Article review

Kathryn Stacy

FSCJ

September 2020
For this article review I chose the article called Global Supply chains in the Post-Pandemic

World by Willy C. Shih. As we all know, when the Coronavirus started to spread around the

world that many of us faced shortages of common supplies. This article goes over the issues

many supply chains faced because of the pandemic. Shih goes over how many businesses

realized the harsh reality of their supply chain being broken. Without crucial resources

businesses started to suffer. What happened during the pandemic is a prime example of what

businesses don’t want to happen again. Because of this, Shih says, that companies will now have

to start to rethink the way that they get their materials. The Author goes over the different ways

this can happen such as starting to manufacture domestically or spreading supply chains out over

different regions. Shih says that the first option would to look at the possibility of manufacturing

products domestically. He stats that in doing so, would cause for prices to rise but because of

competition this would be hard to enforce, therefore not making this option the best suitable one.

He mentions that companies would run into the problem of modern technology. According to

Shih, products have become more complex. This means that while we can produce domestically

with supply chains, our production lines are not capable of producing every material needed for

that products completion. One example that Shih mentions is that, auto makers equipped to make

the touchscreens that are now included in newer vehicles, that those are outsourced. The other

option is to invest in other suppliers so that when issues like pandemics or trade wars (China)

arise, there will be other options to ensure that there isn’t any short supply of products. Shih ends

the article in saying that production managers should use this as an eye opener to change the way

we use supply networks so that when another crisis happens production won’t be affected.
This relates back to chapter two because it talks about the importance of supply management. If

we did not employ supply chain strategies, then there is more of a chance of running into a

hiccup. This is especially true in the article because Shih emphasizes the need to rethink the way

we currently do supply management and how the supply chain will be fundamentally altered

after the events during the pandemic. In the past we have always heavily relied on china for our

manufacturing needs. The events of today prove that putting all your eggs in one basket will

leave you stranded. So, this also brings to the forefront the importance of always having a supply

chain. As an operations supervisor this is helpful information because it would remind me to use

other chains to keep my company running smoothly.

Shih, W. C. (2020). Global Supply Chains in a Post-Pandemic World. Harvard Business

Review, 98(5), 82–89.

http://eds.a.ebscohost.com/eds/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=1&sid=fec94918-e553-47b5-bace-

ce90ef67959c%40sessionmgr4006

https://union.discover.flvc.org/fj.jsp?

st=supply+chain&ix=kw&fl=ar&V=D&S=1641599357305965&I=7#top