As a first step in establishing the business plan, the foundation team will have to think about the basic business idea, i.e., the services and products that the future institution will offer. The team will also think about, who will be most interested in these services and products. Do not limit yourself. List all possible activities that you think your institution would be able to offer to different target groups.
The Guide will assist your thinking process with a list of typical activities offered by supply chain support institutions or associations in the different life cycle phases. Find further information about activities of existing associations at the International Trade Centre's “Worldwide Directory of Purchasing & Supply Chain Associations”
Generally speaking, the activities of a professional support or training develop over time from start-up to maturity.
Note 2 Criteria for business activities
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Every activity needs to: | |
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Benefit the professional group |
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Secure the financial survival of the association or institution |
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Contribute to its future development |
In the following paragraphs typical activities of supply chain support institutions were listed with respect to the different life-cycle phases.
Professional Training
Experience showed that it is resource efficient and realistic to start with short-term training programmes that complement other types of training that are either locally available or specifically tailored to the needs of one or more enterprises. This will allow the young association to build up its reputation, experience and contacts without exceeding their mostly scarce beginner resources. Short-term programmes might also serve as important sales leads for bigger projects with the same client/company at a later stage.
Web site Information
In order to deliver first "quick wins" to its members the association could decide to set up a Web site. Besides the positive effect of increased visibility, the site will serve as broad information and communication base. In the beginning when resources are hardly available, the association can publish existing brochures and information on its training programmes, upcoming training events and any other supply chain management information available - a relatively low investment in time and money.
Member exchange of experience and information
A new association should not tie up its resources in organising costly conferences and big venues, but it could easily manage for more “intimate” member meetings with a special focus on target sectors, regions, etc. It is important that these meetings serve a purpose/objective (e.g. networking, building a sector training initiative, discussing regional supply chain topics, etc.) and that the information exchanged is fed-back to the association's operations. This means, the association should check whether it can offer member beneficial and income generating activities on any of the issues raised.
Email Newsletters
A cost saving alternative to the classical Newsletter are member emails containing news about the association's activities, and depending on time resources, abstracts on supply chain trends or topics. These email newsletters can further be posted on the Website and contribute to its continuing growth and visibility.
Research and Publications
Activities in this field could be undertaken if the association has members and/or supporters that can deliver articles or publications on a voluntary basis. Another attempt would be to work closely together with already existing university or other research institutions that are willing to share some of their supply chain management related work with the institution.
Lobbying & Public Sector
The association could promote the role of supply chain professions and their contribution to the development of competitiveness of the businesses in building and maintaining contact with important public officials. The public sector is also a very important buyer of equipment and goods itself. Hence, the public sector should also be interested in improving its local or national supplier base and relationship (public-private partnerships). Furthermore, the public sector can become an active member and/or client of the support institution.
Training
Being backed by first training experiences and hopefully by a growing list of contacts the association will develop and organise mid to long-term programmes for basic, intermediate and maybe advanced levels. The training offered should be sector related and comprise state-of-the-art techniques related to purchasing and supply chain management operations, touching upon national and international sourcing, materials management, logistics, e-commerce, etc.
In the growth phase the association will face the challenge to organise (inter)national experts who can cover specialised topics. Networking and partnership agreements with other associations should be helpful in this regard.
Website
The Website will have to be continuously growing with the association's activities. New information sources will be added and more active elements developed, e.g. news corner, answers & questions, databases, etc. These developments will have to be funded out of other revenue generating activities.
Exchange of experience and information
The association will have some income left-overs or funding sources that will allow to participate in local, national and international conferences and events. These should be used for awareness creation, collection of information regarding supply chain management trends and key persons and most important, networking.
The association will continue to organise member meetings and symposia on topics and questions relevant to SCM staff and managers. Additionally, the association should use its pool of contacts and invite experts, international specialists or senior national officials in order to up-market its events.
Specialised advice and information services
Besides the Website and newsletter the association will begin to compile and analyse information on SCM. The association has to ensure sustainability of such operations. It will need some additional funding or project contracts to build databases and write reports.
One can imagine that the following types of information could be elaborated:
· Information on scheduled commercial SCM events (trade exhibitions, conferences, fairs, presentations, etc.)
· Economic, legal, financial and/or commercial SCM information e.g. for sectors
· Trend surveys (business practices in SCM, development of SC services industry, etc.)
Research and publications
Lobbying and public sector
See start-up phase actitivities
Training
More and more sector specific training materials and courses will have been developed. The association disposes of a pool of national and international trainer and expert resources that allow more flexibility in terms of client specific topics and courses offered. Additional training projects (minorities, social groups, etc.) can be started with the help of special funding.
Website
The Website could more and more develop into an information and networking tool for members (members only area) and clients providing interactivity in the form of discussion forum, know-how tools, article downloads, etc.
Exchange of experience and information
The association will have resources to organise annual or bi-annual open SCM conferences at a regional or national level. National or international guest speakers and key players will be invited. The conference will strengthen the association's reputation and networking capacities. The association should issue a call for papers and nominate moderators who will summarise workshops or discussion forum. The conference will then lead to a series of publications and articles in the field of SCM.
Specialised advice and information
Depending on the strategy and staff know-how of the association it could expand its advisory and information services to consultancy offers. This means that supply chain sector experts need to be developed into consultants. The acceptance and success of the consultancy offer will strongly depend on the performance and credibility of the institution or association built-up so far.
Research and publications
Having enough expert resources at hand the association could think of issuing a journal or periodical. These resources would also allow to respond to international calls for paper for SCM conferences, publish articles in known journals or newspapers and to do research projects for public bodies (chambers, sector organisations, the government, etc.) As stated in the phases before, a co-operation with a university or applied research institution could be of major interest.