Managing the operational and supply chain impact of the coronavirus

As the coronavirus pandemic sweeps across the world, operations leaders are focused on how to keep supply chains running. In doing so, they face several complicating factors: demand spikes in some sectors, and historic declines in others; variations in manufacturing capacity among cities and countries, with uncertain timeframes for a return to normal operations; and capacity and cost changes across every logistics mode. Rarely have supply chain leaders faced more complex, changing conditions. In this webinar, McKinsey experts lay out three priorities that can help companies manage through the crisis and ultimately strengthen their supply chain.

• Navigate the immediate term—Take targeted actions to manage the crisis. Companies can focus on six interrelated measures to address immediate issues in their supply chains and operations. They can create capacity to manage these activities by establishing a supply-chain control tower within a company’s crisis-response nerve center.
• Plan for a return to normal operations—Build the capabilities today for digitally enabled, rapid planning and supply-chain transparency. Uncertainty in consumer demand, plant operating status, and logistics availability will persist for months. Companies should therefore develop tools and capabilities to revise demand planning and sales and operating planning rapidly and to coordinate logistics appropriately.
• Become more resilient—Note lessons from this crisis and plan for the future. As organizations stabilize operations, they can begin to look ahead, learn from this experience, and build the supply-chain resilience that will help them to withstand disruptions in the future.

For more, see “Supply-chain recovery in coronavirus times—plan for now and the future.”