12.21.2015

Yossi Sheffi's recent book on supply chain resilience is having more and more impact.  A recent interview with DC Velocity provides a good, quick overview.

The final question/answer in the interview is, I perceive, especially important to a sustainable strategy of supply chain resilience:

Q: One of the arguments you make in the book is that by looking at your risk, by preparing for risk, you actually strengthen the entire enterprise. Expand on that a bit.

A: For an example, there is Intel. It had to map its entire supply chain. Knowing who the people upstream are, you not only get risk protection—the sense that if something happened to one of them, you know what the implications are—but you also learn more about what's going on in the supply chain. You start understanding your own supply chain a lot better, which always brings good things.

Mapping supply chains is non-trivial.  Complete transparency is a complex undertaking, further complicated by proprietary implications and the advantage of rapid adaptation.  But being explicit about nodes, links, and interdependencies is a fundamental aspect of risk management.

A recent report by Lloyds found, "Mapping supply chains can also help insurers review their entire portfolio, both to look for areas of risk accumulation – where they may want to run scenarios – and to identify areas of opportunity, where little insurance is currently written and there is limited connection with insured risks."  

What is helpful for the insurer is even more helpful for the insured.


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