Companies across most industries have applied Six Sigma or lean principles to optimize supply chain efficiency. Supply chain executives can further use successful process improvement as a testament to the value supply chain operations offer to the overall business value chain. With stricter budgets and higher emphasis on organizational service quality, demonstrating and communicating supply chain value to internal and external customers is becoming increasingly important.
Sharing ROI of supply chain efforts secures and expedites senior management buy-in and financial support for future supply chain initiatives, according to benchmarking research firm Best Practices LLC.
Having conducted studies of leading companies, the researchers learned that:
* 26% of surveyed companies report supply chain costs less than or equal to 5% of total revenue.
* One third of the benchmark partners report needing nine or fewer employees to carry out the organization's purchasing function.
* 92% of companies surveyed use face-to-face executive meetings between supply chain managers and internal customers to discuss supply chain initiatives and communicate value.
* Over half of benchmarked order management executives consider quality of service provided to be the most defining factor in the value of their operating processes.
* Organizations are increasingly outsourcing non-core activities, and require transparency in measuring and monitoring the value chain performance.
