RightChain: Maximizing Financial and Service Performance with Supply Chain Strategy

From a rich, thirty-year career in supply chain consulting, education, and analytics, Dr. Ed Frazelle observes that a large majority of supply chains do not have the capabilities—education, analytics, and methodology—to deal with their growing supply chain complexities. “The width of the capability-complexity gap determines the opportunity to help our clients,” he asserts. Via algorithms, curriculum, methodology, and publications, Frazelle founded RightChain™ to assist supply chain organizations in closing their supply chain capability-complexity gap. Frazelle explains, “For firms with a wide and widening gap, RightChain™ is able to insert three to five percent of sales on the bottom line and impact inventory between 15-30 percent. For those with a narrow and narrowing gap, RightChain™ is able to put one to two percent of sales on the bottom line and impact inventory between 10-15 percent.”

RightChain™ guides client firms to the answers to the ten questions that comprise a supply chain strategy. The approach begins with supply chain mission questions—What metrics and targets should define supply chain success? What supply chain service strategy should lead out supply chain strategy? The supply related questions include—How much inventory should we carry and where? Who should we source from and in what quantity? The logistics related questions include— What transportation network design and flows optimize our supply chain? What warehouse designs and configurations maximize our supply chain performance? The support related questions include— What supply chain activities should be outsourced and to who? What supply chain information systems best enable our supply chain strategy? The management questions include—What is the best way to organize and develop our supply chain? What planning program best coordinates the activities and players in the supply chain?

According to Frazelle, “RightChain™ is a reference to the umbrella of our proprietary algorithms, seminars, and publications that work together to answer those ten questions. The modules are like plays we run depending on the capabilities and missing elements of a firm’s supply chain.” There are so many interdependencies in supply chain decision making that unless a structured, analytical approach is incorporated, supply chain strategy development becomes like a cat chasing its tail.