Today Buyers Meeting Point welcomes Alan Braithwaite as our guest.  Alan is a Visiting Professor at Cranfield University and specializes in supply chain strategy and operational excellence in the retail, manufacturing and service sectors. He is Chairman at LCP Consulting, which collaborates with over 400 companies internationally. In 2015, Alan co-authored “Business Operations Models: Becoming a Disruptive Competitor” and that is what he joins us today to discuss. Alan has also written several blog posts (available on the Kogan Page site) expecting upon the topics in his book.  In this interview, we explore the following ideas: How operations management and strategy can make a super-performing business.The value of narratives in helping executive teams see their building blocks of value.The role of procurement in creating and protecting net margin.Never underestimating serendipity: the power of the unexpected.