It’s more difficult than ever to keep your supply chain running smoothly. There are a number of challenges you can face at any time like natural disasters, regulations, accidents, political strife, and more. Any disruption today can have significant consequences in a long, global supply chain.
To overcome these challenges, many companies strive to build a resilient supply chain by focusing on three key elements: visibility, predictability, and accountability.
Visibility is a measure of how well a company can look into their supply chain operations and find the information that they need.
• What’s the status of production?
• What does expected shipment date of that last order?
• What’s the 30 or 60 day forecast look like?
• How much inventory do you have on-hand?
Without visibility, companies have no idea what’s happening at various stages, making it difficult to manage your day-to-day and, nearly impossible to plan for the future. You feel like you’re always a step or two behind.
With any number of moving parts and supplies you need visibility through the entire supply chain process from production to your customer receiving their shipment.
Predictability is a measure of consistency, or how smoothly your supply chain runs.
You should be able to tell with confidence when:
• Levels of demand shift
• Market conditions change
• Shipments will arrive
• To order more products based on warehouse space and sales volume
• Production lead time conditions change
Having a predictable supply chain makes it easier to prepare for and deal with disruption and uncertainty when they do happen. It’s essential for maintaining sustainable, long-term business growth.
Accountability is a measure of how well you can mitigate risk.
In global supply chains, you often work with multiple vendors: manufacturers, suppliers, subcontractors, shippers, and more. When an issue does arise – like a product defect or a late shipment – it’s easy to start pointing fingers at one another (which can lead to even longer delays).
But it can also be hard to sort out issues, especially when a vendor isn’t quick to own up to a fault or take responsibility for handling their part of the supply chain. Companies that focus on accountability work to understand how each of their partners work and replaces any company that can’t meet their standards.
Building a resilient supply chain is difficult, but not impossible. Since it takes a significant amount of time and resources to do right, many US companies partner with a company like ITI to handle their global supply chain for them.
By working with our customers over the last 50 years, we’ve learned there are two critical ways to achieve visibility, predictability, and accountability: weekly updates and issue resolution.
Along with daily communication, ITI sends out over 2,500 detailed updates per year to our customers to keep them informed about the status of their projects, orders, and shipments. These specific updates give visibility into what’s happening in their supply chain at any given moment so they can take action (and plan ahead).
We know how frustrating it is when issues do happen. That’s why ITI takes ownership of the problem and works tirelessly to resolve it to our customer’s satisfaction. Over 99% of issues are acknowledged on the same day.
Our clients rely on us to keep their supply chains running smoothly. We provide unique, turnkey global manufacturing services in China, South Korea, Taiwan, Vietnam, and other various countries. Our unique approach will ensure visibility, predictability, and accountability.
When you combine all three areas, it can be a game changer for your business operations and lead to:
Visibility and predictability can enable proactive production planning. When you know what’s happening at each stage of your supply chain, you can easily monitor and make changes to production as you need. You can also keep customers well-informed about their orders and continue to earn their trust in your company.
Visibility and accountability can also help resolve issues effectively when they do happen. Consistent updates help you catch issues quickly and accountability ensures that someone takes ownership to resolve it, which means fewer and shorter delays in your supply chain.
A resilient supply chain is not only optimized for your internal operations, but also for your customer experience. Customers can trust your company to deliver high-quality products and on-time shipments. They’ll prefer your company over others since you meet their expectations every time.
An optimized supply chain for visibility, predictability, and accountability is what leads to a competitive advantage. You’ll be far better equipped to handle disruptions when they do happen, while also staying in control of your bottom line. While others struggle to deliver for their customers, you routinely get the job done and keep your customers happy.
Contact ITI to learn more information.
