Chris Barnes (00:06):
Hey, it’s Chris. The supply chain doctor and host of supply chain is boring. Over the years. I’ve interviewed some of the brightest minds and successful leaders in the world of supply chain management. In May, 2020. I sat down with Ken Ackerman to learn more about him, collect a little supply chain management history. After our discussion. Ken told me about a similar interview he had with Dr. James stock many years prior, and the related work Dr. Stock was doing in November, 2020. I was able to catch up with Dr. James stock to learn about his work as an academic in the field of transportation logistics. And now what we call supply chain manage ment Jim was well connected to many of the original academic thought leaders in the space. Jim did interviews with many of these original thought leaders and shared them with me. The list includes Ken Ackerman, Don Bauer, SOS James Hasket, bud littleand John Langley, Jr. Tom Menser, Tom SP and Daniel Ren To carry on the great work started by Dr. Jim stock. I’m dusting off these interviews and bringing them to you on supply chain is boring.
Dr. Jim Stock (01:13):
And what do you think you learned most from having that military background, uh, that perhaps you carry on even into this day in terms of how you approach your profession in life in general?
Donald Bowersoz (01:27):
Well, one thing is I learned how to compete in a class in which, uh, they literally, I think the phrase, look, the person on your left and your right, because they’re probably not gonna be there before you finish mm-hmm <affirmative>, uh, I think that might have a re originated with pilot training, cuz it was true. So surviving through that kind of rigorous training where you were expected to perform a hundred percent all the time, the expectations were extremely high mm-hmm <affirmative> was very competitive, uh, very maturing, uh, probably, uh, a tremendous school in how to develop leadership skills. So I think the whole military discipline, the no, uh, no excuse environment it’s either perform or don’t, but if you don’t, the consequences were significant that, uh, I think was a very useful period of my life.
Dr. Jim Stock (02:27):
So you mentioned earlier that your ultimate decision to go on the academic arena had somebody with both college, as well as military. How did the military then fit into that?
Donald Bowersoz (02:40):
Okay. The, the decision to be assigned to the ran Corps corporation. Uh, we had a, uh, technical advisor on our base from the ran corporation because they ran, uh, all of the air defense training and they ran simulators. It allowed us to have, uh, simulated attacks on the United States and, and we would use the simulators to, uh, to respond. It was my first experience with anything that dealt with computer generated activity. And this was very early on. Um, when the opportunity came to go to the ran corporation, I was assigned to, uh, be an air force liaison to that group in terms of their global training missions. And I worked with, uh, a psychologist to Dr. Jim Wickers, who all he talked to me about was going to graduate school. And, uh, I didn’t really want to be a lawyer. I should look into the academic world, but I, it ran right off my back mm-hmm <affirmative>, but we had some rather rigorous, uh, um, simulation exercises that were much more than casual events.
Donald Bowersoz (04:00):
And I learned rather extensively, uh, systems, network theory, working at the ran corporation, which was an emerging science at that time. Uh, probably applied more electrical engineering than any other field, but something which in the social sciences, uh, was pretty far out. I mean, there wasn’t much written on it. And, uh, we ran a lot of, lot of what appeared to be kinda like crazy experiments, but it was all part of building a database. And, uh, it was just a, a, it was one of those kind of things where you just waited to go to work in the morning. It was that exciting and living in Santa Monica is not exciting, but the work was very exciting. It was a great six months.
Dr. Jim Stock (04:48):
Okay. So after your military experience, uh, and then the ran experience while you were in there mm-hmm <affirmative> uh, was that then what motivated you on for the master’s
Donald Bowersoz (04:57):
Degree? Well, here’s what happened in a nutshell, um, I getting a master’s degree in business was suddenly becoming something of, of a very popular destination for people getting out of the military. Mm-hmm <affirmative>, the MBA was just emerging and, uh, one of my good friends was going to Stanford and I applied and was admitted Hamford and was all set to go to Stanford. When my wife informed me that she was, and, and I were both ready to have a second child. And at that point I decided, uh, I would take her home after close to three and a half years of moving around with one baby already from house trail, her to apartment, to whatever it was to, to a little motel room in Santa Monica that we would, uh, go back home. So she could have the support of parents, uh, during that time.
Donald Bowersoz (05:54):
And so I applied to Michigan state late. I learned we were gonna get an early out if we were admitted to a, to a college. So I applied to Michigan state found out they didn’t have an MBA, but they had a thing called a master’s in business and they were gonna start an MBA. So, uh, I went back to Michigan state were personal reasons, family reasons, more than anything else mm-hmm <affirmative>, otherwise I’d have been off to Stanford and life might have taken quite a different turn, but, uh, there I was back at Michigan state.
