Chrisantos Osumo

HOW UNILEVER SOURCES FOR PRODUCTS AND SERVICES. Supply chain management consists of logistics which is a framework that helps firms coordinate the flow of materials and critical information within a business. The logistics concept has been developed and integrated with other supply chain management functions to address the challenges of the increasingly global economy. The supply management process seeks to link and coordinate all the firm’s processes and stakeholders that are operating under one value chain such as the suppliers, firms’ customers, and the company operations. The main aim of the supply chain management process is to achieve efficiency and achieve a win-win outcome for every stakeholder in the supply chain. (Christopher, 2004). The supply chain consists of four main processes that must be linked coherently, planning, sourcing, making, and delivering. Supply chain management operations at Unilever. The Unilever supply chain management process covers the sourcing of materials and services from their prequalified suppliers until the finished products are delivered to the final consumers at the right time, right quality, and right place while maintaining the supply chain's efficiency and effectiveness. According to the Unilever planning manager, Unilever depends on the four supply chain functions of planning, sourcing, making, and delivering. Unilever separates the planning function in its supply chain into two main parts: demand planning and supply planning. The main role of the demand planners is to ensure they capture demand drivers from the business environment, and they conduct a data analysis by using the current and historical data to make future demand forecasts. This forecast is communicated through an enterprise resource planning system to the supply planners. When the supply chain planners receive the forecast, they consolidate all the data and develop materials plans, production plans, and distribution plans within the Unilever supply chain. Where they source the raw materials as per the data sent by the demand planners. These plans include short-term and long-term plans including activities. The sourcing function in the Unilever supply chain includes creating and developing a relationship with their prequalified suppliers to ensure that goods are delivered and received effectively and efficiently. Unilever supply chain management teams evaluate their suppliers by negotiating with the appropriate vendors and thereafter including them in their prequalified list of suppliers. Unilever has a sourcing policy that every supplier should conform to do business with them. They developed the policy to ensure that they are improving the lives of their employees across their supply chain and stakeholders in their business environment which is consistent with Unilever's sustainability plan. The Unilever sourcing policy is embedded in twelve fundamental principles that are aligned with the company's business goals that focus on environmental and social impact. This policy was developed with close collaboration with the company stakeholders. The fundamental principles are divided into broad categories: mandatory requirements, good and best practices. The first step is ensuring that the supplier conforms to the mandatory requirements of the company. The mandatory requirements ensure that all the suppliers conform to the fundamental principles for them to work with Unilever. The fundamental mandatory requirements that suppliers must meet are; Business should be conducted with integrity and should be lawful. Work should be done under the agreed terms and conditions, all the workers should be treated equally without discrimination, work should be conducted voluntarily without any force and all workers should have the appropriate age and be paid fair wages. Any company or individual that wants to be a Unilever supplier, needs to go through their Unilever supply qualification system. This is a global supplier qualification platform that gives Unilever a complete overview of all the suppliers that they want to partner with. This platform also helps the suppliers to meet all the requirements that are outlined. Any company that wants to work with Unilever must complete the required information on the platform. This platform helps Unilever identify the partners they want to work with or buy their goods and services. It also helps Unilever understand the potential risks of buying products from a particular supplier all over the world. It helps the company identify the suppliers who need their standards to be improved. Keeps Unilever and its partners accountable when faced with changes to regulations and legislation, locally or globally. The suppliers who successfully register with the Unilever supplier qualification system qualify to be Unilever suppliers or partners. After meeting all the requirements Unilever negotiates contacts the vendors, negotiates then signs short-term or longterm contracts with the supplier. Every supplier for both short and long-term must go through the supplier qualification system. The firm has a global strategy that focuses on the organization's performance when it comes to the supply chain collaboration strategy. The firm has collaborated with different firms to implement its technology strategy. The firm uses radio frequency identification to monitor the movement of goods through their supply chain and, they use data analytics to improve visibility. (Bottani et al., 2017. Unilever was the first company to use blockchain technology to track and control their credibly complicated or critical suppliers such as Walmart. In its strategy to implement sustainability, the company changed its logistics strategy. They no longer outsource they