August, 2014

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Supply Chain Talent: A Broken Link

Supply Chain Shaman

'These are the grim facts. Only 9% of companies feel that they manage supply chain talent better than peers.The issues are growing. Job turnover is 15% and new positions remain open for 4 months before they are filled. I think that supply chain talent is a broken link in the supply chain. I also believe that the adoption of new mental models is a barrier to progress.

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Amazon, Google, and Crowdsourcing: The Battle for the Last Mile

Logistics Viewpoints

'There has been a lot of talk lately as it relates to last mile deliveries, and how retailers can delight their customers at the actual moment of fulfillment. As more retailers venture into the omni-channel space, last mile has taken on more importance. Two behemoths have taken center stage in the battle for perfecting (or […]. The post Amazon, Google, and Crowdsourcing: The Battle for the Last Mile appeared first on Logistics Viewpoints: A Blog for Logistics, Supply Chain, and 3PL E

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6 maps that explain global supply chains

The Network Effect

'We all know that supply chains are becoming more and more global, but how often can we actually see them becoming more global? The site vox.com has compiled 38 maps that explain the global economy. We’ve selected 6 that are especially relevant to supply chains. #1: How Sugar Circulates Globally. Even seemingly simple commodities have complex supply chains.

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Innovative Approaches to Supply Chain Risk

Kinaxis

'by John Westerveld Imagine yourself in this scenario; You wake up at the usual time, and over coffee, you review the news. As you flip through the articles on your iPad, you see it. A major earthquake in Taiwan. Then you get the e-mail. One of your key suppliers uses a supplier that is in the area affected by the quake and is effectively shut down for the foreseeable future… Uh oh.

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Your Workforce: Is Remote-Insourcing the Key to Logistics Efficiency?

In today's rapidly evolving logistics industry, companies consistently strive for efficiency and competitiveness. However, the most significant factor driving business success isn't just technology or infrastructure—it's the people behind your processes. Employees aren't merely resources; they're your most strategic asset. High turnover rates and constant retraining costs severely impact logistics companies, draining productivity and profitability.

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Uber, the Next Amazon?

Talking Logistics

'Remember when Amazon.com was just an online bookstore? Today the company is a diverse online retailer, for both consumers and businesses , as well as a logistics service provider , cloud services provider , tablet and smartphone developer, and much more. Remember when Uber was just an app to get a ride somewhere? That’s what we’ll be saying in the not too distant future, as the company continues to experiment and branch into new areas.

More Trending

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Judging Supply Chain Improvement: Campbell Soup Case Study

Supply Chain Shaman

'Over the course of the last two years, we at Supply Chain Insight s have worked on a methodology to gauge supply chain improvement. We named it the Supply Chain Index. We have found that supply chain metrics are gnarly and complicated.During the last two months, we have been interviewing supply chain leaders to get their views on the methodology.

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Why Russia’s Agricultural Import Ban is more Supply Chain than Economics

Logistics Viewpoints

In July the US, the European Union (EU), and select other countries instituted a number of trade and financial sanctions against Russia for its involvement in the separatist movement in neighboring Ukraine. The EU banned the export of military technology and certain technology used for oil and gas exploration and production in deep water, the […].

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Why the supply chain should be more social

The Network Effect

'No company has ‘truly’ modeled the full relationship set between how companies interact with other companies upstream and downstream in the supply chain. Some of the largest companies in the world struggle to maintain accurate master data about their suppliers. Even companies who have invested in building an accurate database of their direct suppliers know very little about the next tier of suppliers upstream in the supply chain.

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The Next Great Disruption Coming to Supply Chains

Kinaxis

'by CJ Wehlage What would you say is the next great disruption coming to our supply chain world? I’ve heard some common themes, such as weather, political changes, even war. Those are potential, and somewhat out of our control. However, there’s one great disruption already occurring, which has yet to truly “touch” supply chain. It’s the consumer.

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Speeding Robotics Automation with AI

The $53 trillion manufacturing economy in the US is undergoing a major automation paradigm shift due to Artificial Intelligence (AI). Thanks to new practical frameworks, automation projects that were once impossible or inefficient to implement are now being fast-tracked, and robotics automation is becoming increasingly relevant to a growing number of users and scenarios.

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Time for Companies to Rethink Their Customer Delivery Strategy

Talking Logistics

'While couriers have long been used for local or “last mile” business-to-business deliveries in the U.S., and for consumer deliveries in densely populated areas of the world such as Europe and Asia, the average American thinks only of big name players like FedEx, UPS, or a name such as Con-way that they saw on the side of a semi-trailer truck on the highway, when it comes to delivery.

