Expert insights. Personalized for you.
This is a story for the Eds, Franks, and Toms working together in supply chains across the globe. It is also a story for a young supply chain manager attempting to make a difference, but feeling stymied. Efficient supply chains may not be the most effective. MORE
SAP touts “best-run companies” while the Accenture ads claim “ high-performance supply chains.” I am a nomad, searching for a good definition of supply chain excellence. It is a quest and the subject of my next book, Metrics That Matter , that will publish in September, 2014. Supply chain leaders are naturally competitive, and they want to know how well they are doing. Current State: What is The Supply Chain Index? MORE
In the presentation, I shared data on the evolution of supply chain planning and the results on user satisfaction. Neither technology vendor is an industry leader in delivering a solution that fits the needs of the supply chain planner. The common perception is that SAP and Oracle supply chain planning solutions are superior to best-of-breed Advanced Planning Solutions. Summary Data of User Satisfaction with Supply Chain Planning Applications. MORE
Over the years, working for and with numerous manufacturing companies, I’ve seen many supply chain practices that cost companies money. Reason #3 Not having end-to-end supply chain visibility. Reason #4 Making key decisions by modelling the supply chain in Excel. Reason #5 Not having a supply chain risk management process. Reason #6 Not effectively managing inventory. Reason #8 Keeping supply chain information in silos. MORE
At the Supply Chain Global Summit 2018 , Francois discussed the impact of digitalization, Industry 4.0, and L’Oréal’s approach to business that has allowed the company to continuously rank as a Supply Chains to Admire winner for four consecutive years. MORE
In the process of compiling the Supply Chains to Admire report for last year’s Supply Chain Insights Global Summit , the research team at Supply Chain Insights calculated the rate of supply chain improvement of companies by industry for the period of 2006-2013 and 2009-2013. We wanted to see which companies were driving the fastest rate of improvement on the supply chain metrics that matter. MORE
I was moving from a position where I led a manufacturing operation to being a part of a team to design supply chain software to improve planning decisions. The tension I felt reading the brochure on the plane is what I believe every supply chain leader feels every day. That is one of my primary drivers at Supply Chain Insights. As a team we conduct quantitative research of supply chain leaders to help gain clarity of the answers. MORE
Financial balance sheet improvements cannot be driven by traditional supply chain processes. In the words of a supply chain leader yesterday, “Lora, please give me stories of success. I will write the case studies here, and share the dialogue with the supply chain leaders in our podcast series, Straight Talk with Supply Chain Insights. When I first met Nick, he was driving a supply chain transformation at VTech Communications. MORE
Interview with Lora Cecere, Founder and CEO of Supply Chain Insights and Author of Supply Chain Metrics that Matter ( published December 2014 ). Lora Cecere is the founder and CEO of the research firm Supply Chain Insights. She is the author of the enterprise software blog Supply Chain Shaman , which attracts 5,000 readers weekly. Currently, Lora’s research focuses on supply chain sensing and revenue management. MORE
The more challenging part of dashboarding, however, gets down to the actual metrics that should be included as part of a performance management strategy. As a place to start, I thought I’d provide a shortlist of both simple and more complex metrics that our manufacturing and distribution clients are using in their dashboards today. Today’s post focuses on Sales metrics only. By product or customer groupings – Brands, Categories, Type, Geography. Basic Sales Metrics. MORE
In the last six months, in my travels, I have presented to supply chain teams in China, Belgium, France, Germany, Peru, Mexico, Netherlands, South Africa, Singapore, and the United Kingdom. I strongly feel that if I am going to cover the global supply chain that I need to experience it. Connectivity enabled the growth of the global supply chain opening up markets driving opportunity. Supply chain process development is slower. MORE
The average manufacturing company’s supply chain organization is 15 years old. Historically, the traditional supply chain focused on improving costs. Today, more mature supply chain teams focus on delivering value. While companies want to improve supply chain performance and drive value, it is easier said than done. It usually takes at least three years for a supply chain to make an impact on financial balance sheet results. MORE
When it comes to the management of inventory in value chains, frustration abounds. Executive, after executive, lament, “They have purchased many technologies and sponsored many projects to reduce inventories, but they are not seeing results.” ” I have been studying the evolution of inventory technologies as an industry analyst since 2002. The supply chain is a complex system with increasing complexity. The Inventory Management Journey. MORE
Tomorrow, I present the Supply Chains To Admire 2015 Analysis at the Supply Chain Insights Global Summit in Scottsdale, AZ. The theme is “Imagine the Supply Chain of 2025.” At the event, we will also announce the winners of the Supply Chains to Admire methodology for 2015. Today, supply chain excellence is easier to say than define. Sharing of the Supply Chains to Admire Work. MORE
This week, Gartner is hosting their annual supply chain conference. It is now the Gartner Supply Chain Top 25. The research tries to establish “ who did supply chain best ” by looking at a weighted formula of Year-over-Year Growth, Return on Assets (ROA), and Inventory Turns for the Fortune 500 companies. Inventory Turns values are based on an average of quarterly reporting for the past year. Inventory Turns is only part of the story. MORE
To drive global scale, companies need to design the supply chain to buy globally and execute locally. The design of the supply chain is fundamental to making this happen. In our interview of the Supply Chains to Admire Winners, we found a unique approach at Carter’s. For this case study we interviewed Peter Smith, currently the EVP of Supply Chain for Carter’s. The company is one of 15 winners in the 2016 Supply Chains to Admire Research. MORE
