, guest lectures and course discussions.
  • Presentation Skills: Learn strategies for effective presentations and practice presenting to your peers.
  • Integration and Collaboration: Participate in activities throughout the course to learn the importance of integration and collaboration.

SCTL 502: IT Systems & Supply Chain Integration

InstructorBill Keough

Credits: 5

The supply chain objectives of many organizations are hampered by their existing legacy systems and infrastructure, as well as by the lack of cost-effective strategies for migrating to more robust and integrated platforms. This course helps you understand how to document and analyze both business and IT processes, including the best tools and approaches to use. You will get an overview of the enterprise software landscape, the key systems — including ERP, WMS and TMS — required for efficient operation of a corporation, and various approaches for integrating these systems. We also examine strategies for IT consolidation when one firm acquires another, as well as different methods for data exchange with key suppliers, distributors and customers.

Course Themes

  • Critical Thinking: Evaluate IT architecture and internal applications to improve data exchange within a business.
  • Data-Driven Decision Making: Play a game that simulates the purchasing and fulfillment processes and analyzing data sets.
  • Presentation Skills: Deliver a presentation about a key supply chain technology solution.
  • Integration and Collaboration: Explore methods and technologies that are used to exchange information within a large enterprise.

SCTL 503: Inventory Management 

Instructor: Apurva Jain

Credits: 5

Inventory management has a significant impact on a company’s financial performance. This course tackles the common problem of supply-demand mismatch. We explore methods of forecasting that enable you to understand the market demand for products in a supply chain and identify strategies for optimizing inventory in response to that demand. You will undertake a comprehensive analysis of the tools and methods used to manage inventory SKUs (stock-keeping units) with different characteristics — demand, lead-time and more. We also cover sourcing and contingency planning as well as current best practices in supply chain management, including the trade-offs that exist between lean and resilient supply chain principles.

Course Themes

  • Critical Thinking: Read case studies about inventory problems and propose options for improvement.
  • Data-Driven Decision Making: Use time-series sales data to develop predictive models.
  • Presentation Skills: Write about inventory-related issues on a discussion board and prepare a brief presentation.
  • Integration and Collaboration: Participate in a simulation to identify inefficiencies in inventory processes and collaborate on solutions.

SCTL 504: Facility Design & Operations Management

Instructor: Luis Perez

Credits: 5

The design and location of facilities can have a significant impact on the cost and performance of the supply chain as a whole. This course explores the major factors involved in the location, design and analysis of industrial facilities, including just-in-time systems, material handling systems, queuing, material flow analysis, line balancing and systematic layout planning. We also examine the managerial decision-making process in operations such as manufacturing, production scheduling, quality assurance and facility location, along with management of service systems using quantitative analysis and other methods.

Course Themes

  • Critical Thinking: Utilize linear programming to evaluate costs and production rates that impact facility design and operation.
  • Data-Driven Decision Making: Learn how to utilize data for capacity planning.
  • Presentation Skills: Participate in a group presentation that demonstrates good content and form, presentation delivery and ability to entertain questions.
  • Integration and Collaboration: Learn the framework of sales and operations planning (S&OP) and how it fosters integration and collaboration across the supply chain.

SCTL 505: External Supply Chain Transportation Risks

Instructor: Todd Smith

Credits: 5

This course focuses on how supply chain managers can identify and manage supply chain risk factors. These may include pandemics, severe weather, strikes, supplier bankruptcies, and other events that are generally categorized as supply disruptions; as well as many other events that may impact the supply chain, such as changes in technology, regulation or consumer preferences. We provide a general framework for looking at risk, how it can impact the organizations we work in, and how to both better prepare for and mitigate these risks. You'll also explore how these risk factors relate to other supply chain risks — such as product source location, quantity and price — and how strategies to manage these risks might be complementary.

Course Themes

  • Critical Thinking: Learn how to identify risks in the supply chain, assess the potential impact and analyze ways to mitigate the risks.
  • Data-Driven Decision Making: Learn basic decision analysis in order to make decisions in the presence of risk or uncertainty.
  • Presentation Skills: Deliver a presentation on a supply chain risk that you are familiar with.

SCTL 506: Finance & Performance Management in Logistics and Supply Chains

Instructor: Dan Stull

Credits: 5

Successful companies rely on supply chain executives to make informed financial decisions. This course helps you understand how even seemingly small changes in ongoing supply chain operations or cost structures can have a profound impact on the strategic financial management of modern enterprises. You’ll examine how large enterprises — with potentially billions in purchasing power — negotiate exceptionally complex supply contracts, move products around the globe, and utilize a multitude of delivery modes. In this course, you’ll learn to develop a framework for understanding the financial impact of their supply chain, transportation, and logistics decisions. You’ll also explore how to apply corporate finance theory, understand competencies that are critical for continuous improvement, and learn how performance management theory is put into practice in the day-to-day operation of real firms. We’ll also cover how to integrate financial sustainability metrics with a company's supply chain finance strategy.  You’ll gain skills and vocabulary you can use to communicate in financial terms about supply chain decisions and demonstrate value for your organization.

