Navigating uncharted waters for competitive advantage

This is an excerpt of the original article. It was written for the March-April 2024 edition of Supply Chain Management Review. The full article is available to current subscribers.

March-April 2024

Part of any supply chain manager’s job is risk mitigation. Thanks to COVID-19 and the ensuing, and constant, disruptions that have followed, more companies are now focused on reducing their exposure to supply chain chaos. We’ve heard a lot about diversification in recent years—having multiple suppliers in multiple locations. But risk mitigation goes far beyond diversification, and the recent case of Boeing should serve as a cautionary tale not to avoid those other risks.

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Mobility and industrial products executives are navigating the continuation and amplification of supply chain’s disruptive forces: geopolitical unrest, labor shortages and reduced knowledge/skillsets, supply ebbs and tides, rising costs, shifting consumer expectations, and rapid technology advances. Supply chain strategies play a central role in responding to these challenges. For 2024, three specific supply chain initiatives will help executives control spend, mitigate labor shortages, meet consumer expectations, and advance their companies’ resilience and competitive edge. Three critical initiatives companies must embrace are visibility, business continuity, and network optimization.

Visibility and control: The backbone transforming supply chains into optimized supply networks

Technology is generating data at an unprecedented pace—algorithmically. The advances in artificial intelligence (AI) are weaponizing the supply network with robotic process automation and detailed cognitive analytics at the direct-to-consumer behavior level. As a mobility and industrial products executive, you are challenged to ask whether the data you are receiving is the right data for your company and in a form you can use to make insightful, predictive decisions quickly. Do you know the origins of the data? How can you integrate it with your operations systems? How can you leverage the data for process improvement and competitive advantage? What is the value to be created? Do you trust the data? What opportunities are you looking for? What are the cyber risks and data liabilities? So many questions, so few answers.

Two factors will determine the quality of the answers to these questions: the maturity of your planning, procurement, operations, and logistics; and the level of visibility available and applicable to you.

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