At Bendi, we are fortunate to have some fantastic conversations with many people, mainly in the garment industry but also within diverse industries spanning various categories.
Whilst the insights are many, and the conversations all unique in their own ways, we often find ourselves engaged in discussing similar and recurring themes.
It’s almost becoming a truism these days to talk about how varied and complicated some global supply chains are. Products and their components cross borders, change hands, and travel through different codes and regulations (and sometimes their absence, unfortunately). Effectively, an already complicated network of movement in cargo, transactions, and handoffs now involves thinking about invisible systems like transport companies, working practices, different and evolving local climates, and unique geographies.
The risks along the way are everywhere, from employee-employer relationships being at breaking point in one place to the announcement of upcoming bad weather in another and drastic changes in government-led health policies elsewhere again. And when thinking about remediation, some are more manageable than others, for example, in areas where brands (especially those with a manufacturing arm) have direct authority. Some are enforced at the financial & management expense of the brands, enacting their corporate responsibility but without the support of local authorities. And some are almost impossible to apply because a supplier does not appear on a brand’s radar at all.
We have been thinking about the problems for a while, and we’ve made in part our mission to shine a spotlight on ways to improve supply chains. Because of this, we are developing an approach based on risks and mapping the chains starting from brands down to the fruit plantation, the cotton fields, the fisheries, and wherever the inception point of a given commodity is.
We are always looking to improve, finding many ways to leverage data from open source registers and indices, our proprietary models, and customer data to help them navigate sometimes tumultuous waters.
Risk management and supplier mapping are multi-approach, holistic activities that take a lot of work. At times, we borrow from investigative approaches and always take a lot of time communicating with all the parties involved. We want our customers to understand the landscape of their different supplier tiers and the changes that affect their portfolios; from tier 1, they know directly to the end of the tree.
It’s clear that, as Alfred Korzybski pointed out, “the map is not the territory”. But whilst the real world is messy and complex, maps are designed for clarity and purpose. And the opportunity for another read of a situation, especially when we cross it with insights and high-quality data to extract result that can sometimes challenge our expectations and makes us look twice.