Resilience

I posted a new game on edutool.org last week. It is a supply chain resilience game, and you can sign up for an instructor account at resilience.edutool.org. The open-source GitHub repo is at github.com/siemsene/resilience. You can download an instructor manual, a player manual, and teaching slides when you sign in as an instructor. I tested the game in class, and it works well with 50+ students in the room.

I have always been fascinated by how the topic of supply chain management moves from 'behind-the-scenes' to 'spotlight' with the news cycle. If the world operates smoothly, no one thinks about supply chains; when the world erupts into chaos, everyone's spotlight shines on them. We see it in our programs. Applications to supply chain programs tend to skyrocket in the year after a crisis.

We have known for a long time how to build more resilient supply chains: create transparency and identify sourcing risks several tiers into your supply base; build up dual sourcing capabilities to easily switch; create strategic inventory for key components or raw materials; design your products to accept alternative components; design your processes to be more flexible to shift production volumes; source from different regions; negotiate priiority in contracts. The list goes on. But all of these measures are costly. And when the world operates smoothly, efficiency triumphs, and all these resilience measures are rolled back as companies sacrifice resiliency to gain more efficiency. I wanted to make a game about this cycle.

In the game, players make sourcing decisions. They can source from six different suppliers across three different regions. Regions can be disrupted; suppliers can be unreliable. Suppliers also have limited capacity, and if too many new orders come in, they will ration their supplies proportionally. Demand is certain in this game, but supply is not. Players who can meet demand can capture customers from those who cannot.

The game has infrequent disruptions. After a disruption, everyone builds alternative sources of supply, but as the disruption passes, economies of scale from sourcing from a single, low-cost supplier push everyone to abandon their resilience. The game moves in cycles. Students struggle to find a strategy to get through these storms.

This was one game that could lead to decision paralysis, and it requires playing over 30 turns to unfold the cycles. One thing I therefore added is a decision countdown timer; this makes the game a bit more stressful, but I don't think there is any way around it in a classroom setting. In general, when you build classroom apps, time/decision management is critical. If you don't keep the game moving, some students will get bored, and you will run out of time to properly debrief within a session. You need predictability and pace. You can use simple social mechanisms to speed up decisions - nudges from the instructor, or trackers that show how many others have made a decision already. Those work to some degree. But in this case, a countdown timer was necessary.

Give it a try if you teach a supply chain class, and let me know what you think. If you want more features or have questions about the game, just send me an email. Good night, and good luck!