The pandemic highlighted the importance of Supply Chain (SC) resiliency to allow an organisation to adapt to changeable forces whilst maintaining customer service. Large organisations with SC risk strategy currently in place could not fully face the impact of the pandemic. Many SCs not so flexible and resilient were not capable of surviving.
Which are the feature of a resilient SC?
· A resilient SC is the outcome of well-measured strategies that might require interchanges paralleled to other approaches.
· Your resilient plan should encompass people, processes, and technology.
· It can prepare SC staffs to cope with economic upheavals, unexpected customer’s demands, severe weather events, a pandemic, trade disputes, or tariffs, or any possible contingency.
· It incorporates alternative sources, carriers, routes to make companies more flexible when responding to emergencies.
· Even in the most disrupting times, a resilient SC could lean down and stretch out but never come apart.
Consider these elements when developing a resilient SC
Develop organisational resiliency to reinforce your SC strategy – Your organisation must improve its capabilities to find out, counterattack and get back from disruption, whatever the cause. Develop a system with the people, processes and technology that grant real-time visibility and analytical aid to data-driven decision-making.
There will be adjustments between efficiency and cost; every organisation must settle on its terms on how to work out those matters and in advance of their competitors.
Restructure your network – Companies’ SC networks scale rapidly, making it difficult to redesign them. A complete evaluation can identify inactivity and opportunities to reduce costs and better service through operational developments, cut truckloads, and save millions of dollars each year. A well-tuned-resilient SC better equipped to deal with disruptions.
Cooperate with suppliers and customers – While some organisations are looking at supplier’s variety, there are no options for off-shore suppliers for some others. Cloud-based partnership tools link suppliers and service suppliers for more rapidly efficient-shared processes, despite the time zone where the work occurs. Organisations that take away resistance in their skill to work together will better organise to bring about alternative SC options.
Shift away from Lean and Just in Time (JIT) inventories – The virus disruption brings to light the tension on features like lean JIT and zero stocks of vital components, pressing companies to halt or drastically go downhill. To boost resiliency, consider extending the supplier’s base, combining local or near-shore sources; evaluate the material, products inventory or goods indispensable to guarantee a sufficient amount of goods at hand to cover transitory disruptions. Although this approach demands more significant stock investment, conveying higher costs makes it possible to sustain production.
Build up relationships with your Third-Party Logistics (3PL) – Refocus your relationships from transactional to strategical for alternative solutions in which all participants have a long-term reciprocal interest. When disruptions occur, your strategic associates participate in your achievement and discover capabilities and alternative solutions accessible for all partakers.
Make use of Transport Management Systems (TMS) – During a crisis, relying on data that might lag several days could make the company responding too late. Look for a managed transportation service or a TMS provider with the potential technology to deliver real-time data to force the best decision-making.
Consider possible higher pricing substantially; 3PLs could adjust to fast altering market circumstances during the pandemic.
Sign up SC specialists to identify your weaknesses – Employ an external expert to evaluate possible SC risks and re-model approaches to adapt; a supplier who develops a line of attack for several shippers can adjust valuable plans customised resilience ground plan.
Conclusion: Building SC resiliency begins with an assurance that the current situation is not suitable enough. Collaboration, communication, and technology are crucial factors that reinforce the strategy to get ready for the worst. The attempt will pay back in SCs that operate outstandingly both in the best of times and in the coming crisis.
Are you ready to build up a Resilient SC?
Dave Food
Prophetic Technology
M: +44 7775 861863
Photo by David von Diemar on Unsplash