Some Supply Chain Managers May Be “Flying Blind” When Going Global

While many large companies are aggressively pursuing globalization of their products and brands, the large majority are flying blind, without the ability to truly see what is happening globally or make adjustments, according to new research from The Hackett Group, Inc.

Hackett’s new “Global Operating Model” Book of Numbers research, which looks at the performance of more than 100 companies, found a strong acceleration of the trend towards globalization of business, with most companies moving toward high levels of globalization for their products and services lines and expanding the globalization of delivery of business services over the next few years.

In large part these trends are being driven by historically high growth rates in China and other emerging markets combined with stagnation in developed markets. But despite high levels of automation, most companies cannot quickly access much of the information required to truly understand their global performance.

In a recent study, Hackett found that less than half have near real-time visibility into customer information and business volumes, and even fewer have the same level of visibility into supplier spend, working capital, financial performance and forecasts, and risk.

The Hackett Group’s research details the need for companies to align the globalization of their business services operations with those of their overall enterprise, in order to truly succeed at their globalization efforts. Globalization of business services requires dramatic changes to improve visibility of management information, in part through expanded use of automation. But most companies lag far behind in this area.

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