Samir Allen Farhoumand works with many companies to help enhance their supply chain system, particularly globally. However, so many companies make mistakes when expanding to a global network that could set them back for years. He recently discussed a few simple ways to transition to a global supply chain network that could help minimize your growing pains. These concepts help make your success easier to obtain.
Several Simple Steps Samir Allen Farhoumand Believes You Must Take
The most challenging element of the global supply chain is creating an overall strategy that makes sense for your needs and your business design. Unfortunately, too many companies take old-fashioned concepts or national supply chain ideas for granted and try to apply them to a global situation. Samir Allen Farhoumand claims that this mistake is considerable and will impact your success in many negative ways.
How can you expand your national thinking into a global concept? Start by thinking of each new country you serve as a base for operation. Set up different supply chain councils in each of these areas to handle things on a national level. The committees should consist of people local to these areas to help make it easier for them to understand transportation and material access more easily.
A group of councils like this may seem like you’re putting too many cooks in the kitchen. And it can be a problem, Samir Allen Farhoumand states, if you don’t produce a coherent and meaningful strategy for each country to follow. For instance, if one area provides you with raw materials for production, focus on enhancing production and delivery efficiency by finding better transportation methods.
Cross-functional communication will be the most challenging element of this process. This concept refers to opening reasonable paths of discussion across different areas of your supply chain. For example, language barriers can cause confusion or even outright mistakes in a global situation. Even worse, some areas may use different production and storage methods that may impact
In this situation, Samir Allen Farhoumand suggests producing singular techniques and control methods that your team has to follow to ensure everything goes smoothly. First, meet with each of your councils via Zoom or other group meeting methods and present these concepts. Then, ship guidelines to each group, going over each point carefully to ensure that everybody fully understands what must be done here.
In this situation, think of your global supply chain as an expansion of your national network, albeit one with much longer lines of shipping. Each of your countries (and each of its shipping sites) should be treated like large states and their cities as you would any in the US. In a way, you’re thinking of the world as one large country from which you can draw supplies, ship your goods, and keep your business thriving.