If you're a supply-chain executive, there's a good chance that the next tsunami, hurricane, flood or other disaster will take your organization by surprise. Again.

Ethan Hunt, supply chain consultant with Agilent Technologies, talks about the challenges his company faces in gaining full visibility of supply and demand, and in dealing with increasing supply-chain volatility.

Before the cloud - before the commercial internet - there were communications networks that linked manufacturers with their suppliers. How effective they were is another matter entirely.

Here's the latest advice for supply-chain managers: Sweat the small stuff. Manufacturing company executives responsible for parts and supplies tend to worry most about what would happen if deliveries from one of their biggest suppliers were disrupted by a natural disaster or other unforeseen event, says David Simchi-Levi, an engineering professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.