The close of 2014 is a time of reflection for most of us. For me, it was a year of planting many seeds at Mastek and delighting in watching most of them sprout to life. We’ve made investments in expanding our footprint across the UK central government, insurance, retail and financial services.

Paper pushing at Whitehall has, interestingly, taken a turn for the better. Spurred on by the UK government’s deficit-reduction programme, it has moved to the digital world, as civil servants increasingly collaborate, record and report online.

It’s not uncommon for supply chain analysts to lose sight of the wood for the trees by diving deep into the data at their disposal whenever retail supply or availability issues are raised. Alternatively, Supply Chain functions may retain their own team of reporting experts specifically to address this need. While it is a given that the designated analysts will do their best to respond to the issues at hand, conducting a thorough and often complex investigation can be the only way to confirm what remedial action should be taken.