Dr. Jim Stock (06:29):
So during that, uh, time in Michigan state and the master’s program, um, did anything occur, which said, you know, Don Bowers actually go on for a PhD?
Donald Bowersoz (06:41):
Well, it occurred in the following way. Yes. Some things did occur. I was on my way to law school. I had applied for admission to the university of Michigan’s law school during my master’s program. Uh, academics seemed relatively simple. I ended up getting the award for the highest scholarship in my program, which, which, uh, something I felt very good about at the time. And, uh, as I was going through the program, uh, one of my former high school teammates, uh, and classmates, uh, a guy, my name Larry hour, who was a attorney later, became an attorney, was going to graduate school at, at, uh, getting his master’s degree before he went to law school. And he took me up to introduce me to a professor he’d met in business, who, uh, was trying to, it was working on some ideas that he thought I would be able to contribute to.
Donald Bowersoz (07:45):
And I wanted to get a graduate assistantship. So I went up and met two professors, Edward, Mikey, and Frank Mossman. And these two professors were doing some work in, they called at that time extended transportation. And they were trying to figure out how to look at the impact of transportation beyond purely the freight rates. And, uh, I had talked to Larry, well, we’d gotten together evenings and spent time, and I’d told them all about this systems network theory that I’d been working on the air force. And he thought I could match up with them and maybe contribute something. And, and I, but I also became deeply involved with Tom stout. Okay. And Don Taylor, in fact, Don Taylor ultimately became my, my, uh, professor, my senior professor. And I would say the number one person that guided me through my career, but my field fundamental major was in marketing.
Donald Bowersoz (08:51):
And, uh, I was kind of doing this work in distribution and we didn’t have a field. We started the first course and I attended and took it as sort of a student assistant. It was, um, uh, physical distribution, 4 45, which I think still stands as the, probably the first formal course, uh, Mosman and taught it. And, uh, Mikey and I kind of more or less, even though Mikey was a professor, we were the graduate assistants. And, uh, we put together this class and that preceded the book a couple of years, but so I was doing that work, but my real major was marketing. And I, then I got excited at about a PhD. I was working in the inner circles of a university. And at that point I decided to, uh, make application to some schools and I applied to Columbia and to Indiana. And, uh, I got accepted and Indiana offered me the best financial package.
Donald Bowersoz (09:58):
And, um, so at that point I, uh, was on my way to Indiana and Michigan state got a new grant where they could award a, a funded position for one of the, I guess, the first funded P HS that they had, that wasn’t just purely teaching mm-hmm <affirmative>. It was teaching and research. It was funded by a guy by the name of George Ramlow, an early warehouse design person. And George was very interested in extending the thoughts about warehousing beyond just purely the four walls. And, uh, so I had the transportation guys on one side warehousing guy on the other side, and some money offered. Uh, so while I was supposed to go to Indiana in the fall, the night before we began to pack, by the way, my wife was pregnant again for our third child, mm-hmm <affirmative>, uh, Tom stout came to our student apartment, all excited.
Donald Bowersoz (11:01):
He, if you knew Tom stout, you knew that he could get totally motivated and was contagious in that sense that he had the financial assistant. Now he had sponsored me to Indiana where he had gone to school mm-hmm <affirmative> so he was kind of said, you’ve got his stay here, get your PhD. Well, I’ve got him on one side and I’ve got a pregnant wife on the other side, and Indiana lasted about 30 seconds. And, uh, I stayed on a Michigan state for the third degree. Again, I’m very unplanned along the way I had decided law school was, I was a NoShow so law school was, was gone for them.
Dr. Jim Stock (11:44):
Okay. Now, as we look at your career, uh, tell us how you went about securing your first job in the academic sector. We know it occurred after having been in business. Uh, so how did that first position as an associate professor develop, how did you go about securing your first academic position?
Donald Bowersoz (12:03):
Well, um, my first,
Donald Bowersoz (12:07):
What progressed was a book that I think, uh, we’ll talk about at some point, but it was, uh, a book and physical distribution that was written during the same time I was doing my doctoral dissertation. Um, in the fall of 1960, I went to work for the railway express agency in New York. And, uh, the book had been after at that point, it was under review. It was a very, very difficult to get that book published by the way. And, and, uh, so it took a long time between the time we had the manuscript ready to go. And when somebody would actually publish a book in this obscure field that no one knew what it was mm-hmm <affirmative>. Um, so I, I went to New York and started working in the fall while I was finishing my dissertation. And I graduated in, in December. So I was not in academia.
