Supply chain managers are not generally considered to be heroic in their daily efforts. Sure, there are plenty of difficult issues they tackle all the time, but the individual things they take care of generally amount to keeping the business running on schedule - in other words, doing what they were hired to do. Supply chain managers can make themselves more important to their organizations by thinking ahead of their daily operations and keeping an eye on these 4 areas of concern that are already emerging in 2018.

Your manufacturing, shipping, warehousing, and retail channels are all perking along just fine. You have a great team handling your EDI transactions and managing exceptions and your trading partner relationships are in good shape. So what could go wrong and threaten all the good work you’ve done?

The answer is that you should be caring about the security of your supply chain more now than you ever have. In fact supply chains have had a relative free period for many years because… well, because it’s a supply chain and not something hackers can easily monetize. But the games and the stakes have changed.