Supply chain news

  For most, the benefits of outsourcing are far-reaching, from leveraging specialised knowledge, to expanding your markets, channels, and service offerings.  For some the reality is challenging, and it can take more time than expected initially, to become accustomed to working together as outsource partners.   For others, challenges being experienced have begun to frustrate, and […]

The imposition of new sanctions, following the invasion of Ukraine, will need to be enforced and managed by organisations in Ireland and around the world.  These sanctions have been imposed by the EU, as well as the UK, US, Canada, Japan, and others. We have talked about trade compliance and managing sanctions previously, but with […]

Healthcare Supply Chains are adapting to a different World Every two years, in conjunction with Jamie Kowalski Consulting LLC, PerformanSC seeks inputs from supply chain leaders within health systems, on the evolution of their healthcare supply chain practices.  The research has charted the evolution of health system supply chains since 2012, and in particular the […]

Using supplier scorecards to align performance As we noted in our recent post on KPIs and metrics, a strong metrics framework is needed to manage supply chain processes on a daily, weekly and monthly basis.  Here we look at best practices in outsource supply chain governance, with some thoughts around supplier scorecards. Supplier scorecards are […]

Tackling inflation in our supply chains For the first time in over 30 years, inflation is a concern faced by many western economies.  Academics will debate how we got here – concerns over fuel supply, expansionary economic policies, recovery post-pandemic, geo-political instability, logistics congestion, additional non-trade barriers – but supply chain professionals have been feeling […]

Aftermarket certification for your ICT equipment For a long time, the fate of ICT equipment, no longer needed, has been the least of an organisation’s concerns.  Indeed, most seemed content to let someone take aftermarket equipment away for the smallest fee on offer.  Other companies, typically those dealing with higher volumes of more recent used […]

  Selling your B2B outsource solution – the online sales meeting The arrival of Covid-19 has turned the B2B sales world somewhat upside down.   Maintaining contact with your clients and providers has moved online, international visits haven’t gone ahead, and at times it feels like the B2B channel is now almost entirely virtual. 3PLs, 4PLs, […]

Reflecting on a challenging retail season As retailers reflect on what has been a challenging holiday season, supply chain constraints will feature heavily in their considerations. Planned inventories to support holiday sales and promotions were disrupted.  Supplier shipments were delayed, transportation costs rose, and suppliers looked to recover additional costs.  Labour shortages across the supply […]

Operations Research: A Supply Chain Perspective In this final introduction to OR in the supply chain, we discuss facility location choices, and the common techniques that are used to geographically position plants and DCs, in order to provide demanded services.  These methods are essential to the optimal design of network structures.  They are widely applied, […]

An approach to supply chain metrics and KPIs We are often asked what are the key performance indicators that should be considered when measuring supply chain performance.  Every time you buy, sell, make, or move something in a supply chain, you leave a data trail.  With all this data available, there is nearly an unlimited […]