Decision-making process in supply chain management: Case of a small food business

© Proceedings of the 2020 IISE Annual. All Rights Reserved.The majority of enterprises in Latin America are micro enterprises or SMEs; nonetheless, these businesses don¿t have nearly the same rate of success as bigger firms. In order to propose strategies that will allow them a more prosperous future a research project was performed, in collaboration with MIT Center for Transportation & Logistics¿ whose objective is to evaluate the decision-making process regarding the supply chain in micro, small and medium enterprises along with Latin America. This particular investigation was carried out on a small food firm, located in northern Mexico; the purpose of this investigation is to provide an analysis of the decision-making process, as well as provide improvement proposals. The research method is a case study using an app designed by the MIT GeneSys team; the methodology consists of three stages: (a) planning, (b) data collection and observation (c) analysis and improvement proposals. As a result of shadowing sessions, easy to solve areas of opportunities to improve manager time efficient, were identify such as lack of appointing and delegating the basic operational activities as well as lack of written agreements between the firm and their suppliers. Major suggestions like the implementation of an acquisition criteria for new machinery and investment projects within the company were also proposed.

Decision-making process in supply chain management: Case of a small food business Academic Article in Scopus