Manufacturing strategy: The story of its evolution

Abstract

Abstract This essay has two stories to tell: first, as promised, the evolution of what is known as “manufacturing strategy” and, also, the parallel story of the value of combining teaching and research through the Harvard Business School's focus on teaching by the case method. This second tale may be of particular interest in view of recent critiques of business schools and their research practices [Bennis, W.G., O’Toole, J., 2005. How business schools lost their way. Harvard Business Review 83 (5), 96–104].