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Uncovering the hidden lessons in ???The Goal??? (part 2)

DELMIA Quintiq

'If you read my previous post about The Goal, you already know who Alex Rogo is. Alex achieves the almost impossible feat of turning around his failing production plant and making it the most profitable operation in the company. For this, he uses the Theory of Constraints (TOC), following five steps of continuous improvement. Even more interesting, he determines these five steps by analyzing an event (hiking with his sons scout troop) that is completely unrelated to a production process

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The Mechanisms of Supply Chain Resilience

SCM Research

'Two ingredients are needed to create supply chain resilience: robustness, which is proactive, and agility, which is reactive. Robustness builds on anticipation “to gain knowledge about potential changes that might occur in the future” and preparedness “to maintain a stable situation” Agility builds on visibility “to gain knowledge about actual changes that are currently occurring” and speed “to get back to a stable situation” Wieland, A., & Wa

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Use Simulation Planning to Predict Future Supply Chain Performance

Logistics Viewpoints

'What if you could accurately predict how your supply chain will perform in the future? Know how a strategy change will impact your service levels or costs? Predict when you will stock out or be late with a shipment? To do this you need ESP. Not extra-sensory perception, but it’s the next best thing from […]. The post Use Simulation Planning to Predict Future Supply Chain Performance appeared first on Logistics Viewpoints: A Blog for Logistics, Supply Chain, and 3PL Executives.

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Supply Chain Resilience Checklist

Strengthen your operations with the Supply Chain Resilience Checklist. This practical, easy-to-use tool helps your organization prepare for disruptions and ensure long-term continuity in an unpredictable world. Why Download: Identify and assess critical supply chain risks Ask the right questions to evaluate vendor preparedness Implement effective strategies to reduce vulnerabilities Improve communication, transparency, and coordination across your network What You’ll Learn: How to evaluate and m

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Why overcoming stale data is key to achieving a great supply chain

The Network Effect

'If we feel that today we have achieved a level of goodness across our supply network planning and operations, how do we target and mobilize toward greatness? The challenge for us in today’s competitive environment is how to evolve from ‘good’ to ‘great.’ We’ve gotten to ‘good’ by deploying the dominant technologies of today, but whose architectural design unfortunately perpetuates significant latency and inefficiency across the supply network.

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“Storage Wars” Rescues Supply Chain Ignominy

Kinaxis

'by CJ Wehlage. Take a good long look at this picture. That’s my ignominy. That’s my garage. When we moved to San Diego, we loved the weather, we loved the ocean sunsets and we loved getting rid of our parka coats, gloves, scarves and tossle caps. Roddy Martin, my colleague from AMR Research, now with Accenture, often uses the term “ah-ha” moment.

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What is an Outside-In Supply Chain?

Talking Logistics

'If you want to stay ahead of your competition, take the step beyond the traditional approach to supply chain. Most supply chain analysts believe that to remain competitive, companies must transform their supply chains from being focused inward to focusing on trying to predict demand to customer-driven chains that are organized to respond to demand with lightning speed.

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See the Future of Your Supply Chain with Predictive Lead Time

Demand Solutions

I’ve seen it play out so many times. A growing, well-established manufacturing company decides to take its business processes to the next level by implementing an ERP system. The company evaluates solutions, makes the best choice for its needs, and begins the implementation process. Months later, the new system is live, and the company’s planners begin building their business processes into the system.

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From Curiosity to Competitive Edge: How Mid-Market CEOs Are Using AI to Scale Smarter

Speaker: Lee Andrews, Founder at LJA New Media & Tony Karrer, Founder and CTO at Aggregage

This session will walk you through how one CEO used generative AI, workflow automation, and sales personalization to transform an entire security company—then built the Zero to Strategy framework that other mid-market leaders are now using to unlock 3.5x ROI. As a business executive, you’ll learn how to assess AI opportunities in your business, drive adoption across teams, and overcome internal resource constraints—without hiring a single data scientist.

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FMCG Stock Shrinkage happens in the best run operations, even yours!

Enchange Supply Chain Consultancy

'My colleague Stefan Cucu recently wrote on the subject of stock shrinkage in coolers located in HORECA outlets in Romania. One of the points he made warned Supply Chain professionals about the likelihood of stock shrinkage anywhere along the chain. The term shrinkage covers a multitude of incidents but all inevitably lead to missing stock, extra cost and ultimately, poor customer service.

