Researchers’ Perspectives on Supply Chain Risk Management ManMohan S. Sodhi and Byung-Gak Son Cass Business School, City University London, London EC1Y 8TZ, UK, M.Sodhi@city.ac.uk, B.G.Son@city.ac.uk Christopher S. Tang Anderson School of Management, University of California, Los Angeles, California 90095-1481, USA, ctang@anderson.ucla.edu S upply chain risk management (SCRM) is a nascent area emerging from a growing appreciation for supply chain risk by practitioners and by researchers. However, there is diverse perception of research in supply chain risk because these researchers have approached this area from different domains. This paper presents our study of this diversity from the perspectives of operations and supply chain management scholars: First, we reviewed the researchers’ output, i.e., the recent research literature. Next, we surveyed two focus groups (members of Supply Chain Thought Leaders and International SCRM groups) with open-ended questions. Finally, we surveyed operations and supply chain management researchers during the 2009 INFORMS meeting in San Diego. Our findings characterize the diversity in terms of three ‘‘gaps’’: a definition gap in how researchers define SCRM, a process gap in terms of inadequate coverage of response to risk incidents, and a methodology gap in terms of inadequate use of empirical methods. We also list ways to close these gaps as suggested by the researchers. Key words: supply chain risk management; researcher survey; literature review; research agenda History: Received: December 2009; Accepted: January 2011 by Ananth Raman, after 2 revisions. 1. Introduction Company executives are reporting increased concerns about the rise of supply chain risks. This makes sup- ply chain risk management (SCRM) attractive as a research area to academics who wish to have impact on business. On the other hand, the area is still emerging and has rather unclear boundaries at this stage, leading to questions about diversity among re- searchers in terms of the scope of SCRM, possibly in relation to their perception of industry needs. More- over, with researchers having different domain expertise, questions naturally arise about the diver- sity of research tools and their appropriateness, again, in relation to the perceived industry need. This paper uses a field research study to characterize this diver- sity of scope and research tools in the researchers’ perception of SCRM. We believe these findings pro- vide a basis for collaboration among the researchers themselves and with industry. Although we initially took the traditional approach of literature review, i.e., examining the research out- put, the fact that SCRM is still at a nascent stage made it more appealing to conduct a field research study of researchers in this area. As articulated by Eisenhardt (1989) and Yin (2003), field research is a well-estab- lished research method in the management literature especially for new research areas that require explo- ration. In the operations management literature, Meredith (1998), Seuring (2005), and Voss et al. (2002) have argued that field research study is an appropriate approach for conduct exploratory inves- tigations of new operations management topics that are not well defined or understood—certainly SCRM fits that description. Jehn et al. (1999) have used a multi-method field study method to explore diversity in workgroups—in our case we wish to explore di- versity among researchers, so we too decided to use a multi-method field study. Adapting the methodology presented by Burgess (1984) and Voss et al. (2002), we first carried out direct observations to make our perceptions more concrete, then gathered some evidence through surveys of focus groups, and finally sought confirmation and addi- tional information through a survey. Thus, we employ the three methods—‘‘participant observation, infor- mant interviewing, and enumeration (sampling)’’— advocated by Zelditch (1962) for field research. Specifically, first, we obtained direct observations of diversity in the output of SCRM researchers by re- viewing some recent research literature so as to formulate our own perception of diversity in scope and research tools. Second, we conducted open-ended surveys of two focus groups of supply chain research- ers—supply chain management researchers at the 2008 Supply Chain Thought Leaders (SCTL) Conference in PRODUCTION AND OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT POMS 1 Vol. 21, No. 1, January–February 2012, pp. 1–13 DOI 10.1111/j.1937-5956.2011.01251.x ISSN 1059-1478|EISSN 1937-5956|12|2101|0001 © 2011 Production and Operations Management Society