Development of a Process of Supply Chain Strategy Formulation: Action Research in Food Processing and Heavy Fabrication Industries

Strategic operations planning can assist companies to improve their competitiveness but the process of planning for manufacturing operations and supply chains requires further improvement. This paper describes our development of a method of strategic operations planning called Strategic Operations and Logistics Planning (SOLP). SOLP requires a team of managers to undertake a series of workshops during which they determine the order-winning criteria to satisfy end product groups and formulate the forward policy settings needed to efficiently satisfy the corporate goals of companies and their supply chain partners. SOLP has been applied eight times in manufacturing industry. Action research is used to learn about process application in a business situation and iteratively improve the model's ability and breadth. The applications show that managers are always able to construct a strategic plan, although the extent that it addresses the tasks required to follow the desired strategy is variable. Successful business outcomes are found in two thirds of the cases, predicated on the degree to which the participating managers have the ability, will and opportunity to implement them.