Supply chain management (SCM) is a concept that is vital to any business or organization. It refers to the collaborative efforts of numerous channel members to implement, manage, and design a value-added process that is seamless to meet the actual wants of end consumers. As such, SCM entails some activities, and it brings many benefits to entities which use it. On this background, this paper is going to discuss the following SCM activities: security, globalization, and misalignment.
Security
Supply chain security refers to the efforts driven towards enhancing the security of supply chain to ensure uninterrupted supply performance to achieve its objective through protection against threats from external such as theft, terrorism, and piracy. In accomplishing this uninterrupted performance state, organizations or other companies have to implement security measures sets that are designated as supply chain security management (SCSM). In this context, SCSM is defined as the application of technology, policies and procedures to safeguard supply chain assets (equipment, information, facilities, product, and personnel) from damage, terrorism, or theft (Jażdżewska-Gutta, 2014). Also, it inhibits the introduction of people, contraband, or mass destruction weapons that are unauthorized into the supply chain. As such, SCSM main activities include; credentialing of supply chain participants, validating and screening of cargo contents being shipped; advance notification of the destination country about the content of the cargo; ensuring cargo security while in-transit through the use of seals that are tamper-proof and locks; and scrutinizing cargo on entry. Though it requires some costs to be incurred, is, however, has many benefits to the companies such as enhancing the entire supply chain reliability, improve cargo tracking, and lower losses exposure due to terrorism, crime, smuggling, and fraud (Jażdżewska-Gutta, 2014).
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Misalignment
Supply chain misalignment denotes the misalignment of demand and supply in the supply chain management. This demand and supply chain inaccuracies may derive many activities that are undesirable in the supply chain management (SCM), and as such, lead to severe consequences when there is the existence of misalignment. Thus, the misalignment raises the pressure on managers of the supply chain to deliver service and at the same time minimize costs and inventory (Cacevski, 2014). Any substantial deviation from the line of original base numbers will possibly lead to increases in the costs of supply chain and stock, and a decline in service. As such, the occurrence of this imbalance results in the entire supply chain suboptimal functioning. Therefore, because forecasts/demands are applied in making long-term strategic decisions and short-term tactical decisions in the SCM, the integrity and quality of such information are essential and a driving force which manager of the supply chain must consider in pursuit of an excellent of a supply chain (Cacevski, 2014).
Crisis Management
Every activity of a business entails risks, and the most common one is the financial risk. However, there are also numerous other risks which endanger either directly or indirectly the economic side. All these risks levels affect the supply chain, and identifying them is even challenging (Honkanen, 2013). Therefore, companies must find ways or strategies of to ensure their supply chain continuity through the process of supply chain crisis management, and that entails how well organizations prepare for threats that impact supply chain in crisis situations. Therefore, the basic idea of supply chain crisis management is to enable companies in a crisis to remain flexible and react quickly to any event through the use of its standard (Honkanen, 2013).
References
Cacevski, O. (2014). Applied Project: Supply and Demand Misalignment. Retrieved May 21, 2018 from http://dtpr.lib.athabascau.ca/action/download.php?filename=mba-14/open/OliverCacevskiProject.pdf
Honkanen, U. (2013). How companies are securing their supply chain during crisis situations.
Jażdżewska-Gutta, M. (2014). Supply Chain Security Measures-The Business Perspective. Innovative Methods in Logistics and Supply Chain Management , 225.
