Assignment:

Produce an analytical report, mapping and analysing the procurement and supply chain for a chosen company. Present your results as both a written report (2500 words) detailing your findings, and improvement programs AND a Google Sites presentation of your complete analysis. Read all instructions and format requirements below before beginning on your assessment task.

Background:
You have been recruited as the procurement and supply chain analyst for a major company (e.g. a multinational manufacturer, large retailer, service provider).

The Director of Supply Chain has asked you to meet with him. During this meeting, he has discussed some of the challenges and opportunities that the company is currently facing, indicating that the supply chain team should proactively seek for end-to-end supply chain improvement programs to safeguard the company's long-term success. The Director of Supply Chain tells you that the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) is very keen on the supply chain performance of the company and sees the supply chain team as having a strategic role to assist the company to progress toward its vision, mission and strategic goals.

The Director of Supply Chain has also told you that there will be a board meeting coming up in a few weeks, and has requested you to work on an end-to-end procurement and supply chain mapping and analysis of the company, and identity improvement programs that can result in potential cost savings while contributing to social and/or environmental practices and performance of the company.

You know that perhaps this is your greatest opportunity to create some visibility of your skills, strengths and innovate ideas to the top management, and also demonstrate that you can significantly contribute to the supply chain efficiency and effectiveness of your employer.
The Director of Supply Chain has given you some valuable information in terms of specific issues that you will need to address as part of this work (see below). You know that there is a lot of work involved in addressing these issues and that you will have to undertake a structured and professional approach to develop an analytical report that impresses the top management.

Description

In order to develop your analytical report, you will need to go through the following steps:

1. Choose a company (multinational manufacturer, large retailer, service provider) - make sure the product associated with your chosen company is not too complex (e.g. car, aircraft and the like)

2. Address all tasks outlined in the list of Detailed Tasks using secondary (e.g. company reports, journal articles, newspaper articles) and/or primary (e.g. interview, survey) data

3. Create a Google Sites page (see below for how to do this), and share the URL with your lecturer .

4. Upload your comprehensive analysis of all tasks outlined in the list of Detailed Tasks to Google Sites (see below), and only include your key findings in your report. A number of analytical tools (from the topics covered during the semester) are suggested throughout the tasks which will assist with the analysis.

5. Discuss the company's procurement and supply chain analysis, focussing on the synthesis of the findings associated with supply, operations, information, integration and sustainability issues. We suggest that you use the dynamic alignment model (Module 5) as a theoretical framework to synthesis your findings into a meaningful supply chain-wide discussion of issues that the company is facing. This is a fundamental component if the report as you will need to provide an integrated understanding of your analysis which requires delving into the issues of, for example, alignment and systems thinking.

6. Drawing on Step 5, propose and discuss improvement programs focused on supply, operations, information, integration and sustainability which can collectively contribute to mitigate the challenges that the company is facing across its supply chain.

Prepare your report as a Word document, addressed to your company's Board, no more than 2500 words, using Academy of Management referencing style (your reference list is not included in your word count). Make sure you address all the questions in the Detailed Tasks in your report. As you prepare your report, upload all your analyses to Google Sites, sharing your progress with your tutor.