How visible is your supply chain? A model for supply chain visibility assessment

Abstract

ABSTRACT Recent studies have highlighted the potential of supply chain visibility (SCV) to improve companies’ performance, support the decision-making process and increase the resilience and sustainability of supply chains (SC). However, the definition and the approaches to manage visibility are not consensual, especially when it comes to its assessment. This paper studies the influence that some characteristics of the information shared among SC partners have on SCV and provides a model that allows to assess the level of visibility. Focus group research was used to discuss the visibility assessment model with academic and practical experts and case studies were conducted to evaluate the implementation of the model in real contexts. The results support the applicability of the model in complex SCs and show that the visibility indices proposed can help managers to identify the SC partners where improvement actions are needed. This study contributes to literature and practice by means of a model to assess the visibility throughout the SC by considering different types and characteristics of the information shared.