Accessories Designer
The Client
Our client designs, manufactures and delivers sustainable accessories supplying leading UK supermarkets and retailers.
As a business experiencing rapid growth, management recognised the importance of embedding resilience to maintain the growth trajectory whilst operating in a complex environment. They wanted to ensure there is a business continuity (BC) plan that can evolve and grow with the organisation, smoothing any potential “bumps in the road”.
The client understood it would give a degree of comfort and be helpful for customers to know a plan is in place. Insurers are likely to require confirmation of BC planning in the future.
The Challenge
The results of an internal risk analysis with managers needed to be turned into actionable plans; protecting the supply chain and reputation is of paramount importance to the business.
Operating as an end-to-end business, the complexities of maintaining design, manufacture, logistics and sales capabilities can create a challenging risk environment. The geopolitical risks that arise with factories and key dependencies located in the far east could impact production and transport routes, leaving the client unable to fulfil product and delivery commitments.
Teed’s wide experience of working with manufacturing, retail and distribution clients, meant we were ideally placed to help the client understand the business continuity threats that may impact their ability to meet delivery schedules. Useful insights into similar businesses could be incorporated when identifying where and when would be best for the client to invest in building up resource resilience.
A full lifecycle project was needed to implement a comprehensive business continuity management system to ensure all gaps were identified, contingencies and workarounds agreed and strategies developed to plug the gaps.
The Solution
Teed’s consultant started with exploratory discussions with relevant business representatives to gain an in-depth view of operations, threats and areas to focus on. This included an IT review with the company’s external IT resource to understand the technology infrastructure and dependencies on third parties.
Eight business impact analysis and planning workshops were undertaken for the most critical areas of the business to explore priorities, requirements and issues. From these, the warehouse, stock and factory facilities were deemed critical, the potential loss of which could jeopardise business performance. A separate recovery strategy workshop was held to drill down into these aspects and identify logical, cost-effective strategies to overcome full or partial loss.
The consultant took the findings of the analysis, planning and strategy workshops to develop a BC plan with the necessary response and recovery information to allow the company to support its critical activities in the event of an adverse situation.
To prove that the output of all the discussions held over the course of a project are worthwhile and necessary, a tabletop exercise is vital to validate priorities, recovery strategies and the actions needed in the face of adversity.
For this client, four evolving scenarios were introduced during the exercise, based on key threats to the business:
- Warehouse and stock destroyed by fire
- A cyber-attack making IT unavailable
- Loss of a key manufacturing facility
- Disruption to a third-party supplier
Participants recognised the value of the tabletop exercise with one commenting:
“Despite having no preparation, we were able to generate actionable ideas for responding to these worst-case scenarios.”
“It was interesting to see how these tough situations hit every part of the company.”
Improvement and risk mitigation actions were identified during the project, clearly showing what needs to happen to satisfy business continuity objectives and keep impacts within acceptable levels.
Improvement actions were documented as a BC Actions list, each rated via a (RAG) system: Red (high), Amber (medium), Green (low), based on their level of impact from a business continuity and risk perspective. At the end of the project, no further red actions were remaining, leaving 13 amber and 8 green actions to be taken forward by the client.
Of these, a straightforward mitigation action to split certain stock at key times, for example, in the lead up to national events and campaigns, would ensure priority customer requirements can always be satisfied, thus protecting reputation. Improvements to supplier management practices were identified to help minimise supply chain threats; some actions recommended further improvements to cyber and IT resilience; plus, mitigation to reduce dependence on select key individuals.
The Result
The client now has an effective and scalable business continuity management system embedded into ongoing responsibilities and business activities. Building on this will enable the client to keep business continuity front and centre through further growth and provide assurance to stakeholders that their interests are protected.
The management team is now wholly sold on the benefits of business continuity planning and recognises that Teed’s involvement enabled them to meet their brief of an actionable plan to manage risks to the business.