Supply Chain Improvement Programme

Each supply chain improvement programme will commence with a ‘Business Improvement Review’ (BIR) which diagnoses issues that each participant company needs to address. The BIR was developed as part of the UK National Supply Chain programme. Thus, we have a track record in developing frameworks for business improvement programmes.

In terms of quantifiable benefits to each company and to the supply chain as a whole there are three categories by which each improvement gauges impact:

a) Measurable change against Skills Development
It is important to stress that improvements that take place are delivered via the participation of individual employees on the programme. Typically NVQ3 and NVQ2 level team leaders and operatives attend the Masterclasses. Skills in areas such as Problem Solving, Data Collection & Analysis and standardised work are scrutinised before and after the intervention in order to assess ‘distance travelled’ by participants.

b) Measurable Quality, Cost and Delivery (QCD) benefits 

Our definition of QCD benefits are ‘industry standard’ and are used by other organisations across the UK including the Manufacturing Advisory Service (MAS) Dissemination and comparison of outcomes across member states is a potential application of the QCD methodology. The seven measurable QCD benefits within an IF supply chain improvement programme are:
• Not Right First Time
• Delivery Schedule Adherence
• People Productivity
• Stock Turns
• Overall Equipment Effectiveness
• Value Added per person
• Floor Space Utilisation

c) Measurable Partnership Improvements
In terms of the dynamic between all of the participating firms and thus the impact on the supply chain as opposed to the individual companies it is also possible to construct ‘before and after’ metrics.
These metrics are based on both supplier and customer perception exercises which ask respondents about changes in the following business functions:
• Engineering
• Quality
• Schedules
• Logistics
• Commercial
• General
The supply chain improvement programme can be applied across sectors other than the automotive sector so one potential angle is a comparator of outcomes and effectiveness across different sectors. Financially the structure of a programme when delivered in a domestic UK context has typically been a one-third, one-third, one-third ‘split’ between grant funding, beneficiary cash contribution and in-kind contributions.