PaperWorking Paper No. 26-04
The State of the Art in Supply Chain Risk Management 2026
How Large Corporations Catch Up: A Step-by-Step Action Plan and a Self-Audit
· 13 pages· In English
In the last week of October 2026, British shoppers sent sales of tinned food and torches soaring because their government had asked them to last three days alone. Hormuz and Suez lost in the same week, Jaguar Land Rover idled by a cyber attack, the Rhine at 31 centimetres at Kaub: yet most boards still manage supply chain risk with a Value at Risk built once and filed. What the state of the art does differently, and a ninety-day plan to catch up.
What you will find inside
- Ten years and one summer: how 2025 and 2026 turned known risks into operating conditions.
- Why a frozen Value at Risk measures the past: the arithmetic, the tier-one eyesight, the calendar.
- Time to survive and time to recover (MIT), and why Lean is not the defendant.
- Six practices that hold, and a twelve-question self-audit for the board.
- A ninety-day, eight-step catch-up plan, with no software before week eight.
Who it is for
Executive committees, supply chain, purchasing and risk leaders in mid-caps and large groups.
“A frozen assessment measures the past.”
The author
Manuel Gourmand
Founder of Phi-Lean · ENIM engineer · MSc Lean Enterprise, University of Buckingham
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