Donald Bowersoz (13:06):
I was in business mm-hmm <affirmative> and I stayed in business then for stayed at REA until he then president bill Johnson, who had hired, uh, this team to come in and reinvent the railway express agency decided it couldn’t be done. And the team was disbanding and, uh, going to different jobs. And, and, uh, the same time style called me up and said, wouldn’t you like to teach now? I, lot of people don’t know that I went back to Michigan state in the 10 year track in the spring of, I believe it was 62 and taught for one term. And then, uh, I had an offer to go with EF McDonald company and, uh, Tom, again, his opinion was, well, we don’t have any graduates that are vice presidents of major corporations. So you ought to go do that. You can always come back here. So I left Michigan state and went with EF McDonald company.
Dr. Jim Stock (14:09):
Okay. So
Donald Bowersoz (14:11):
That was a pretty fast transition. And we moved back to east Lansing and then to date in Ohio, we, it then, uh, the six month period, mm-hmm,
Dr. Jim Stock (14:19):
<affirmative> now in terms of, um, we mentioned earlier in your introduction, 40 years at Michigan state, um, we’ll talk specifically about some of those years in, in a few moments, but when you look back on that 40 year, uh, time horizon, what do you consider to be, be the most significant accomplishment, uh, as a professional academic?
Donald Bowersoz (14:42):
Oh, wow. Uh, the, the 40 years seem to go fairly quick. It’s, uh, just amazing how fast, uh, in retrospect, they, those years do go upon arriving at Michigan state. Full-time after I’d been in business for close to five years. And then that started the 40 year, uh, uh, of continuous service. Um, I wasn’t planning on really staying. Um, another event had happened in my family. My wife had gotten ill mm-hmm <affirmative> and it was, uh, uh, the decision to go to Michigan state was after deciding not to go to Ohio state, I’d been offered, uh, the chair that Jim Hesket had had at state when he went to Harvard and, uh, uh, it, a full rank chair at Ohio state. His initial, uh, academic appointment was, uh, with the chair was a pretty exciting event of my life. And it was only right there almost the last minute that I, I turned it down when Michigan state made me an offer of an associate professorship without a chair.
Donald Bowersoz (16:00):
And I didn’t do it cuz I wanted to, I did it because my wife, uh, had Ms and was not in, in good shape. And it was the only right thing to do to put her back again in the family context. Mm-hmm <affirmative> so we went to east Lansing on because of that. Now that starts you in a, in a position where you figure that, uh, soon as things get a little better here, I’m going to get on somewhere else. Cuz I had felt I’d been there an awfully long time already. Mm-hmm <affirmative> uh, I was promised a promotion within a year and, and actually the first year came up and bud aand was there at that time. And I remember Tom stout saying, well, bud, Bud’s in line be promoted and I can’t get two through in one year. Uh, but trust me, you’ll go up next year.
Donald Bowersoz (16:54):
And I did and it all happened, right, bud got promoted and then I got promoted. Then bud left went to Ohio state, took that chair. So that’s worked out great for bud and I stayed in Michigan state. What do I accomplish over those 40 years made a lot of students miserable. I, uh, uh, board a lot of people with my stories and uh, continued to work on that one book and develop it. And it’s now moved through a couple of different title configurations and it’s still, uh, on the market. I’m proud to say that there’s only some part of two or three chapters that are still the same as the first book mm-hmm <affirmative>, but there are still a few paragraphs in there that have stood the test of time. And I think that was my main accomplishment building. The, the supply chain program is one of the faculty with a committed administration and continuing to write and do research in the field.
Dr. Jim Stock (17:55):
Okay. And uh, when you look back, we talked about this very early as a youngster. You said you were a stubborn person. You think that was instrumental in, uh, uh, having you get as many things done and accomplished as you did.
Donald Bowersoz (18:11):
Well, I, I think it probably did because, uh, uh, between the combination of the military, uh, and then, uh, the academic discipline this necessary, uh, I think that that allowed that, that early persistence as opposed to stubbornness, but being focused on doing things and getting ’em done matured. And I do believe that trade has carried through mm-hmm <affirmative> I can’t remember starting projects and not finishing them. Mm-hmm <affirmative>, they’re not all outstanding, but at least they’re finished.
Dr. Jim Stock (18:47):
Do you have any regrets regarding your career path and what you were able to achieve in those 40 years that you spent at Michigan state?
