Archive for December, 2009

I have just listened to another excellent webinar by Hau Lee on SCMWorld. What is really interesting is the way in which he balances supply chain design, principally through postponement, with the need to respond rapidly and effectively to mismatches between demand and supply, encapsulated in the concept of “extreme information exchange” stated by Dr Lee. The combination of all these capabilities result in breakthrough performance. At the risk of violating copyright laws, below are some key graphics. I encourage everyone to view the replay on the SCMWorld website.

At the heart of the concepts promoted by Hau Lee – Agility, Adaptability, & Alignment – is the uncertainty of supply & demand. This drives all the behaviour and design criteria, and the need for extreme information exchange. Implied, but not called out explicitly, is the need for timely information exchange, but even more importantly is the need for extreme responsiveness to the information exchange, which in turn requires the need for extreme information analytics and extreme collaboration between trading partners and internal organizations.

Lastly, Dr Lee refers to “interface activities” as being some of the greatest barriers to supply chain efficiency. Of course at the heart of this is the need to remove barriers in doing business with trading partners, or alignment of objectives and measures, and the sharing of risk.

This webinar is only one of a number of articles and webinars that focus on the issue of the blurring/blending of planning and execution.

Where do you think the next breakthrough will come from? Planning better or responding to plan variance better?

I saw a post in a LinkedIn group recently that posed the question of why supply chain professionals were having so much difficulty marketing themselves in the job market?  As someone who has been looking to hire some supply chain consultants for a few months, let me give you my perspective as to what I am looking for – perhaps it will give some new insight to those currently searching…. 

Unfortunately, we are finding it difficult to find the right type of person.  There do seem to be several candidates out there, however we are looking for a mix of deep supply chain skills as well as technical proficiency - perhaps that is difficult?  Or perhaps candidates should be marketing themselves a little better? 

• I think it is important for candidates to list specific business accomplishments at each job and not just general job duties. 
• I also find it helpful to have the candidates list which business problems/processes they have been working on.  It is easy to say inventory reduction of X, but how did you accomplish it (VMI, supplier visibility, etc.)? 
• Some SCM candidates under emphasize their technical skills as well.  These skills should be brought to the forefront, because most SCM business problems require some type of technology to assist in solving the problem.
• Industry expertise is nice, but not required.  We work with many different types of industries and find that 90% of supply chain business problems are consistent across industries, with minimal uniqueness per industry.  However, exposure to different industries is nice to know.  For consulting, exposure to different industries adds credibility when working with different customers. 
• Location of candidates is also not that important, however they should be close to a major airport.  A challenge is that many of the candidates I see do not want to travel.  That is understandable, but if they aren’t willing to relocate or travel, it will be difficult to find a match in certain geographies.
• Some people mention they are looking for entry level jobs and those are hard to come by in the consulting world and in private industry.  Customers do not want to pay top dollar for someone who doesn’t know more than they do.  However there are some entry level jobs I would hire.  I think the key for entry level jobs is to be very flexible.  Willing to live anywhere, relocate on your own and willing to travel.  We can have more junior people learn on bigger projects and then grow from there.  Entry level candidates really need to demonstrate drive and ambition.

I would love to hire some high quality SCM professionals with deep skills and technical proficiency with a willingness to travel and solve lots of different business problems for lots of different companies.  The key is having the candidate indicate on their resume they have all the right skills so the resume is not passed over.

I just a read an IndustryWeek article that reviewed a recent Siemens / McGraw-Hill sustainability survey.   As the Copenhagen climate conference begins and the political rhetoric becomes louder each day, it is interesting that there are leading corporations ahead of the curve; early-adopters of  green technologies and policies.  These corporations are increasing their sustainability efforts in a down economy, citing reduced energy costs, customer satisfaction, market differentiation, and general financial performance as key drivers.  

Of particular interest to me is that a growing number of executives surveyed said they now request energy/greenhouse gas data from their suppliers.   How are suppliers going to react to this request?  Once this emission data is  base-lined, what tools will suppliers use on a daily basis to help them manage the inevitable requirement that they reduce these emissions?

Has this information been requested of you?  Are you prepared?

I am really excited about this upcoming webcast we are sponsoring – it certainly falls in the “must-attend” category.

The presenters include  Elisabeth Kaszas, director, supply chain at  Amgen;  Wayne McDonnell, research director, life sciences at AMR Research and well…me, but I’m the afterthought.

Full details below – register today – it is less than two weeks away!

Prescriptions for the Modern-Day Pharmaceutical Supply Chain
December 17, 2009
12:00 p.m. CST (1:00 p.m. EST)

The healthcare supply chain is faced with some unique challenges, especially for bio-pharmaceutical manufacturers. Given that many drugs are critical to patient health, much of the lean inventory practices employed in other industries (particularly popular for high-tech/electronics) are not acceptable options because of inventory shortage risks. As well, the typical pharmaceutical supply chain faces many regulatory bodies that are required to approve any changes in manufacturing or packaging, which limits the flexibility of the supply chain and adds to the challenges of inventory management and production capacity.

Regardless, there are a lot of efficiencies that can be gained nonetheless through the deployment of technology that can aid a company to:

• plan production and distribution to meet anticipated demand,
• monitor performance against financial and operational targets, and
• respond quickly and effectively to ongoing changes in demand or supply.

In this presentation, AMR Research will highlight the key characteristics and trends of the modern-day pharmaceutical supply chain. And learn first-hand from Amgen how they are effectively managing their complex supply chain despite the challenges inherent to the pharmaceutical industry.

I just read Justin Fogarty’s (of Supply Excellence) article “Frugal Fatigue” or Consumer Confidence? and I can’t help but sympathize for the S&OP managers trying to make heads or tails of the demand signals they are seeing.  Adding “Frugal Fatigue” as an additional consideration makes interpretation even more difficult and reinforces the need for a responsive supply chain.  Forecasting in any environment is extremely difficult, but in this environment it almost seems futile.

Forecast accuracy will reveal itself in about one month in the form of either empty warehouses and unsatisfied demand or full warehouses and clearance sales.   What do you think?

Recently, this message from SearchSAP.com hit my email… “SAP, Microsoft align against Oracle in business software market”.

I couldn’t help but have this vision of these big dinosaurs fighting each other while completely unaware of the potential danger of their extinction. The rest of humanity is hard at work redefining how to work and play without them, and quickly coming to realize that there is a better, faster, cheaper way, thanks to cloud computing, Google, and the pioneering work of Salesforce and Amazon. These clumsy slow-motion giants don’t seem to get it. They are quickly running out of people willing to sign $250,000,000 checks to deploy what is supposed to be a “software product” on their own hardware. This change couldn’t come soon enough.