Should Defence Use the SCOR Model to Benchmark Itself?

By Paul R. Salmon FCILT

Introduction: Borrowing from Industry Without Copying It Blindly

Defence supply chains are under more scrutiny than at any point since the Cold War. War in Europe, persistent global instability, fragile industrial bases, and stretched defence budgets have forced governments to ask difficult questions about readiness, resilience, and value for money. Against this backdrop, it is entirely reasonable to ask whether Defence should adopt established commercial frameworks to benchmark and improve performance.

One framework is mentioned more often than most: the Supply Chain Operations Reference (SCOR) model, developed and maintained by ASCM. SCOR is widely used across industry as a common language for describing, benchmarking, and improving supply chains.

But should Defence be using SCOR to benchmark itself?

The answer is not a simple yes or no. Defence can gain real value from SCOR — but only if it is used with discipline, humility, and a clear understanding of what Defence supply chains are fundamentally designed to do.

What the SCOR Model Actually Is

At its core, the SCOR model provides a standardised way of describing how supply chains work. It structures activity around six high-level process categories:

Plan Source Make Deliver Return Enable

Beneath these sit progressively more detailed process levels, supported by a hierarchy of performance metrics grouped around five attributes:

Reliability Responsiveness Agility Cost Asset Management Efficiency

SCOR’s real strength is not that it tells organisations what decisions to make, but that it gives them a common framework for:

Mapping processes Comparing performance Identifying gaps Benchmarking maturity against peers

In industry, SCOR is frequently used to diagnose inefficiency, improve coordination between functions, and drive continuous improvement.

Why SCOR Is Attractive to Defence

Defence organisations often struggle with fragmentation: between commands, between acquisition and support, between military and civilian, and between Defence and industry. In this environment, SCOR has three immediate attractions.

1. A Shared Language Across a Fragmented System

Defence supply chains are full of well-meaning people using different terms for the same things — or the same terms to mean different things. SCOR cuts through this by offering a neutral, internationally recognised vocabulary.

For organisations such as Ministries of Defence, Defence Equipment and Support bodies, and multinational alliances, this matters. A SCOR-based view can:

Improve dialogue between Defence and industry Reduce misunderstanding between policy, delivery, and operational communities Provide a common reference point for allies

In short, SCOR helps everyone describe the same system in the same way.

2. A Framework for Process Maturity, Not Just Activity

Defence is often rich in activity metrics and poor in outcome insight. SCOR’s structured approach encourages organisations to ask:

Is the process defined? Is it repeatable? Is it measured? Is it improving?

This is particularly valuable in areas such as:

Forecasting and demand planning Supplier management Inventory policy Information flow and data quality

Used sensibly, SCOR can expose duplicated effort, unclear ownership, and brittle hand-offs that undermine performance.

3. A Disciplined Approach to Metrics

SCOR’s performance attributes force difficult but necessary conversations. Rather than measuring effort (“how busy are we?”), SCOR pushes organisations toward outcomes:

How reliable is the supply chain? How quickly can it respond? How well does it adapt? At what cost? With what asset efficiency?

For Defence organisations under pressure to demonstrate value, this kind of metric discipline is appealing.

Where SCOR Starts to Struggle in a Defence Context

Despite these strengths, SCOR was not designed for Defence — and that matters.

1. SCOR Is Optimised for Commercial Efficiency

SCOR assumes supply chains exist to balance service, cost, and capital in a competitive market. Defence supply chains exist to enable military capability, often under conditions where:

Demand is unpredictable Failure carries strategic consequences Cost is constrained but not the sole driver Political and sovereign considerations override optimisation

In industry, a supply chain failure might mean lost revenue or market share. In Defence, it can mean loss of life or mission failure.

If applied without adaptation, SCOR’s efficiency bias risks encouraging behaviours that look good on dashboards but degrade operational resilience.

2. Operational Risk Is Not Central to SCOR

Defence supply chains operate under risks that most commercial models barely acknowledge:

Contested logistics Attrition Single-source dependencies Long industrial lead times Surge requirements under crisis

SCOR references agility, but it does not inherently model:

War reserve sufficiency Industrial mobilisation Time-to-recover under hostile conditions The consequences of deliberate disruption

For Defence, these are not edge cases — they are core design drivers.

3. Defence Is a System-of-Systems, Not a Linear Chain

SCOR is fundamentally a process reference model. Defence logistics is a system-integration problem spanning:

Platforms and equipment Support solutions Industrial capacity People and skills Data and digital infrastructure Alliances and interoperability

These elements interact across the entire capability lifecycle, not just within a neat Plan–Source–Make–Deliver loop. Optimising one part of the chain in isolation can degrade system performance elsewhere.

SCOR struggles to capture these second- and third-order effects.

The Risk of Using SCOR as the Wrong Kind of Benchmark

The real danger is not using SCOR — it is misusing it.

If Defence treats SCOR as:

A compliance checklist A target operating model A definition of success

then it risks incentivising:

Short-term efficiency over long-term resilience Lean inventory at the expense of readiness Local optimisation that damages system integration

In extreme cases, Defence could end up benchmarking itself to commercial “best practice” that is fundamentally misaligned with its purpose.

The Right Way to Use SCOR in Defence

The question, therefore, is not whether Defence should use SCOR, but how.

SCOR as a Reference Spine, Not the Skeleton

SCOR works best in Defence when it is treated as:

A reference model, not a design authority A baseline, not an end state A common language, not a doctrine

Used this way, SCOR can add real value.

Where SCOR Makes Sense

Defence should consider using SCOR to:

Map and rationalise end-to-end processes Benchmark internal maturity across organisations Support structured conversations with industry Train personnel in supply chain fundamentals Identify capability gaps in planning, sourcing, and delivery

These are areas where SCOR’s neutrality and structure are genuine strengths.

Where SCOR Must Be Supplemented

SCOR should never stand alone in Defence. It must be layered with Defence-specific frameworks that explicitly address:

Availability and readiness outcomes Supportability and system integration Risk, resilience, and adaptive capacity Industrial mobilisation and surge Sovereign and alliance constraints

In other words, SCOR should help describe how the supply chain works — but Defence frameworks must define what matters.

A Defence-Adapted View: SCOR Plus

One useful way of thinking about this is a “SCOR Plus” approach:

SCOR provides the process structure and metric discipline Defence-specific models provide the operational context and decision logic

Under this model:

SCOR metrics are interpreted through an availability lens Cost is balanced explicitly against risk and resilience Asset efficiency is assessed alongside time-to-recover Agility is tested against realistic operational scenarios

This allows Defence to benefit from SCOR’s strengths without inheriting its blind spots.

Implications for Defence Leaders and Practitioners

For senior leaders, the message is clear:

SCOR can support assurance and benchmarking It cannot replace judgement, experience, or operational insight

For practitioners, SCOR can be a powerful tool for:

Structuring analysis Communicating with industry Identifying improvement opportunities