Procurement Flexibility as a Tool for Supplier Selection in Disastrous Environments

Supply chain flexibility (SCF) is being viewed most important among the tools to counter and handle risks and uncertainties in today’s volatile markets. It may also be considered to plan strategies, in order to gain competitive edge over competitors. Recently extensive work is being reported in SCF focussing mainly on its multi dimensional aspects and implementation. However SCF is no free lunch and it may require huge investments to realise its potential benefits. ‘How much flexibility is required’, thus becomes the prime concern for firms willing to be flexible. This question is rarely discussed in the literature and in its scarcity, flexibility performance measurements remains untouched for risky and uncertain environments. Therefore measuring SCF is a prominent field where research needs to be focused. In this paper a mathematical model is proposed to evaluate supply chain flexibility at supplier buyer interface with an aim to attain robust supply in all possible scenarios. Further cost of procurement in view of flexibility is investigated in disastrous scenarios to support procurement decisions by managers. The paper contributes by analysing and evaluating SCF in environment of demand and lead time uncertainties and risks of major plant disruptions.