The Scarcity and Competence Gaps of Teaching Logistics in Top European Business Schools

As logistics is an interdisciplinary field, the landscape of higher education in logistics is rather diverse. The goal of this study is to evaluate the presence, scope and content profile of logistics and supply chain topics in undergraduate programme catalogues of all European business schools with EQUIS accreditation and compare their offering with the expectations to the skillset of modern logistics manager as expressed in ELAQF competence model by European Logistics Association (ELA). The study covers 102 schools and provided a catalogue of 414 undergraduate programs, however with only 20 logistics-themed programs among them. In terms of most foundational competencies, these programs mostly demonstrate a strong fit with ELAQF – they are sufficiently broad. However, in various focal areas of logistics, even on assumed introductory levels suitable for undergraduates, there are major shortcomings, especially in terms of sustainability and resilience, but also on various traditional functional topics. These findings indicate a major gap as a systematic and growing problem, as arguably the relevance of supply chain specialists in the current business environment is higher than ever. This future workforce gap, we argue, cannot optimally be filled by students from vocational or engineering-based logistics programs.