Back at the dawn of the 21st Century, when I was the chief editor of a Penton Media publication called Supply Chain Technology News, my boss at the time – the legendary Bob Rosenbaum – came up with the idea of an annual feature that would profile the most influential practitioners of supply chain management. We all agreed this was a great idea, since nobody else had ever done anything like this before, so my staff and I put together a lengthy process to vet the top supply chain people.
Somehow we decided to create a “Top 25.” I don’t remember how we arrived at that number, other than we thought 10 sounded like too small a number and 50 sounded like too many, so 25 became our target. We also decided early on that we would focus only on senior executives at manufacturing and retail companies, since these were the types of people who were receiving the magazine, so we eliminated from consideration consultants, academics and analysts on the grounds that we wanted to limit the honor to just those who actually managed supply chain activity at their companies.
As you would imagine, this annual feature became very popular with our readers, and of course it was particularly popular with those who were named to the list. The “Top 25” profiles ran from 2001-2003, and would no doubt have continued on had not the plug been pulled on SCTN due to the bottoming-out effect of the dot-com collapse that saw many of our advertisers being acquired by other companies or in some cases go out of business completely.
For reasons too convoluted to go into here, SCTN’s archives are no longer available on the Internet, but I’m not going to let a little thing like that stop me from revisiting the last installment of the Top 25. It being a full decade since the last time we put together a Top 25 (the idea eventually morphed into the “10 Best Supply Chains” profiles we did for Logistics Today), I thought I’d do a “where are they now?” update of the 2003 class of the “25 Most Influential People in the Supply Chain.” Following in alphabetical order are each of the 25 honorees (actually, there are 26, since we honored the co-CIOs at Intel at the time), along with what they did ten years ago and what they are doing now.
As you’ll see, some have remained with their companies over that time span, some have moved on to similar supply chain roles with other companies, some are profiled in my book, Supply Chain Management Best Practices, some have formed their own companies, some have retired, and in the case of Avnet’s Jim Smith, some have passed away. In any event, all were significant contributors to the supply chain field in 2003, and many remain just as influential to this very day.
Karen Austin
2003: senior VP/CIO, Kmart Corp.
2013: senior VP and CIO, PG&E
Brad Boston
2003: senior VP and CIO, Cisco Systems Inc.
2013: retired
Wayne Bourne
2003: VP, logistics-transportation, Best Buy Co. Inc.
2013: Bourne Management Group Inc.
Bob Boyd
2003: VP of procurement and supply chain management, Weyerhaeuser Co.
2013: retired
Bruce Burnham
2003: VP, North American supply chain management, Burger King Corp.
2013: managing member, Burnham & Tillinghast LLC
Doug Busch
2003: co-CIO, Intel Corp.
2013: senior VP and COO, Intel-GE Care Innovations
Mel Campbell
2003: executive VP of customer support services, Johnson & Johnson
2013: VP, worldwide operations, external supply, Johnson & Johnson
John Campi
2003: VP of global sourcing and chief procurement officer, DuPont
2013: managing partner, Genesis Management Group
Steve David
2003: CIO, Procter & Gamble Co.
2013: Boston Consulting Group
Linda Dillman
2003: CIO, Wal-Mart Stores Inc.
2013: CIO, QVC
Nicholas Donofrio
2003: senior VP, technology & marketing, IBM Corp.
2013: retired
Kirk Gutmann
2003: product development information officer, General Motors Corp.
2013: VP of automotive strategy, Siemens PLM
Dick Hunter
2003: VP, Americas Manufacturing Operation, Dell Computer Corp.
2013: partner, Daylight Partners
Patrick Hurley
2003: VP integrated supply chain, North American tire operations, Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.
2013: VP manufacturing & chemical operations, Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.
Larry Kittelberger
2003: senior VP of administration and CIO, Honeywell International Inc.
2013: retired
Theresa Metty
2003: senior VP and chief procurement officer, Motorola Inc.
2013: CEO, Metty Advisory Group
Sandra Morris
2003: VP/co-CIO, Intel Corp.
2013: CEO, CafeGive
David Podeschi
2003: senior VP of merchandising and logistics, 7-Eleven Inc.
2013: principal, D&SP LLC
Helmut Porkert
2003: chief procurement office, ChevronTexaco
2013: consultant, Strategic Procurement Solutions Inc.
Gary Reiner
2003: senior VP and CIO, General Electric Co.
2013: operating partner, General Atlantic LLC
Alexandre Royez
2003: VP and executive director, supply chain, Dow Corning
2013: retired
Thomas Sidlik
2003: executive VP, procurement and supply, Chrysler Group, Daimler Chrysler
2013: director, Delphi Corp.
Paul Singer
2003: senior VP, technology services/CIO, Target Corp.
2013: CIO, Supervalu
Cheryl Smith
2003: CIO, McKesson Corp.
2013: principal, Smith & Associates
Jim Smith
2003: senior VP and director of operations, Avnet Electronics Marketing, Americas
2013: passed away on January 10, 2012
Veasey Wilson
2003: executive director of supply chain management, Northrop Grumman Newport News
2013: VP of business operations, Northrop Grumman Corp.
