There is a lot of talk about "supply chain transparency" from a variety of quarters these days.

But what does it really mean?

For example, a recent MIT study that mapped definitions of supply chain transparency related to labor practices in the apparel industry found vastly differing definitions across organizations.

A recent article in the Harvard Business Review from Alexis Bateman, director of MIT's Sustainable Supply Chains initiative, and Leonardo Bonanni, founder and CEO of technology firm Sourcemap, provides some interesting insight on gauging a given company's progress on supply chain transparcency.

As seen in the graphic below from the artice, Bateman and Bonanni say "Transparency can be measured along two dimensions: supply chain scope (the depth of interaction in the supply chain) and milestones on the path to complete transparency."

This is pretty good, SCDigest thinks.

The authors say few companies have reached the Innovator level, but cite apparel company Patagonia as one example. Its Footprint Chronicles map a subset of raw materials, mills, and factories that make Patagonia products and drill down into details about vendors' operations and staff.

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