moved their logistics in-house. The company consolidates the goods to reduce the emissions and cost of production. Unilever partnered with Astute solutions to implement RealDiallogTm this is a knowledge management solution and agent assist tool. They did this intending to achieve world-class consumer goods contact center. This system responds to the customers' queries through the company website, or the provided portal, email, and contact center. It understands the user's questions and answers them in their language. The procurement in Unilever ensures that selling and distribution of the products are advertised to their distributors, partners, and foodservice merchants and this is instituted through the sales workforce’s team and independent dealers. Retailers are the primary places that Unilever uses to distribute its products. After the goods have been manufactured they are distributed to the biggest retailers such as Walmart which are responsible for distributing the products. They usually use kiosks to introduce their new products to the market while utilizing personal selling. Unilever collaborates with retailers to promote a selection of these products. When the Uniliver distributors want to return the goods they ordered if the items are defective at the time when they are delivered Uniliver has a contact center where the customer calls within 48 hours for an exchange or a refund. The items are picked up within 48 hours. Unilever has implemented E-procurement which helps them achieve one main strategic goal world-class supply chain and simplification of their procurement process. Six drives are being used by Unilever device executive buying, influencing simplification, enabling and implementing procurement globally. The Unilever supply chain structure is aligned with the company's business plan. This helps Unilever company take advantage of opportunities across the enterprise hence saving money and time. They have abandoned the conventional supply chain philosophy and they have opted for the modern understanding of and emphasis on both the market and the supply chain strategies. Unilever has collaborated with suppliers and partners for them to achieve a long-term sustainability goal. They collaborate to foster innovation with the stakeholders and long-term investment within the supply chain. Unilever developed a sustainable living plan which they have been implementing for years. Unilever wants to grow its revenues while lowering the environmental impacts, which include the manufacturing and the customer's use, and disposal of their products. The company recognizes the fact that a customer of choice for their suppliers is very important to receive preferential access to services, ideas, and technological support through the partnership they develop. (Dentoni, Bitzer, and Schouten, 2018). This has also developed Unilever's procurement manager mindset from being transactional to be business relationship management approach to procurement. The company is very committed to serving its customers' growth through its existing products. It has heavily invested in market research and exploration to warrant that its products continue to meet its customers' needs, due to the evolving lifestyles and the change in customer preferences. The company ensures a steady supply of goods to its world outlets to satisfy millions of consumers. This has been maintained for a long while because the company has been maintaining the high quality of its products. It has also implemented a databank management model to simplify its databases and reduce downtime. Unilever was particularly pleased with the solution’s failure prediction function (Kubota, Horita, and Tasaki, 2020). By allowing database managers to unpack and regroup data while mission-critical requests remain online, the solution reduces downtime. Unilever has invested heavily in the quality management team and the analyst that are responsible for ensuring that the quality of the products is consistent. They conduct all the checks and identify any inconsistencies that may make their way to the consumers. Any defects noticed are forwarded to the department manager to ensure that quality goods are produced (Berghout, 2020). They find it hard to maintain 100 percent accuracy because human error is inevitable. The supply chain strategy has helped Unilever achieve its supply chain goal. It has been established on a direct consumer theory, which has enhanced consumer feedback hence products are manufactured to meet consumer needs. This has worked as a marketing strategy for Unilever since their products are manufactured based on their consumer requirements. This has also helped the company to rapidly respond to the changing economic conditions, by producing products that will trade well during harsh economic conditions. They have integrated their supply chain with all their internal departments, for example, the research and development for the creation of products are fed with the information that comes from the consumers hence designing products that meet customer needs. Uniliver collects customer feedback to help to grow and improve its products. References 1. Brands – Unilever. 2. Wilshaw, R., Unger, L., Do Quynh, C., & Thu, T. P. (2013). Labour Rights in Unilever's Supply Chain: From compliance to good practice. An Oxfam study of labor issues in Unilever's Viet Nam operations and supply chain. Oxfam. 3. Bilovodska, O. A., Saher, L. Y., & Syhyda, L. O. (2018). Supply chain management: world’s companies experience. 4. Trinh, D. (2018). Improving Supply Chain Management at Unilever Vietnam. 5. Mvubu, M. (2015). Green supply chain management challenges in the South African fastmoving consumer goods industry: a case of Unilever (Doctoral dissertation).