Resilient to Antifragile - Shaping up of Supply Chain


Buzzword which existed AND got a lot louder over the past year or so is Supply Chain Resilience. From Supply Chain Leaders to Analysts, Executives in the Boardroom to executives in the front line seem to have drilled it down to their Strategic as well as Operating environments that Supply Chain which is Resilient is not only the need of the hour but also the future.

Flexibility & Responsiveness in a scenario which didn't unfold as anticipated hence the need to help the system achieve its preconceived state through various mechanisms is typically what the industry appreciates as "Supply Chain Resilience". e.g. An event like Covid-19 occurred. The systems has to be restored to its optimum as soon as it can. Enterprises which have bee able to respond to that in the most efficient manner have been said to have a "Resilient Supply Chain". In short the disruption didn't create negative value for its stakeholders. 

Resilience technically means the ability of the Supply Chain to absorb the shocks. Mechanisms for Supply Chain Resilience typically include "Redundancy". During the times of unexpected events, when Resilience of the Supply Chain is needed, these mechanisms help achieve Resilience. Inventory as a Substitute to Capacity, Manufacturing sites with redundant capacity (volume redundancy as well as location redundancy), Under committing v/s over achievement, Multiple backups (systems to vendors all included) are typical mechanisms of Supply Chain Resilience. 

As a practitioner of the Supply Chain I wish to get one step ahead of Resilience. The need is to "exploit" (with a positive connotation of the word exploit) the current situation to build an "Antifragile" Supply Chain, a Supply Chain which exploits the opportunity to create more value than only absorbing shocks to avoid negative value. "Antifragile" is not a synonym of "Resilience" and also is not an antonym of "Fragile".

For me Antifragile is something which exploits, rather leverages, a negative event to make itself grow in a way that creates a new state of being. Supply Chain practitioners need to think of "Anti-fragility" beyond thinking "Resilience"

Comments

  1. ShriramApril 24, 2021 at 8:12 PM

    Thought provoking article . Thanks

    ReplyDelete
  2. UnknownApril 27, 2021 at 3:57 PM

    Apart from this, we all SCM professionals need to start thinking post vaccination when the business environment comes back to normal equilibrium, how our supply chain is ready with the influx of more orders which are expected to come up for the execution, Building strong capacities with hand holding with suppliers is also need of the hour. Global market equations are going to change. Current understanding of business commitments will also change.

    ReplyDelete

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