Supplier Accountability Program Improves End-to-End Supply Chain Management

Supply chains have grown more intricate, increasing end-to-end vendor management difficulties. The complexities of a supply chain from planning, sourcing, and procurement to manufacturing, logistics, and distribution make the management of vendor partnerships increasingly unwieldy.

Manufacturers must handle the unpredictability from dozens of stakeholders, including early shipments, late shipments, and increased order sizes. So how do multinational companies handle the supplier who fails to deliver on time or who ships too soon? Traditionally, this has been a labor-intensive “trust-but-verify” process that often fails to curb rogue vendors, potentially disrupting customer relationships and damaging your reputation.

The challenge

Stanadyne, a 140-year-old innovative fuel systems developer, wanted to increase the accuracy of their order fulfillment with vendors. They needed to create full upstream and downstream visibility in the supply chain and establish a way to intercede, expedite, and communicate potential problems, overages, or shortages with vendors and customers.

In the last decade, Stanadyne moved from strongly emphasizing in-house manufacturing processes to outsourcing key components of their portfolio. This complicated sourcing and purchasing, changing key workflows of their global supply chain. However, they needed new tools to adapt to these changes as the company experienced rapid growth. Stanadyne’s keen emphasis on continuous improvement emphasized technology as a driver of process improvements to help them meet their goals.

They felt this would have a positive impact on their overarching goal to grow their business’s commercial and automotive side in what had become a very competitive marketplace.

Managing vendor partnerships was Stanadyne’s goal when they partnered with LynnCo’s supplier accountability program. Together, we rolled out a tangible, easy-to-manage web portal that improved supply chain relationships while increasing accountability for their global vendor network.

The solution

At LynnCo, we understand how technology can improve the performance of even the most dispersed and complex supply chains. We’ve developed a new tool for monitoring vendor performance to give our partners more control of their inventory and shipments. Stanadyne was one of the first LynnCo clients to roll the tool out to their U.S. vendors in a pilot of the new supplier accountability program.

LynnCo worked closely with Stanadyne to introduce a technology solution that helped maintain their quality signature while also managing supplier relationships. We trained every Stanadyne vendor in the supplier accountability program and management tool, so they would not only be prepared to use the technology but also understand the benefits it provides to their business.

The user-friendly web portal has adjustable parameters where Stanadyne and its vendors can communicate their needs and progress. This portal allows Stanadyne to set specific shipment dates and volumes. Vendors report their progress in the portal and notify Stanadyne the date and details of a shipment. If the vendor wants to ship early or late, the vendor can send a request through the portal, which Stanadyne can then approve or decline.

The results

The responses from the Stanadyne supplier accountability program in the United States beta test were extremely positive, especially from vendors. In addition to reining in unpredictable shipping practices, vendors also saw a benefit in the portal as a way to manage their own Stanadyne order records.

The vendor accountability tool has since gone live with their international suppliers. As part of the process with the international team, they turned off the U.S. vendors. However, while Stanadyne’s management team were at a conference, a vendor came up to ask if they could turn the portal back on because it was such an effective purchase order (PO) management tool.

Jeffrey Williams, the Global Director of Supply Chain at Stanadyne, said, “You hear the words ‘partnership’ and ‘collaboration’ a lot, but LynnCo really meets the definition.” They truly appreciated LynnCo acting as a Stanadyne team member by managing vendor training and taking the burden off Stanadyne employees.

True partnership is about creating solutions that work for everyone. Although a supplier accountability program sounds like it only controls in vendors, it offers significant benefits to their businesses as well. We’re proud to offer solutions that help our clients and their supply chain partners.

[cta]For more information on how to put LynnCo’s supplier accountability program to work for your business, contact your Solutions Strategist, Jeanette Sefers, at Jeanette.Sefers@lynnco-scs.com.[/cta]