At the airport for an early flight, returning home after a speaking engagement, I was having a moment, feeling “tweepy” (my new word for tiredness that makes me weepy) as I stood in line to order breakfast. The trip had been a busy several days on top of a difficult year. The woman taking my […]
A nation divided, a political party at war with itself, bitter rivals seeking nomination, an assassination attempt. If this seems like a transcript of the evening news, representing some of the most challenging times in US history, think again. This was the setting for Abraham Lincoln’s first inaugural speech in 1861. The president’s call to […]
Drug shortages strike fear into people’s hearts. If you’re a patient in need of a particular drug for a critical health condition, you fear not being able to get access to the medicine you need. If you’re a pharmaceutical company, you fear the hit to your business, both headlines and bottom line. It takes enormous […]
Getting started with AI in supply chain might not start where you think. Some try delving into deep learning or a crash course in generative AI (GenAI), but I don’t recommend starting there. Instead start with the foundation of your AI strategy, which should be an understanding of your company’s supply chain and your data. […]
I should have known better. I work in supply chain. Even worse, I work for a company who makes solutions to help companies solve these kinds of problems, which I listen, speak and write about for a living! What was the problem? I ordered a table online without checking reviews sufficiently. If I had done […]
Chief supply chain officers feel overwhelmed navigating the intense digital fog surrounding AI in supply chain, so I offer five principles for navigation. For sure, the opportunity for AI in supply chains is massive. First principle: AI should augment humans, not replace them. he capability boundaries AI keeps crossing are nothing short of amazing. These achievements make it easy to forget what machines cannot provide, which I call the 3 C’s: context, collaboration and conscience. Second principle: The expert fusion of AI, heuristics and optimization is key. AI can also model problems at scale to produce […]
“Our rules of thumb are no longer up to the challenge.” This description by a Chief Supply Chain Officer of the state of the supply chain he found in his new role stuck with me. The tumult of our times has accelerated interest in artificial intelligence (AI) for help more advanced than rules, and ChatGPT’s […]
Feeling overwhelmed by the persistence and prevalence of crisis? There’s a new word for this current state: polycrisis. Wishing your supply chain were strengthened rather than strangled under these conditions? There’s an older term now being applied to supply chains for this capacity: antifragility. Are you trying to figure out how NOT to join the […]
What almost cost $2B a day and more than 700,000 jobs in the US alone, but would have led to global reverberations? The rail industry was on the brink of a strike-induced labor shortage that would have happened overnight if the President hadn’t intervened. This averted disruption is just one recent example of the impact […]
If “the forecast is always wrong,” is improving forecast accuracy even the solution to our demand planning woes? In times that continue to defy our ability to predict them, the words of famous statistician George Box have never been more right: “All models are wrong, but some are useful.” So what can we do to […]
Malcolm McLean, a trucker from North Carolina, was tired of waiting. He had a load full of cotton bales, and while idling away hours at a shipyard watching stevedores load other cargo onto ships he dreamed up containers that transformed global supply chains. Loading and unloading trucks was inefficient, so his frustration led to the […]
Supply shortages resulting in empty shelves or parking lots of WIP inventory represent a spectre causing supply chain leaders to reconsider supply chain inventory practices. Opinion of just-in-time (JIT) as a practice has taken a battering and inventory is rising. Calls are increasing for a return to just-in-case (JIC) policies, with some citing this trend […]
The Sonoran Desert where I live may seem like a hostile environment, with as little as 3-15 inches (7-38 cm) of annual rain and scorching sun that can reach 118 F (47 C). Yet plants, animals, and Native peoples thrive in this environment with resourcefulness and adaptability. The future of supply chain I foresee brings […]
Supply chain sustainability is a higher priority than ever. In MIT’s State of Supply Chain Sustainability 2021, 80% of executives surveyed said the pandemic either had no impact on their commitment or increased it. PwC reports that almost half of assets under management are held by investment firms committed to decarbonization. Investor concern about material […]
It’s graduation season, so the hunt for critical supply chain talent is more vigorous than ever. We may be known for ensuring we can make and move “stuff,” but ultimately supply chains are human. In a white paper on “How reinventing the supply chain can transform the planner role,” consulting firm EY cites their research […]
In a survey of 150 global manufacturing executives, 47% committed to improving supply chain visibility and tracking. According to the Global Supply Chain Disruption and Future Strategies Survey Report, this goal was the top-ranked planned tool investment. But what does supply chain visibility mean and will this investment really give the executives what they want? […]
The most recent McKinsey Global Survey on AI shows a 25% increase in use by companies over the prior year, a trend that shows no signs of slowing. At this pace, have we entered the Age of AI? Do we even need supply chain planners, or can we turn out the lights and go home, […]
Supply chain is in the spotlight. It is the business function that is front and center – on top of the minds of consumers and executives. The global pandemic has ripped the rug out from under supply chains, but also highlighted its importance. Agility, resiliency, and sustainability are keys to supply chain survival, so you can’t afford to wait to invest in building these capabilities, which are entwined with each other. We can’t know what path the current disruption will take, only that there is [,,,]
The rug has been pulled out from beneath us. Doing things the same way we’ve always done them will no longer serve us, so we can’t simply put it back in its place. In fact, the definition of pulling the rug out from underneath someone is that doing so causes their plans to fail, because […]
Is your supply chain immature? Does it resemble a 14-year-old boy, as a planner I met at an Institute of Business Forecasting and Planning event described his company’s supply chain? Grown up beyond diapers but not yet making good decisions consistently. In an immature, disconnected supply chain, planners operate inefficiently and in reactive mode. Not […]
Analytics, big data, data science, machine learning, artificial intelligence, deep learning, heuristics, optimization – do you feel beaten down playing buzz word bingo on a constantly changing board? It can be hard to understand which new buzzwords bring business value and which are best left in the lab to mature. And yet this barrier hasn’t […]
