Entries tagged as supplier performance

As an impetuous small child (and some say adult) I often demanded things from my mother. When I didn’t meet her requirements of polite speech, she would say “What are the magic words”?

Who’s to blame if your supply chain falters?

As an operations management professor, I am always asking my graduate students a lot about their own companies and sometimes I am disappointed with the answers I get. 

Anyone who rode the «tube» in London would certainly recognize this phrase. You have to mind the gap between the station platform and the metro wagon when entering or exiting the train in order to avoid falling in between. We can easily use the same phrase when it comes to sourcing, selecting suppliers and buying goods from overseas companies. Why? Because there is a huge gap of supplier performance data for companies overseas that no technology can bridge today. The problem is especially acute when we are talking about small and medium size companies that cannot afford spending countless dollars on supplier selection but are faced with the tough realities of dwindling customer demand and the push to reduce prices.