You can think of business as a supply chain game between competing companies. To show what we mean, we offer this multiplayer, online supply chain game. This is not a game to merely entertain you, or help you memorize a few facts. It’s a serious game to engage you, and help you learn real supply chain skills and strategies that you can use to manage actual supply chains.
Use our simulations individually to learn about supply chains, or connect the simulations to create a multiplayer online game. Both ways you will practice techniques and develop skills that can be used for improving supply chains in the real world. Schools in Asia, Europe and North America have used our simulations to create games and competitions. Use the Cincinnati Seasonings supply chain case and simulation shown here, or create unique cases and supply chains set in specific countries or industries:
- A business school in India created their own case and supply chain set in India.
- A logistics college in Indonesia hosted a national contest with teams from 42 other universities competing to design and improve the supply chain of an Indonesian company.
- The MBA program at a university in the United States created a contest to simulate and improve a real supply chain in the aerospace industry.
A Multiplayer Online Supply Chain Game (MOSCG)
Imagine a company called “Cincinnati Seasonings” located in Cincinnati, Ohio USA. The company has done well, and you have been hired to head up the company’s supply chain operations. The company wants you to improve their existing supply chain, and then expand it to support their growth as they open new stores. You manage the supply chain outlined in the diagram below.
Cincinnati Seasonings is the case study most people start with when they begin using SCM Globe simulations. This case can be used as a stand alone case study and simulation, or it can be configured as the basis for a multiplayer supply chain game.
In the Cincinnati Seasonings case study There is a factory manufacturing different food seasonings that are sold as a packaged product called the “Spicy Cube.” They have a seasonings factory downtown in an industrial area by the river, and a distribution center at a transportation hub on the outskirts of town. They deliver products to stores in Ohio and surrounding states. These facilities are placed on the map in their actual locations as shown in the screenshots.
[ We are glad to provide a free evaluation account to instructors, students and supply chain professionals interested in exploring SCM Globe simulations — click here to request an account — Get Your Free Trial Demo ]
The objective of the game is simple: Meet product demand at the stores for 30 days while lowering inventory and operating costs as much as possible. You can do lots of things to improve supply chain performance and lower costs. You can open or close facilities and adjust factory production rates. You can add or remove delivery vehicles and change routes and frequencies to move products between facilities. And you can do these things in any combination that seems useful.
The simulations show what works best. Try out different ideas and run simulations to see how well they work. Based on what the simulations show, keep making improvements to your supply chain design until you get a supply chain that performs well. 
Financial Reports and Key Performance Indicators are the Scorecards
The simulations generate financial and performance data during the simulations. Anyone who knows how to use a spreadsheet can download the simulation data and analyze their supply chain results in greater detail (see button “Export Results to Excel” in the upper right corner of the screen above). Based on simulation results, you keep improving your supply chain design and performance. Then click the export results button and download the simulation data when you find a design that gets good results. The simulation data downloads as a CSV file which can be read by any spreadsheet (Apple Numbers, Microsoft Excel, Google Sheets, etc.)
Here is the scorecard (as it is in the real world). The screenshot below shows a sample Monthly P&L Report plus key performance indicators (KPIs). The report and KPIs are generated by downloading simulation data and importing the data into the reporting template. This provides an objective basis to compare different supply chain designs created by contestants. The winner can be the one who generates the highest profit, or who creates the supply chain with the lowest carbon footprint, or any combination of measurable results shown in the sample report below.
[ See more about how to download and analyze simulation data in “Analyzing Simulation Data“. Scroll down to the heading “Download Simulation Data to Spreadsheet Reporting Template” and find out how to download a copy of the reporting template shown above to your own computer.]
Connected Spreadsheets and Real-Time Dashboards
The simulations and reports can be used in different combinations to create supply chain competitions. Use them individually, or create a multiplayer online game composed of SCM GLOBE and Google spreadsheets. The multiplayer game gives every student their own Google Sheets workbook where they copy-paste the results from their SCM GLOBE simulations. Each player’s workbook is connected to the instructor’s workbook.
When a student copy-pastes their results from SCM GLOBE into their appropriate sheet the results are automatically shown to the instructor and to all other players through the dashboard reports in each Google Sheets workbook. A diagram of this network is shown below.
Through this process of connected spreadsheets we can create a simple competition where each player copy-pastes their results from their personal SCM GLOBE simulation into a personal Google spreadsheet that’s connected to every other player and the course instructor. This provides a live scoreboard showing each player’s gross profit achieved, and this is the metric used to judge the performance of each player’s supply chain.
Field Testing
We tested the game with a group of students in Provo, UT. These were students who got together with Eugene Sheely (writer of this article). The group was comprised of about half undergraduate and half graduate students. All were business majors. One was an industrial engineer working on a minor in supply chain management. Otherwise none were supply chain students.
The first challenge was to quickly convey how to use the SCM GLOBE software. That didn’t take too long, about 20 minutes. We talked about the app and players logged on and scanned through the short videos and tutorials in the “Getting Started” section. Once people got the basic idea of the four entities (Products, Facilities, Vehicles, Routes) and saw how to use them to create supply chain models, they were able to start working with their supply chains and running simulations. Feedback from this test showed us where to make some changes to the user interface in Google Sheets, but the basic game mechanics were found to be solid.
One player got stuck looking at instructional slides and the dashboard in Google Sheets and wouldn’t start playing. He kept asking, “How am I to run a simulation if I don’t know what would work?” Other players already playing the game told him the point is to run simulations again and again until you figure things out by correcting problems in the supply chain. But this student wanted to find the perfect answer first before he would start working on his model. He was afraid to get a wrong answer in the simulation. This approach does not take advantage of the learning experience the simulations offer. People cannot develop their understanding of how supply chains operate unless they try things out and let the simulations show them how their ideas will work.
Set turns or game periods for minutes, hours, or days — whatever is appropriate for your situation. For example, players can have one hour (or half a day) to complete the first turn, then two hours (or one day) to complete the second turn, and one and a half hours (or whatever the instructor feels is appropriate) to complete the last turn.
One notable aspect we saw was that players who completed their simulations started to compete with each other when they saw each other’s results in their scoreboards in Google Sheets. In the regular Cincinnati Seasonings case study students usually stop interacting with their supply chain simulation once they’re able to make it run for 30 days.
But when individual scores were made public for all to see, players went back and studied their supply chains and found ways to lower their costs. All the while they were laughing and having a great time as they saw the changes they had made update their scores and beat their competition.
Companies that master the game of using supply chains for competitive advantage see their customer base expand and their revenues grow. What you learn playing this game is directly applicable to the real world of supply chain management.
WRITTEN BY:
Eugene Sheely, Instructional and Game Designer
Provo, UT
NOTE: If you are interested in using this multiplayer game, there is a complete Instruction Manual – send email to: info@scmglobe.com