A global poll of more than 1,000 senior executives by consulting firm Accenture found that managing operational risks related to the supply chain was important or very important to 76 percent of respondents. But results of the efforts differed as widely as the approaches, which included monitoring risks, defining capabilities to fill potential gaps, and building excess capacity.

Nearly three-fourths of the companies represented in the Accenture survey reported returns on investment on their risk management efforts of 50 percent or less. Twenty-one percent of participants reported a 51 to 100 percent return on investment and seven percent had a return on investment of more than 100 percent.

The many approaches respond to a flurry of risk drivers that threaten multiple supply-chain areas. Topping the list: information technology that provides fragmented or insufficient data and lacks agility to allow companies to respond to market changes.

IT, cost factors, and the global economy, which survey participants named as the top three supply-chain risk drivers, most likely affected quality, planning, talent, and sourcing and procurement.

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