Donald Bowersoz (18:56):
Well, I regretted not going to law school and I had a sabbatical, uh, that, uh, was coming due. And so I decided I would use my sabbatical and, uh, reapply to law school. And that was, uh, by that time I was a full professor and I remember, uh, I went out to lunch with, uh, an attorney in Lansing was also had been my CPA and I told him what I wanted to do. And, uh, and he said, uh, he looked at me and he said, he said, I’ve always thought you were nuts, but now I know you’re nuts. He said, you know, you, you’re my role model. If I could do what you’re doing, I quit being an attorney. So I didn’t go to law school. And, uh, yeah, I think there were some other aspects of research that maybe could have pushed the field faster if we’d gotten more done. I think that no matter what you’re able to, if you make a realistic evaluation of what you could have accomplished, there’s always a gap.
Dr. Jim Stock (19:57):
And do you think you achieved most of what you wanted to accomplish? If not, what else would you like to have done?
Donald Bowersoz (20:04):
I, uh, I think yes, although I found myself, uh, just in the last year, since retirement writing another different kind of book and, uh, my wife is convinced that I, I, I never will stop and I guess that’s kind of in our blood, if you’ve, I read a tremendous amount and, uh, have seem to have a lot of ideas, uh, but not quite the same amount of ambition. And I’m, I’m kind of working my way into retirement right now. Cause,
Dr. Jim Stock (20:38):
And in those early years, were there any individuals that served as a mentor or mentors for you and you know, how did they influence you in those early days?
Donald Bowersoz (20:50):
Yes. Um, the very, uh, the very beginning of my career, uh, when I had my first assistantship during my master’s program, I worked with, uh, under a gentleman by the name of art Warner and art, uh, was a, uh, very interesting real estate. And he taught me a lot about location analysis. Mm-hmm <affirmative>, he was an economic grapher and I w and he was very influential. And then Tom stout and I always have to, uh, uh, take stout and Taylor in combination because they were, uh, the one, two punch. And I can’t really say who was one and who was two, they were both influential, um, Tom in the motivational sense and Don in a research sense. And, uh, one of the great honors of my career was, uh, being brought in as an author on the stout Taylor marketing, managerial marketing book, which, uh, I believe to this day was kind of a, a pace setting book. It, uh, it truly dealt with managerial marketing and, uh, I helped through one, one revision and both of them were finished for one reason or another and writing textbooks and, and we allowed it to die.
Dr. Jim Stock (22:15):
To what extent have you, uh, conducted your professional life with a personal code or mission statement, uh, or belief system, and how has that influenced how you’ve, uh, conducted your professional life?
Donald Bowersoz (22:28):
Well, I, um, I sincerely believe that, uh, a number of us and I include you. I have, uh, have felt for a long time that there’s a missing discipline in business. And that supply chain management is, uh, represents the integration of most of the operating area as a business in a cross-functional and cross organizational manner in the development of that discipline, which is being carried on by many disciples of, of the original people Grover plow. And then, uh, and I would put Jim Hesket in that cat growing, but LA land, I mean, uh, and others, I could go on naming. Uh, they, uh, they started something and the development of it has continued to the point where today the, I think there’s a growing recognition that we do have a discipline. It does have framework, it does have principles, it is capable of prediction. It can be used for advancing research.
Dr. Jim Stock (23:38):
An interesting question. Uh, what, would’ve been your ideal job, if you could have had any job in those 40 years, what would it been?
Donald Bowersoz (23:47):
Well, I had a couple of chances as the years went on to leave and go into industry and into consulting. Um, I had an offer to become the director of global logistics for GM, and, uh, each time I went down that road and, and, uh, particularly the consulting partnership a little later on, um, I, uh, I decided in favor of staying with the academic profession. So, um, I guess I have generally got the feeling that that’s where I was destined to be. I’m surprised I was at Michigan state all those years. Uh, it wasn’t by design. Uh, you do build a lot of loyalty and, you know, we worked together for a while. I was very comfortable there, uh, but I considered leaving for other academic jobs a few times almost went back to Indian, Anna to Columbia, talked to Harvard at one time. And each time I would finally decide, uh, I guess the final one came at Tennessee. These were during the years when I didn’t have a chair and other people were offering chairs. Uh, but by that time I had children and family and a place in Northern Michigan, I on lake and the life, the things in life that were important were much different. And then Michigan state developed the chair and that sealed the deal, I guess mm-hmm, <affirmative> from that point on. Okay,
Dr. Jim Stock (25:18):
Well, let’s, uh, turn back. We’ve talked about, uh, your early family. That is your parents. Yeah. Um, talk about, um, uh, your family now and, and, uh, growing up. Do you have children? And if so, how many and, uh, how
Donald Bowersoz (25:33):
Long, how long is this tape? We
Dr. Jim Stock (25:35):
Got, we have time.
