The Supply Chain

Unit 2 Assignment: The Supply Chain

This assignment will assess your knowledge based on the following Outcomes:

MT433-1: Discuss the significance of supply chain management in a global organization.

GEL-1.02: Demonstrate college-level communication through the composition of original materials in Standard English.

In this assignment, you are going to analyze the supply strategy of an organization. Preferably, you will select the organization where you currently work or one where you previously worked. If this is not possible, you may select a well-known company on which you will be able to gather significant supply chain information.

However, if you need to choose this route, you must communicate with your instructor through email first- explain why you are not able to use your personal work experience and propose a company on which you will write your paper. Your instructor will let you know how to proceed. You need to do this early in the week so you have time to agree on a company. Failing to do this on time is not an excuse for submitting your assignment late, or using a company without approval.

In order to complete this assignment, you may need to first collect information from your organization. Start this process early in the week so to ensure you have all the information you need.

When a firm, its customers, and its suppliers all know each other’s future plans and are willing to work together, the planning process is easier and much more productive in terms of cost savings, quality improvements, and service enhancements. The first step in making this integration a reality is to recognize the importance of supply chain management and locate your organization in its supply chain.

Instructions:

For this assignment, analyze the supply strategy of your organization.

Describe your organization: What do they do, who are their primary competitors, what is your position within the organization.

Describe your organization’s position in the global supply chain.

a. For its primary product line, describe the supply chain from the beginning to the end. Create a diagram similar to figure 1.1 and explain. Make sure to describe all participants and their roles, from the beginning to the end. Note the countries in which each participant is located.

b. Conclude by explaining the significance of supply chain management for your organization’s success. How has supply chain management impacted your operations?

How does the purchasing function in your organization select suppliers? Discuss the factors on pg. 58 with a purchasing professional and ask them to order these factors from most to least important. Then, provide details on the top three ranked factors by explaining why they are a top priority for your organization. If any of your suppliers are international, are any special factors considered?
Respond using the critical elements below:

Compose your original response in Standard English, paying special attention to grammar, style, and mechanics.
Respond to the questions in a thorough manner, following the prescribed format and citing your sources using the current APA guidelines.
Ensure that your viewpoint and purpose are clearly stated.
Demonstrate logical and appropriate transitions from one idea to another.
Your paper should be highly organized, logical, and focused.

ANSWER

Nike Supply Chain Management

Nike

Nike is among the largest sports apparel and footwear Company which has been occupied with the advancement, plan, advertising, and provision of athletic clothing, footwear, and accessories. The company’s headquarters are in Beaverton, Oregon, and has more than 62,000 employees. The brand products of Nike are categorized into Basketball, Running, Football, Women’s and Men’s training, Sportswear’s, Action Sports, and Golf (Jiang, 2019). Nike has divided their brand categories to easily expand its target market to all the categories due to sports casual fashion style. Nike has been leading in the sports industry through meeting consumer needs and developing innovative products to retain and attract clients, a major aspect considered by the company. Nike faces high competition from companies such as Reebok and Nike which are the two major competitors. However, the competitive ability of Nike has increased due to the development of modified sneakers in the context of meeting the needs of people. Stability is another major feature that has supported Nike sneakers based on safety options. Nike relies on a global supply chain that spans multiple countries and continents to supply and source materials.

Nike has been positioned as one of the top companies for wide-ranging obligation for supply chain concerns, the utilization of supplier management mechanisms, and audits to examine suppliers for non-compliance. For decades, Nike has lead the way in global supply chains. Nike contracts lots of nations with stores that source materials locally with regards to the company standards. Nike has been a leading modernizer in supply chain management conception through integrating new analytic approaches like lean manufacturing, express lane and tools such as 3D printing and RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) (Liu, Ma, and Zhou, 2021). The main principle behind Nike’s supply chain management is diversification and outsourcing. The supply chain at Nike has quickly cultured how to cope with supplementary logistical challenges while outsourcing and has seen abundant cost savings.

Nike’s Supply Chain Strategy

Nike adopts a different product development in its supply chain process compared to its competitors. Nike does not own any factory for manufacturing footwear and apparel. For Nike to get new apparel or shoes, the whole process can take more than fifteen months from the time the material is received from the contract suppliers to the final distribution to the retailer. The contract suppliers to produce the shoes using materials and designs offered by Nike (Jiang, 2019). The contract suppliers of Nike are located in China. The supply chain process for Nike begins with contracting suppliers who offer the raw materials used in manufacturing footwear and apparel. Nike’s supply chain is characterized by high levels of subcontracting and vertical disintegration. The main advantage of outsourcing is that the Company can concentrate on core competencies such as new product development and marketing.

Nike has five major distribution centers within the United States and sixteen distribution centers outside the United States. For instance, the distribution center in Ham, Belgium is linked to the company’s commitment to reduced carbon footprint and direct sales. Nike has invested on flexible and fast supply chain to deliver a full range of products to consumers. Nike products are then sold in all sorts of retail shops both large and small as well as independent shop stores and sporting goods stores. The last participant in the supply chain is the customers. These are the individuals that purchase Nike shoes and apparel. Getting the product to the consumer means that the company has successfully managed its supply chain. Customer service is a major aspect of the supply chain since they depend on the company to meet their needs. The customers are from different parts of the world. Most of the customers at Nike are considered to be on the client, customer, and supporter stage.

The Significance of Supply Chain Management to Organization’s Success

Nike supply chain management functions on major principles: to reduce costs, outsourcing, lower risk, diversification, and corporate social responsibility to control the effect of the company on the world it operates in (Baliga, Raut, and Kamble, 2019). Nike’s supply chain innovation has boosted supply chain management and the organization’s success. Considerably, most of the successful companies in the world have adopted innovative supply chain management practices. For instance, Nike uses the Express Lane approach to add value and add lead time. This program brings together rapid prototyping with digital and 3D printing which minimizes the inventory while boosting the speed of delivery which in turn boosts client satisfaction. Nike has also relied on lean manufacturing which enables the business to minimize waste, increase production, lower costs, increase profits and improve quality. The RFID technology has improved the visibility of each supply chain stage. RFID technology enhanced the decision-making process resulting in greater efficiency and precision through cutting the leading times and understanding what exactly the consumers want at a specific time thus getting the right products, at the right time and to the right customers.

Selection of Suppliers

The global procurement team manages the procurement process by choosing and contracting the right suppliers with the right goods and services. The main focus when selecting suppliers is purchasing sustainable products (Jiang, 2019). Nike gathers information from suppliers through better buying a rating initiative that gathers supplier data and response on purchasing. Nike uses information from better buying to inform systems and process improvements in the selection of suppliers. The three main factors that should be considered when selecting suppliers include quality, reliability, and cost. The quality levels of the purchased items or the contracted supplier should be a very vital impact in supplier selection. Product quality should be high and steady since it can directly influence the quality of the final products. Reliability is linked to supplier characteristics and the product quality level. There is a need to consider whether the supplier is reliable and financially stable to enable them to invest in development and research and remain relevant in the business. The supplier lead time should be reliable to prevent interruption of production due to a shortage of material.

References

Baliga, R., Raut, R. D., & Kamble, S. S. (2019). Sustainable supply chain management practices and performance: An integrated perspective from a developing economy. Management of Environmental Quality: An International Journal.

Jiang, W. (2019). Sustainable development of supply chain in the footwear industry–take Nike as the case. Asian Business Research, 4(3), 86.

Liu, X., Ma, L., & Zhou, Y. (2021, September). Supply Chain Management of Nike. In 2021 International Conference on E-Commerce and E-Management (ICECEM) (pp. 437-441). IEEE.