Supply chain risk management in French companies

The risk thematic is not new in management, but it is a recent and growing subject in supply chain management. Supply Chain Risk Management (SCRM) plays a major role in successfully managing business processes in a proactive manner. Supply chain risk has multiple sources including process, control, demand, supply and environment. Supply chain management, faced with these risks, requires specific and adequate responses such as techniques, attitude and strategies for management of risk. This paper is based on an empirical study of 142 general managers and logistics and supply chain managers in 50 different French companies. It demonstrates that for organizations to be effective, SCRM must be a management function that is inter-organizational in nature and closely related to strategic and operational realities of the activity in question. Moreover, the findings of our empirical study suggest that effective SCRM is based on collaboration (collaborative meetings, timely and relevant information exchanges) and the establishment of joint and common transverse processes with industrial partners. (C) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.