Supply Chain Management Theory Riordan manufacturing is not an island; it requires many inputs to achieve the subsequent output of end product. Riordan's Hangzhou, China facility is no different. This brief is meant to give you, as a new hire, an abbreviated understanding of how we construct supply chain activities to give us an operational advantage in providing a quality end product to our end customers at the lowest cost. Supply chain management is composed of a network of interconnected businesses that work together to ensure that customer deliveries are met.Each of these businesses that ork within the supply chain network are contracted to provide either goods or services that allow Riordan to deliver on these aforementioned commitments. Supply Chain Management spans a number of deliverables, such as raw materials, work in process inventory, finished components for assembly etcetera; these deliverables are all harnessed in concert to provide a finished product.

Each of these businesses must be managed proactively to deliver on time, at the right cost and the highest quality.There are standards that Riordan has implemented to ensure that our supply chain meet the goals of on-time delivery. Through these standards that encompass design, planning, execution, control and monitoring, Riordan hopes to ensure we can deliver a consistent product. These standards allow Riordan to leverage worldwide suppliers and logistics, to synchronize supply with actual demand and to measure delivery against this demand. Competitive Strategy Riordan works hard to ensure that the suppliers that have been selected are done so competitively.

When Riordan chooses a supplier, there are various factors that are considered above and beyond piece part price. The supplier must endure a barrage f audits, including quality, parametric modeling as well as load and capacity planning models. The use of these tools allows Riordan to ensure that the supplier is capable of delivering products to the specifications that have been set forth. Global sourcing strategies are implemented to leverage supply chain across the world; by having global visibility of pending spend, our procurement professionals can package potential awards for better pricing.

Each of the suppliers chosen are representative of adherence to these strategies; if a sourcing decision is made outside of strategy, the approval of the Chief Procurement Officer is required. This allows Riordan to continually pursue the sourcing strategies that have been agreed upon at the highest levels of the organization. Customer Fulfillment Strategy New advances in IT have streamlined the process of meeting customer demands. As we previously discussed, there are many variables that have an impact on the final delivery of an end product to the customer.

Various activities must be coordinated and synchronized to ensure that customer deliverables are adequately met. Factors such as supplier lead time, internal manufacturing lead time, and logistical delivery time must be considered to ensure the customer's needs are met. This can be demand to the supplier based on negotiated lead time. In an efficient organization, standard Bills of Materials and demand forecasting is flown down to suppliers to ensure that they accept the commitment to providing their goods and services at the agreed date.The internal / external facing processes allow these actions to take place. Process Thinking The aforementioned processes allow Riordan and it's supply chain to replicate success on a continual basis.

With ERP / MRP systems, Riordan can ensure that it's demand signal is automated, removing variation from how schedule lines were agreed before these IT solutions. By following a set process, a performance baseline can be set. Once the baseline is set, Riordan can seek to measure this performance on a continuous basis to set targets for the year.Processes allow organizations to analyze this performance; through this analysis, process improvement activities may be undertaken to improve the output of the given process.

Only by analytical tools and objective targets can Riordan hope to understand how the supply chain is performing. Other measurements applied to suppliers (balanced quality / delivery scorecard) will allow Riordan to ascertain how to tailor future supply chain / sourcing strategies.