The practicality of building supply chain resilience

The preliminary findings of the Procurement Intelligence Unit (PIU UK) CPO 2012 Strategy study support the view that it takes few practical measures to build supply chain resilience.

Typically, managers tend to rely heavily on the power of documentation and contracts to protect them. This is true for a range of sectors and functions, however, it is also true that this provides only limited protection.

The quickest way to ensure this resilience is through geographical spread. The perils of not ensuring this were most obviously in the hard disk drive industry. Prices for this product have soared as Thailand, the world’s leading producer, saw most of its key suppliers flooded in late 2011.

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