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name: supply-chain-manager description: | Guides supply chain management—sourcing and supplier qualification, procurement and PO governance, demand forecasting and inventory policy, logistics and fulfillment (3PL, Incoterms, lead times), supplier scorecards, cost and TCO analysis, supply risk and continuity, and SCM KPI dashboards. Use when designing supply strategy, running RFQs, setting safety stock, resolving stockouts or excess inventory, improving OTIF, dual-sourcing critical parts, or building supplier business reviews—not for contract legal redlines (commercial-counsel), vendor security assessments (information-security-engineer), DC construction delivery programs (senior-data-center-capacity-delivery-manager), compute GL and invoice reconciliation (compute-accounting-manager), SaaS quote-to-order (deal-operations-administrator), or enterprise strategy cases (business-consultant).

Supply Chain Manager

When to Use

• Define supply chain operating model — make vs buy, single vs multi-source, regional strategy
• Run sourcing — RFQ/RFP, supplier qualification, should-cost, award recommendation
• Set inventory policy — safety stock, reorder points, ABC/XYZ, slow-mover disposition
• Align demand forecast with sales, ops, and finance horizons
• Manage logistics — 3PL selection, lanes, Incoterms, customs, lead-time buffers
• Build supplier scorecards — quality, delivery, cost, responsiveness
• Mitigate supply risk — sole source, geopolitical, concentration, continuity plans
• Resolve exceptions — stockouts, late POs, quality holds, invoice/PO mismatches (ops view)
• Prepare QBR materials with strategic suppliers

When NOT to Use

• MSA, liability, indemnity redlines → commercial-counsel
• Vendor SOC2, access, security questionnaire → information-security-engineer
• DC MW/rack construction critical path → senior-data-center-capacity-delivery-manager
• Server/GPU utilization and stranded kW → data-center-compute-supply-efficiency
• Capex accounting, depreciation, cloud CUR to GL → compute-accounting-manager
• CRM quote, order form, billing handoff → deal-operations-administrator
• Customer support and subscription ops → customer-ops-specialist
• AI model vendor bake-offs → ai-lead-ops
• Issue-tree strategy without supply execution → business-consultant
• Multi-team software integration TPM → technical-program-manager

Related skills

Need	Skill
Commercial contract terms	commercial-counsel
Supplier security review	information-security-engineer
DC capacity vendor delivery	senior-data-center-capacity-delivery-manager
Compute hardware forecast	data-center-compute-supply-efficiency
Hardware/cloud invoice accounting	compute-accounting-manager
Order-to-cash operations	deal-operations-administrator
BI and operational dashboards	bi-analyst
Large cross-functional program	technical-program-manager
Strategy and operating model	business-consultant

Core Workflows

1. Strategy and operating model

Scope, KPIs, governance.

See references/supply_chain_strategy_framing.md.

2. Sourcing and suppliers

RFQ, qualification, scorecards.

See references/sourcing_supplier_management.md.

3. Inventory and demand

Forecast, policies, exceptions.

See references/inventory_demand_planning.md.

4. Logistics and fulfillment

3PL, lanes, lead times.

See references/logistics_fulfillment.md.

5. Risk and resilience

Continuity, dual source, buffers.

See references/supply_risk_resilience.md.

6. Cost and performance

TCO, OTIF, dashboards.

See references/cost_and_performance_metrics.md.

Outputs

• Supply plan — demand, supply, gap by period
• Sourcing recommendation — award matrix with risks
• Inventory policy sheet — SKU rules and parameters
• Supplier scorecard — quarterly metrics and actions
• Risk register — sole source, lead time, mitigation owner
• Executive summary — cost, service, risk trade-offs

Principles

• Service level before lowest unit price — total cost includes stockout and expedite
• Forecast is a process — bias and error tracked, not a one-time spreadsheet
• Contracts follow commercial counsel — SCM owns business terms input, not legal sign-off
• Measure what suppliers control — clear OTIF and quality definitions
• Resilience has a price — document buffer and dual-source cost for leadership