Introduction
The assessment of companies’ responses to emerging threats by developing strategies for their mitigation is important for subsequent recovery and can be explained from the perspective of supply chains and risk management. Thus, for example, the fashion industry’s financial losses deriving from the COVID-19 crisis are directly connected to these concepts and are examined by distinguishing their spheres of influence. Therefore, this paper aims to summarize the selected research on the topic, justify its applicability to real-life challenges of businesses connected to their unpreparedness for particular events, and discuss its relevance to the studied notions.
Summary of the Article
The article under consideration published by McMaster et al. (2020) presents comprehensive data regarding the recent shifts in international business risk management stemming from the spread of COVID-19. More specifically, it is focused on the fashion industry and its multinational corporations as the principal actors in the field. According to this source, these changes are reflected in the corresponding supply chains, which suffered particular disruptions in their work and recognized the worsening of the problems existing before the pandemic (McMaster et al., 2020). From this point of view, the assessment of their state was essential from the perspective of emerging challenges and for predicting further complications.
Thus, the revealed issues included inflexibility and uncertainty, and they were complemented by the confirmed lack of transparency, which appeared before the crisis (McMaster et al., 2020). As for the methods for accompanying risks mitigation, they were the adoption of more adaptable and diverse approaches to the main operations.
The reasoning for the Article’s Selection
The selection of this article for the paper was conditional upon its applicability to all enterprises and industries affected by the pandemic. Hence, the proposed strategies can be applied to the needs of all businesses in similar conditions and improve their situation in the market. In turn, the major economic processes evaluated through the lens of the study’s findings can be optimized for dealing with future crises regardless of their nature. These factors were added to the incorporation of both theoretical information and the proposition of practical actions in the research and defined the value of the conducted examination.
Relevance of the Article to the Studied Concepts
The article on risk management in the fashion industry with the assessment of existing and emerging threats related to supply chains (SC) is relevant to the discussion of challenges of global production. It narrates the mechanisms of coping with such problems, which contribute to a better understanding of urgent needs in this respect. For example, the authors emphasize the importance of readjusting the SC structure with the inclusion of various circumstances. They primarily include the upstream and downstream disruption durations, specificities of the epidemic’s development, and the timing of closing and opening of organizations of operation (McMaster et al., 2020).
Moreover, they distinguish lean and agile (flexible) types of supply management while highlighting the latter’s better suitability to the case and provide the characteristics of disruptions resulting from unpredictable events in supply and demand (McMaster et al., 2020). Therefore, this publication covers the significant concepts related to the current difficulties and allows a conclusion on its usefulness for similar occasions.
Conclusion
To summarize, the coordination of the functioning of global supply chains in major fields and the efforts of entrepreneurs on mitigating the risks stemming from the organizations’ unpreparedness for crises are well-studied by scholars. They describe the theory concerning all the aspects of such occasions and elaborated on practical steps to address their needs at such a difficult time. Therefore, the article is useful for the participants in the market willing to ensure the successful recovery of their companies and eliminate the threats connected to different units’ cooperation.
Reference
McMaster, M., Nettleton, C., Tom, C., Xu, B., Cao, C., & Qiao, P. (2020). Risk management: Rethinking fashion supply chain management for multinational corporations in light of the COVID-19 outbreak. Journal of Risk and Financial Management, 13(8). Web.