A strategic approach to the supply chain is unlikely to be successful without sufficient effort to establish workable relationships based on trust. These will promote the maximum utilisation of interdependent skills and exploitation of the knowledge base. These relationships will be deployed through multiple levels of the supply network to reap the advantages and benefits that currently remain untapped.
Michael Dell said, 'Today we have access to technology that greatly facilitates the exchange of information. We can share methodologies with supplier-partners, which results in dramatically faster time to market.' Dell looked at available technology and saw what could be done. Many established organisations should imitate this approach and take a more lateral view of their business. As Gary Hamel, co-author of 'Competing for the Future' said: 'A company's blindness is due to an unwillingness or inability to look outside current experiences.'
Based on the ubiquity of the Internet, future business models will open channels to extended, flexible and networked supply chains. This will provide the opportunity to create global value-based solutions, which can expand and contract to meet changing demands. Underpinning this concept will be partnerships and collaborative commercial agreements, developed around clusters of interdependent suppliers that can maximise their joint capability.
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