Course Themes

  • Critical Thinking: Identify non-value added core processes in an organization and develop solutions to efficiently produce value.
  • Data-Driven Decision Making: Develop metrics to analyze the performance of strategically important processes and establish improvement priorities.
  • Presentation Skills: Deliver a presentation about an improvement made to a strategically important core process, including the financial benefits of new ideas and improvements.
  • Integration and Collaboration: Use operational and financial data to collaboratively develop solutions to improve a strategically important core process.

SCTL 507: The Practicum 

Instructor: All Faculty

Credits: 5

The practicum project gives you the opportunity to apply the knowledge you’ve gained in the program to solve a contemporary supply chain problem, preferably one facing your current company or organization. In the practicum you will work in a team to conduct a preliminary analysis of potential project ideas and determine which one — based on complexity, the political landscape and other factors — is most likely solvable within the available timeframe. After reviewing this analysis with your supervising instructor, you will select one problem to be the focus your practicum. You will then create a detailed plan that defines the overall approach, key stakeholders, major tasks, required resources, potential risks and mitigation strategies, project timeline and metrics used to measure results. Students present their findings to the program's advisory board.

Course Themes

  • Critical Thinking: Identify, define and scope a real-world supply chain or logistics challenge and develop a realistic and cost-effective solution.
  • Data-Driven Decision Making: Collect actual performance data relevant to the change you are advocating and use it to validate your proposed solution.
  • Presentation Skills: Deliver a pitch to a panel comprised of members of the SCTL advisory board.
  • Integration and Collaboration: Work in teams to develop your project solution and present your findings.

SCTL 508: Collaboration Across the Supply Chain

InstructorBill Keough

Credits: 5

In an era of stiff global competition and an unprecedented drive to reduce supply chain costs, successful firms know that effective collaboration across the supply chain can provide a powerful competitive edge — if executed properly. Effective collaboration with suppliers upstream and distributors, retailers and customers downstream can boost sales, reduce product inventories, speed time to market and offer a host of other business benefits. However, reaping these benefits requires the artful and simultaneous orchestration of technology, performance and relationship management, along with the harmonization of business processes across organizations. This course examines these critical success factors and their inter-relationship, while also emphasizing the importance of corporate culture as an enabling factor in collaboration.

Course Themes

  • Critical Thinking: Play a complex game over the course of 8 weeks where you will optimize the supply chain for a manufacturer. You will analyze factors and develop strategies in order to achieve the highest return on investment (ROI).
  • Data-Driven Decision Making: Analyze quantitative performance data in the supply chain game.
  • Presentation Skills: Present in both individually and in teams, real-world career experiences that show how collaboration could have produced different business results.
  • Integration and Collaboration: The entire course will be exploring this subject.

SCTL 510: Freight Transport and Emerging Autonomous Systems

Instructor: Curt Heaslet 

Credits: 5

The transport of freight — everything from B2B industrial materials to B2C e-commerce to the home — plays a critical role in terms of cost and competitiveness for any enterprise that moves physical goods. The first part of this course addresses the key components of transportation in the context of strategic, business and operational management of complex supply chains. You'll learn techniques to develop strategies and plans over multiple time horizons, execute freight movement and analyze a wealth of information to continuously improve enterprise freight performance in the global business environment. Where appropriate, we'll examine the role of generative AI in data gathering, processing and analysis. The second part of the course examines the role of emerging autonomous systems (primarily vehicles and warehouse operations) in supply chain operations.

Course Themes

  • Critical Thinking: Evaluate macroeconomic factors and assess potential impacts on a corporate freight transportation business.
  • Data-Driven Decision Making: Design data-based key performance indicators (KPIs) and model and analyze scenarios for a freight transport scenario.
  • Presentation Skills: Deliver two presentations during this course, one which will be to an outside logistics professional.
  • Integration and Collaboration: Model and analyze the costs and risks of collaborative shipping with other enterprises.

SCTL 511: Foundations of Data Analytics

Instructor: Nikhil Suresh

Credits: 2

Aspiring senior supply chain & logistics professionals need to know how to collect, manipulate and analyze large data sets to make informed decisions. This course provides a foundation for data-driven decisions. You'll learn data modelling; how to identify, collect, manipulate and correlate data sets; descriptive and diagnostic analysis; and a number of other topics. You'll become familiar with using large data sets to solve specific business problems and will use Tableau to perform data visualization.


CET 568: Transport Economics

Instructor: Jenny Liu

Credits: 5 (Joint offering with Online Master of Sustainable Transportation; course approval pending)

Transportation economics is essential for understanding the effects of policies and projects on transportation outcomes and the way we prioritize, plan, operate and fund transportation facilities. This course presents an overview of principles of economics (including utility theory, supply and demand, pricing, public goods, and market failures) as a foundation for understanding public investment in and regulation of transportation systems. The course will also highlight transportation finance, cost benefit analysis, the effects of transportation systems on the economy, and the efficiency and equity of transportation pricing and investments.