Manufacturers should focus on improving by continuously working on new ideas and strategies to stay relevant. Moreover, they also need to drive out costs and improve customer service. 

It has been proven that companies that work on supply chain agility have better customer service rankings than their competitors. Companies using strategic supply chain models with interactive software build up the core of their business.

Supply Chain Agility

When a market responds to changes smoothly, it is referred to as supply chain agility. Moreover, these changes are vast and involve everything from what the customer prefers to economic and market volatility.

It isn’t just about adjusting the daily operations and workflow to meet internal KPIs. It is about changing the process internally by improving manufacturing supply chain agility. It means data management, adopting new technologies and vendor service agreements.

The aim is to maintain a responsive and informed supply chain that can get through the market changes without hassle.

What does a successful supply chain agility rely on?

Successful supply chain agility relies on the following.

• Understanding what the external factors are shapes your supply chain logistics. It needs to be considered even if the business is stable.
• The value chain components affected by the disruptions in the industry should be explored.
• Integration of a proactive technology for addressing the value chain points.
• The new process should be regularly analyzed, for example, production cost savings, and cross-functional collaboration. Moreover, adjustments should be made when needed.

How to improve supply chain agility?

Here are some strategies that can help you in improve your supply chain agility

Examination and Adjustment

A successful supply chain doesn’t start by isolating your company nor requires you to create key performance indicators just for new ones. If a business wants a true agile chain, it should respond to the changes within the broadest industry. It allows the organization to be aware of what is happening in the market, why it is happening, and what can be done about it.

Since the outlook is comprehensive, the companies face struggles managing the facilitation, considering a true agile system. The leaders expect changes in everything—for example, the labor, inventory practices, logistic providers, and product development relationships.

Real-Time Point of Sale

Manufacturers have started using software for demand planning. They gather insights for aggregate historical data and focus on making improvements through inventory. Moreover, their shipping schedules are based on the previous cycles. However, this makes the pattern monotonous. Though it is essential to supply chain agility, it should not be the only focus point. When companies balance their demand and planning, they witness greater success.

Production and Selling Data Synchronization

Production planning and scheduling data systems should be aligned with demand-driven sales. It creates a more efficient and effective chain of networks. When these databases are integrated, it removes the response times according to the variable demand cycles. In addition to reducing out-of-stock issues, and improving the overall control of inventory.

Why should you care about supply chain visibility? 

Supply chain visibility means being aware of what is happening in your supply chain. Moreover, although the meaning is simple, it isn’t something that can be achieved easily. Since the past few years, multiple organizations have experienced disruptions in their supply chain due to weather changes, unforeseen circumstances like fire, and natural disasters, for example, storm warnings.

After a thorough analysis of the companies, the observation suggests that most companies were caught off guard since they had a poor supply chain. Furthermore, in some cases, companies were unaware of their supplier’s and sub supplier’s whereabouts. Some of them were also unaware of the critical dependencies. 

Supply Chain Visibility

There are various definitions for supply chain visibility. However, the most common one is the ability to track raw materials and components from the original manufacturers and suppliers. It is all through the organization’s manufacturing facilities provided to the customers. In addition, for retail operations, the goods are tracked from the suppliers to the end customers.

When the situation is ideal and the supply chain visibility is good, chief officers have access to the following data

• Supplier’s order receipt
• To complete the order, the status of the raw materials is available
• Manufacturing program and status of the supplier
• Supplier’s delivery date
• Details of shipment
• Regulatory and customer information
• The status of the order regarding the progress plan

If companies want to gain full benefits of supply chain visibility, all the information should be trackable in real-time. However, some organizations can and do achieve this.

A manufacturer has the option to digitize his entire factory to track the transformation of raw material to finished goods. However, they will not be able to keep realistic estimates until they don’t integrate IT into their system with the suppliers. Based on that, there are two parts for visibility

• Operational Visibility 

It means that you can gain visibility for your operations, for example, whatever product is under your care can be tracked at any time. Considering a factory, it can be the IoT sensors monitoring machine usage and inventory levels? Moreover, data silos are reduced when the IT network is interconnected.

• Partner Integration

Partner integration means that a company can choose a partner to drive high-level internal visibility. Furthermore, they can also extend it to their supply chain partners. When you have your real-time tracking system, you can easily schedule a suite. This additional integration can help in covering the whole value chain.

Importance of Supply Chain Visibility

Modern supply chains are very complex in most cases. According to the statistics, supply chain complexity is unignorably when supply chain visibility is considered. A lot of companies also had the misconception that their company could achieve complete visibility over internal, inbound, and outbound aspects of the supply chain. Moreover, the surveys were all unanimous and most companies viewed the importance of improving supply chain visibility for availability and on-time delivery. In addition, companies with full supply chain visibility achieved a higher EBIT on average.

Although the pandemic caused significant damage to the supply chain and logistics, supply chain organizations couldn’t stop staying committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion also known as DEI. Supply chain organizations are holding larger companies and depicting a solid representation of people of all colors. The main focus areas for diversity in supply chain are recruitment, learning, and development. These three areas are keys to DEI’s success.

However, the pandemic didn’t leave a chance to disrupt supply chain operations in the workplace and production units. But high levels of dedication and motivation of supply chain organizations and their employees didn’t stop them from working for their companies’ sustainability. The recent work survey by Gartner Research and the Association for Supply Chain Management released a report on the current state of DEI in supply chain. 

Dana Stiffler, VP analyst at Gartner, said that:

“Our 2022 results find that supply chain organizations show strong intent to encourage inclusion, diversity, and equity, especially for women and marginalized racial and ethnic groups. However, we also see a chasm between global, publicly held companies and the rest in terms of commitment and results.”

Scarcity of working talent:

Supply chain organization heads are currently dealing with an extreme shortage of working talent. To hunt for new talent, leaders need to closely reassess and evaluate candidates’ DIE’s commitment and relevant knowledge about supply chain management and logistics.

A study on diversity, equity, and involvement in the supply chain from Gartner in 2022 was conducted on a global level. This survey releases a report which stated three primary learning keys and methods for the respondents in Canada and Europe.

Learning No. 1: Big and global companies should lead the way

The major difference between global companies and smaller companies is the amount of commitment, interest and dedication of their employees. Besides these three factors, their pay equity is equally important. The reason behind this disparity and misbalance is a large amount of scrutiny that global firms face from their big financial investors and regulators. Their essential stakes are involved in the company; hence, if they wouldn’t scrutinize it, they have to bear potential losses.

However, color representation is better in all aspects of global companies. According to the data, 45% of full-time supply chain employees in international organizations are people of color versus 40% in their small peers.

Learning No. 2: Goals and prompt accountability are key to success

This does not mean supply chain team heads in smaller companies are supposed to make little progress in their respective firms. Everyone should work to their maximum capacity and implement the finest methods of supply chain sustainability which will result in DEI success. 

Goals ultimately need a working and active implementation of ideas. This is one of the working keys of global companies. Larger organizations have three times more fixed DEI initiatives. These organizations enhance and try to grow DEI outcomes at equal priority as other business goals. 

Learning No. 3: Recruitment should be an investment priority.

After you have understood your DEI goals, your immediate next step should be on how to accomplish those goals. With this, you also should realize how powerfully you can implement your DEI initiatives. Recruitment, learning and development, and employee engagement are essential aspects of supply chain organizations. Recruitment initiatives should focus on various interview panels and diversity referral programs.