Building an Effective Supply Chain in a Non-Steady State

In this episode of the Rethinking Supply Chain podcast, Venzee CEO, John Abrams reconnects with Phil Renaud, Executive Director of The Risk Institute at the Ohio State University Fisher College of Business, to continue their conversation about supply chain resilience.John starts the episode by bringing up three points that stood out to him while participating in a global conference that Phil’s organization hosted. First, resilience matters, second we’re generally lacking when it comes to planning for low-probability events, and third, nobody builds ‘just-in-case’ supply chains.In most cases, companies outsource portions of the supply chain, and generally, it is to a single service provider. In this conversation, John asks Phil about how to develop the ‘just-in-case’ contingency plans to stay ahead of the game.Phil shares his experience working in retail to provide some ways in which supply chain stakeholders can plan for one-off disruptions. He describes some of the difficult conversations that executives may need to have when it comes to discussing the fragility of supply chain networks. Although the cost has gone down, companies tend to rely on a single distributor, and that model may need to change as unique disruptions continue to occur.Contact Phil and The Ohio State University Risk Institute at http://fisher.osu.edu/risk.