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Efficient Financing Options Help Enhance Factory Standards in Emerging Markets

Logistics Viewpoints

'The financial supply chain needs more attention than it usually gets. Traditionally, the focus of supply chain management is on the movement of finished goods and raw materials across the value chain. But companies also need to pay attention to the flow of money. The movement of money happens in the form of bank credits […]. The post Efficient Financing Options Help Enhance Factory Standards in Emerging Markets appeared first on Logistics Viewpoints: A Blog for Logistics, Supply Chain, an

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Supply Chain’s New World Order: How Companies can go from From Good To Great

The Network Effect

'Today and in the posts that follow, I want to discuss the technology transformation that many supply chains are undergoing, and discuss how these changes can help the wider organization move from “good” to “great” Enterprises today face a conundrum in the optimization of their supply network performance. While many have driven significant improvements over the past few years through the application of advanced tools, processes, analytics, and measurement systems, how can

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Streamlined Sales and Operations Planning: A Konica Minolta Case Study

Kinaxis

'by Melissa Clow Today we have a great customer, Konica Minolta, that recently allowed us to write up their sales and operations planning story and I believe that it has merit in sharing with our readers! At Konica Minolta, the IT Equipment Business team was struggling to get a quick and comprehensive view of the global supply chain network. The Japanese consumer electronics company didnt have visibility into the impact of supply and demand changes on the business.

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The AI Race Isn’t Just About Tech Superiority – Its the Supply Chain, Stupid!

The race to dominate AI is no longer about who has the smartest algorithms — it's about who can build and scale faster. Behind every AI breakthrough lies a battle for resources: data centers, compute hardware, power, and telecom infrastructure. And right now, even tech giants are hitting a wall. Our latest white paper reveals the six critical supply chain elements that are increasingly separating AI leaders from the rest.

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Managed Services: The “Stretch Armstrong” of Logistics

Talking Logistics

'One of my favorite toys as a boy was Stretch Armstrong, a muscle-man action figure with a stretchable body. As the catalog picture below illustrates, you could pull its arms and legs up to four feet in length (although I never had the strength to pull them out that far). “Stretch him long, stretch him thin, watch him return to shape again” — over and over again, until he ultimately developed a tear, and the great mystery of what was inside (red gelled corn syrup) came oozing out. .

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New Books for Your Bookshelf

Supply Chain Insights

'This year, we will publish two new books: Supply Chain Metrics That Matter and The Shaman’s Journal. We are adding these two new books for your bookshelf to stand beside Bricks Matter which published in December, 2012. In 2015, it is our goal to publish another new book, Lessons in Supply Chain Leadership. Each book takes a new twist on the old topic of supply chain excellence.

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Reducing Risk and Creating More Resilient Supply Chains

SCM Research

'That does a supply chain risk researcher’s heart good: MIT Sloan Management Review has recently published two interesting case studies about the interface between risk and supply chain management. First, in the magazine’s spring issue, Chopra and Sodhi call attention to a dilemma faced by most managers: “Solutions to reduce risk mean little unless they are evaluated against their impact on cost efficiency” To protect supply chains from disruptions anyway, the authors sug

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Shelf-Level Collaboration Should be seen as Foundational to Omni-channel Initiatives

Logistics Viewpoints

The hottest trend in supply chain management is omni-channel. Five years ago it was shelf-level collaboration. But really, these initiatives should be seen as mutually reinforcing. Omni-channel is retailing is based on providing consumers with a better shopping experience by leveraging both stores and the e-commerce channel. The idea is that a customer should be […].

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State of AI in Sales & Marketing 2025

AI adoption is reshaping sales and marketing. But is it delivering real results? We surveyed 1,000+ GTM professionals to find out. The data is clear: AI users report 47% higher productivity and an average of 12 hours saved per week. But leaders say mainstream AI tools still fall short on accuracy and business impact. Download the full report today to see how AI is being used — and where go-to-market professionals think there are gaps and opportunities.

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The supply chain implications of rising healthcare costs…

The Network Effect

'The pressure to contain or drive down health system costs continues to be of big focus. In the US, healthcare expenditure per person has risen by almost 78 per cent since 2000 to USD 8,700 in 2011 (Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services 2012). In Europe, the proportion of healthcare costs as a share of GDP is predicted to rise from 6.7 in 2008 to 7.6 per cent by 2020.

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Remembering: Compromise. Confessions of a Supply Chain Dropout by Laura Dionne, TriQuint at Kinexions

Kinaxis

'by Melissa Clow. Like I’ve mentioned in my last couple of Thursday blogs, we are starting to gear up for this year’s Kinexions (our annual training & user conference ). A few weeks ago I began to reminisce about our fun customer videos from past conferences and I decided to create a blog series to share. So, on this ‘Throw Back Thursday’, I would like to share this video of Laura Dionne, director worldwide operations planning, presenting “Compromise.

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Develop a Shared Vision Statement with Your 3PL

Talking Logistics

'As highlighted in a November 2012 HBR blog post , the Israeli company Netafim captured almost one-third of the “seemingly commoditized” micro-irrigation equipment market by changing its business model to better address the needs and constraints of its customers. According to the authors, “Netafim went so far as to change [its] mission statement from ‘making the best drip irrigation equipment for customers’ to ‘helping the world grow more with less’, an objective far more aligned with the objec

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