Donald Bowersoz (25:36):
We have time. Okay. <laugh> well, in, in my, uh, my life, I lost my first wife, uh, few years after we moved back east Lansing <affirmative> and, uh, we had three children, two girls and a boy. Okay. Uh, a few years later I got remarried. Unfortunately, that marriage didn’t work out well with one major overriding exceptions. I had two wonderful sons who, uh, are still with me. So that adds up to five. And a few years ago, I got Remar to a wonderful lady who had four children. So now we have nine and, uh, it might be easier to tell you what they’re not doing than to tell you what they are doing. Uh, I have two sons, two oldest are in the supply chain field. I have a daughter who’s a marketing, uh, consultant. So that’s the first three I have, uh, uh, or excuse me.
Donald Bowersoz (26:39):
I, I got that mixed up again. I gotta back up a little bit. First family, two daughters. One’s a high school teacher and, uh, chairman of a department at, uh, Michigan high school. Uh, my oldest son is, uh, in logistics and my youngest daughters, a marketing consultant. Then my next two sons, uh, one of those is with the Kohler corporation in logistics. The other one, hold your hat is attending school at Ohio state university. And then I, uh, uh, have my four stepchildren. Uh, one of, uh, of whom is with Disney on ice is a stage producer. Another only been a skater with Disney for 10 years. Uh, one of them is in culinary school and the other one’s going the university of south Florida. So we have quite a plan.
Dr. Jim Stock (27:36):
And as a parent to a number of children, what was your main goal as a parent, uh, were raising those children,
Donald Bowersoz (27:45):
Uh, much like my fathers, uh, with a little less insistence on graduate education, but to get, uh, uh, fully prepared for life. And, uh, everybody in our family is one way or another, either going to school part-time or full-time, or has degrees.
Dr. Jim Stock (28:06):
Now we’ve mentioned and discussed your parents, uh, several times already. In what ways do you think your parents influenced you the most?
Donald Bowersoz (28:13):
Um, I think the very most was, was encouraging that, that drive to be persistent to you accomplish something and also building confidence that, that, so often I see lacking in young people that I’ve worked with, and that’s a, yes, you can do it otherwise you can make that speech, or you can be in that club, or you can be, uh, anything you wanna be because in the environment that we’ve been raised in, in this country, uh, saying you can, is only an alibi for not putting out the effort to do it.
Dr. Jim Stock (28:52):
And you mentioned briefly some brothers and sisters in your family. Uh, how many are they? Are they older or younger? Are they in what professions are they in today?
Donald Bowersoz (29:03):
Well, my oldest brother’s deceased. He was a physician, you know, my son, the doctor, the first one that went to, to a college in the history of our, our particular family went all the way through. In fact, he became a, uh, a gynecologist and he was a specialist. He died, uh, a couple of years ago. Mm-hmm <affirmative> uh, then I was, then I have an older sister. Uh, she married a world war II, veteran, an amputee, and, uh, uh, she did not go on to school, but she did go to the college of life. She had 13 children and has quite a, quite a clan. Uh, then, uh, I have a younger brother who, uh, uh, went on to school, but not to graduate school. And who is now a trustee of lake Sumter junior college.
Dr. Jim Stock (29:59):
And you had mentioned, um, uh, while in the military, having a young wife and a, a baby, and then another one on the way, which influenced you to move back to Lansing. How did you and your first spouse meet?
Donald Bowersoz (30:12):
We met, uh, during my senior year of school. She’d been from the same high school I’d gone to. And, uh, we’d been in high school, one in the year together. She was a freshman at, uh, Michigan state. And, um, I met her quite by accident at a, at a party during Christmas holiday. And she knew all about me and I never had remembered having seen her from that time on, I, I saw a lot of her <laugh>.
Dr. Jim Stock (30:45):
Was she supportive of your, uh, uh, move into career?
Donald Bowersoz (30:50):
Absolutely. This, she was, uh, very supportive and all those years in the military and moving around and, and the sad thing was she was quite young when we began to realized that she was ill and I’ll never forget the day we went to actually to Ohio state university medical school, where she got diagnosed.
Dr. Jim Stock (31:13):
Now, Don changing course for just a moment, looking at, uh, the history aspect, uh, other than the present time, what period or era would you like to have lived in
Chris Barnes (31:27):
Supply chain is boring as part of the supply chain. Now network the voice of supply chain, interested in sponsoring this show or others to help you get your message out. Send a note to chris@supplychainnow.com. We can also help with world class supply chain, education and certification workshops for you or your team. Thanks for listening. And remember, supply chain is boring.
