FRAMINGHAM, MA – Results from a global supply chain survey reveal a disconnect between business objectives and supply chain strategy, says Manufacturing Insights.

According to survey findings, 71% of respondents cited increased quality and customer satisfaction as their top business objective, followed by reducing overall cost and improving productivity (66%), and increasing revenues and exploiting new markets (62%).

However, 48% of respondents cited reducing material, manufacturing, and/or logistics costs as their top supply-chain strategy. Second and third supply strategies cited, respectively, were more responsiveness and timely decision-making across the global supply chain (39%), and more responsiveness to changes in the marketplace (36%).

When asked to identify “the most important IT investment areas in terms of their impact on global supply chain performance over the next two years,” the top three answers were advanced supply network planning or manufacturing scheduling, advanced inventory management or optimization, and supply chain execution, logistics control and management.

The survey results indicate many companies have a gap between overall objectives and how they execute in the supply chain, says Manufacturing Insights. 
 
The research firm conducted telephone surveys of 823 companies in January and February. More than 80% of respondents represented a line of business in their organization, such as supply chain operations, materials management or procurement.