Problem definition in supply chain improvements is often too narrow.

It is true that companies find so many improvement levers in their supply chain. However, the way they convert these levers into improvement projects is sub-optimal.

A company may feel overwhelmed with current issues in their supply chain. They may like to cut inventories, reduce stockouts, bring down write-offs and discounts, lower the quantum of market returns (especially perishables and pharma), improve vendor reliability, make their production lines more flexible, etc. It typically ends up selecting one of these as the most important project for the time being and defers other improvements to future periods.

The issues listed above are not separate problems, but actually the undesirable effects of a common root cause. Solving one issue in isolation may end up aggravating other issues.

I would recommend spending some time in analysing these issues in a logical manner to understand the common root cause and eliminate it. A good solution has the inherent property of eliminating all these undesirable effects simultaneously.