Navigating global supply chain challenges: a quality manager’s perspective

Aaron Hoare Date published: Jul 11, 24

Global supply chains are inherently full of complexities, making it difficult to ensure continuous quality and compliance. Organizations need to navigate an integrated system of processes, people and technology across multiple different countries, cultures and time zones. Not only does this require knowledge of different local regulations and cultures, but also a strong understanding of the varying risks and possible disruptions associated with each individual region.

As a result, organizations with global supply chains are often exposed to a higher range of risks, leading to a range of challenges such as cost fluctuations, significant delays, difficulty tracking the movement of goods and penalties for non-compliance.

However, when they’re managed effectively, global supply chains can deliver numerous advantages. With overseas labor and production often being cheaper than onshore manufacturing, organizations can reduced costs with transnational production. Flexibility and efficiency can also increase, enabling organizations to swiftly respond to changes, increase productivity and ultimately, meet demand.

To fully realize these benefits, quality managers across all industries need to create robust global supply chains that simultaneously ensure quality and compliance, mitigate risks and enhance operational efficiencies. In this article, we explore the best practices for global supply chain measurement to ensure quality and compliance on a global scale.

1.      Choose the right suppliers

Supplier selection is a vital step in ensuring quality and compliance throughout a global supply chain. Quality managers must do their due diligence on every supplier, and conduct regular audits, to check their financial stability, compliance record and relevant accreditations and supply chain practices.

The specific qualities an organization looks for in a supplier will vary depending on their needs and priorities. However, generally, quality managers should look to partner with companies who are committed to quality standards, have effective risk management protocols, have a good reputation in the industry, are responsive when issues occur and offer a balance of high quality and cost-effective pricing.

2.     Diversify suppliers

In order to minimize the risk of disruption, it’s often wise for organizations to diversify their supplier portfolios – especially for critical or hard-to-procure items. Relying too heavily on a single provider, or even multiple providers in the same region, can expose operations to an inflated risk of costly disruption.

As a result, quality managers should look to build a network of providers around the globe – either by having multiple suppliers for a single item on an ongoing basis, or by maintaining a database of approved alternative vendors that can quickly plug the gap if an incumbent becomes unable to meet demand.

3.      Standardize expectations

Quality managers should establish and maintain universal standards, protocols and expectations for all their suppliers around the world. This is especially important if the organization has multiple providers of a single item, as variation between suppliers is likely to lead to inconsistent quality for the organization.

These standards should be communicated clearly with comprehensive documentation that includes detailed guidelines and procedures. When universal standards are communicated clearly and suppliers are all held to the same standards, quality management is simplified – making it easier to ensure consistent high quality globally.

4.      Ensure local compliance

Achieving and maintaining compliance can be extremely difficult when supply chains span numerous countries. But with failure to meet regulatory requirements likely to result in fines and penalties, as well as reputational damage, compliance is vital.

To help ensure compliance with local laws and regulations, organizations should find and engage with local experts who can advise on local compliance requirements and alert the organization about any changes. Quality managers should also look to train employees and suppliers on local requirements and standards, ensuring everyone is aligned on expectations.

5.     Continuously manage risk

Monitoring and managing risk on an ongoing basis is crucial for global supply chains. By spreading operations across several regions, organizations increase the range of risks they’re exposed to. As a result, quality managers need to perform regular risk assessments, identifying, updating and mitigating risks to protect against serious disruption.

Contingency planning is also crucial, clearly laying out what steps should be taken in the event of specific disruptions in order to minimize the impacts on the business. Such plans should also be collected from suppliers to ensure resilience and business continuity throughout the supply chain.

6.      Leverage technology

To efficiently manage and monitor complex global supply chains, quality managers should employ the latest supply chain tools and technologies. Ideally, supplier management should be integrated into a wider quality management system (QMS) solution to ensure a continuous focus on quality throughout the supply chain.

By investing in modern tools such as automation, data analytics and real-time tracking, organizations can ensure their operations are safe and efficient around the world.

7.      Proactively control quality

Of course, quality managers need to continuously monitor and ensure quality – both within their own organization and across the supply chain. By conducting regular checks and quality assessments throughout production and the supply chain, quality managers can maintain control over their organization’s standards around the world.

Establishing effective feedback loops is an essential part of ensuring quality and continuous improvement. Quality managers need to be able to quickly identify and resolve issues by communicating with both suppliers and customers – and organizations therefore need to make it easy for their partners to raise quality issues.

8.      Build strong relationships

To help ensure the supply chain continues to operate smoothly around the globe, organizations need to build strong partnerships with suppliers and other stakeholders. This can be challenging when dealing with partners around the world, however it can be hugely valuable in the event of disruption.

By fostering trust with third parties, quality managers can build a culture of openness and collaboration – helping to identify and resolve issues more quickly.

9.       Communicate globally

A key part of building relationships is communication. Quality managers need to create and maintain open lines of communication across the supply chain and around the world to enable swift resolutions to any issues that arise.

For global supply chains, language barriers and varying time zones can make communication difficult – leading to misunderstandings and delayed responses between parties. To alleviate these challenges, organizations should leverage technology such as QMS solutions to facilitate smooth knowledge sharing and effective problem solving across borders.

10.  Source ethically

Although offshore sourcing can often be cheaper, it can also come with additional responsibilities. In particular, organizations have an ethical duty to ensure labor laws and human rights are respected across their operations – from sourcing raw materials to producing parts.

Additionally, sustainability and compliance with environmental regulations should also be a key priority throughout the supply chain. Organizations should check certifications for ISO 14001 for environmental management, and ISO 45001 for occupational health and safety, to ensure standards are being adhered to by every supplier.

Navigating global complexities

In order to minimize the inherent risk of global supply chains, and realize the full benefits they can offer, quality managers need to continuously and proactively manage their suppliers.

However, with several other responsibilities to juggle simultaneously, comprehensive supplier management can often take a back seat – particularly amidst ongoing labor shortages. By integrating supplier management directly into the organization’s QMS solution, quality managers can easily track and monitor suppliers’ risk and compliance status around the globe.

Designed with quality managers in mind, Ideagen’s quality solutions support over 6,000 businesses around the world to comply with industry standards and streamline quality management processes. Seamlessly integrating with existing processes, our SaaS tools elevate quality and supplier management – helping organizations to gain a competitive advantage by leveraging the latest technologies.