Bottleneck Management
It happens even in the best business relationships. Sooner or later, a bottleneck occurs, no matter how long the company has been working with the same supplier, and no matter how closely the relevant departments at the two companies work together. A supply bottleneck can easily trigger hectic troubleshooting, but the first thing to do is examine the situation in greater detail. What was the actual cause of the bottleneck? Was it just an unfortunate coincidence that caused production to break down? Or was there some systemic flaw that could reappear at any time?
In order to prevent future supply bottlenecks, the first step is the most important one: conduct a detailed analysis of the circumstances. Quite often it turns out that the bottleneck affects only a few critical parts. Future procurement strategy should focus on gaining as much freedom of action in the supplier market as possible.
Bottleneck management starts with three short-term measures:
Establishing targeted program management and focusing resources on problem components
Implementing near-term change of supplier (focusing on development and testing resources for short-term approval)
Dispatching a number of employees to the supplier; obtaining delivery forecasts from the supplier which can be updated daily; ensuring timely internal communication
Over the medium term, more incisive measures are possible:
Substituting parts or eliminating variants
Making further supplier changes in order to achieve greater diversification
Focusing on new developments and new technologies in order to reduce dependence on old technology
The three long-term recommendations for avoiding supply bottlenecks are:
Building up additional suppliers with capabilities identical to those of current suppliers
Identifying suppliers who, while not yet at the required level, can be developed further with measures already in the drawer
Dual sourcing (that is, using at least two suppliers in parallel for critical components)