Manufacturing is the foundation of my interest in supply chain management. Supply Chain and Design. This was the beginning of my journey from manufacturing to understanding larger supply chain concepts. I knew nothing about the world of logistics, inventory management and order optimization. Much to my chagrin, when I entered into the world of supply chain, the processes of source, make and deliver were usually not designed. MORE
The second part of Drucker’s quote, “if you can't measure it, you can't improve it,” really brings home the importance of having the right set of metrics. In the field of supply chain management, we have created an abundance of metrics and key performance indicators (KPIs). For the past 30 years I have been involved with multiple efforts to build a set of supply chain metrics and have learned a few things along the way. MORE
At Supply Chain Insights, we have been actively working in our own mine sweeping project. We loaded 493 financial metrics from balance sheets and income statements for each company into the data lake for the period of 2004-2016 using YCharts data. The company was then assigned to one of 37 peer groups based on the Supply Chains to Admire methodology. Does Supply Chain Planning Drive Value? Mine sweeping is essential to warfare. MORE
A quick scan of the Internet will yield a long list of “the biggest-ever supply chain disasters”. in inventory write-down and 20% drop in stock value. Would access to better supply chain and IT performance information have helped avert or mitigate these failures? MORE
This afternoon, I poured myself a cup of tea to pen congratulation emails to the Supply Chains to Admire award winners. Each year, based on feedback from supply chain leaders, we refine the methodology. Supply Chains to Admire Award Winners. MORE
I feel that topic of supply chain management is analogous to the downward cycle of the news channels. What Drives Supply Chain Excellence? I analyze supply chain management. The broader the definition of end-to-end strategy and the alignment of supply chain processes drives value. Over the last month, I have been working on the 2019 Supply Chains to Admire analysis. They want to know, “What drives supply chain improvement? MORE
This morning, we announced the Supply Chains to Admire Winners and Finalists for 2016. Selfishly, we need standard for our research, but we also want to help supply chain leaders gain new insights from a deep data-driven analysis. There is no agreed standard for supply chain excellence. The Supply Chains to Admire analysis is now in its third year. Figure 1: Supply Chains to Admire Methodology. Five months of analysis. MORE
Over the last two decades the company successfully leveraged global scale to define supply chain leadership. With 12,000 supply chain employees operating in 80 countries with 2400 storage facilities, supply chain excellence and innovation are the foundation of corporate performance. For this case study we interviewed Ralf Busche, Senior Vice President of Global Supply Chain Strategy and Performance. Inventory Turns. MORE
Last week, I spoke on the evolution of the digital supply chains and my vision for Supply Chain 2020 at the World Trade Group Event in Miami. These will be the foundation of digital supply chain thinking that will redefine business in the next decade. In five years, I believe that we will have supply chain planning systems that learn while we sleep. Figure 1: Supply Chain 2020. Figure 4: Current State of Supply Chain. MORE
In my work with Supply Chain Insights , I immerse myself in learning. I continually question my long-held beliefs on supply chain excellence. . When readers finish a Supply Chain Shaman blog, I want to drive a set of unique takeaways. Today, I am going to share five insights that I have gleaned from our work on Supply Chain Planning Benchmarking. Figure 1: Supply Chain Planning Benchmarking Methodology Overview. MORE
“someone must have their mojo working over at the record company” In the 1990s supply chain had MOJO. Improvement on the key metrics of growth, inventory turns, operating margin and Return on Invested Capital (ROIC) is elusive. mo·jo: noun. MORE
As supply chain clichés take flight, clients struggle with execution. One of these concepts that I hear a lot; but see few tangible examples, is the idea of “customer-segmented supply chain.” The discussion of customer-segmented supply chains happens often. Most supply chain planning teams do not know their customers. Spinnaker Management Group asked me to co-present on a demand-driven webinar with SanDisk. MORE
User adoption is a challenge that often arises during the rollout of supply chain analytics solutions. The obvious danger of this is that business rules and data governance often don’t exist from department to department or user to user, leaving an overall picture into the health of the business that is foggy because KPIs and metrics do not correlate across the organization. MORE
Included in this post is Cummins’ digital award for the 2016 Supply Chains to Admire. I want to understand why some companies outperform on the Supply Chain Metrics That Matter while others do not. I am enlisting their support to share their stories in podcasts, blog posts and at the Supply Chain Insights Global Summit on September 6-9. The Customer-Centric Supply Chain Strategy needs both.). Supply Chain Alignment. MORE
The traditional supply chain leader focused only on cost reduction. Snow fell last night as I worked on my last Supply Chain Metrics That Matter report. This is number 15 in a series that looks critically, industry by industry, to understand relative improvement of peer groups on the Effective Frontier. Ironically, most companies are very entrapped in measuring and rewarding functional metrics which degrades overall improvement. MORE
Time For A Supply Chain Check-Up? When a company contacts me to help them with their supply chain, the pain is usually a gap in customer service. They tend to have many pretty PowerPoint slide decks–full of acronyms, pretty pictures and E2E commitments–but they lack a common definition of supply chain excellence. To complete a supply chain diagnostic, I take these four steps: Step One. As a group, we drill into root issues. MORE
You are pissy and opinionated in this world of supply chain blandness. The term supply chain excellence is easier to say than define. I have been trying to define it as a supply chain analyst for over fifteen years. When I wrote the book Bricks Matter , I wanted to write a celebratory book on why the adoption of new technologies and practices in supply chain had improved corporate performance. The Supply Chain Index. MORE
Each year at Supply Chain Insights we study performance and improvement of companies in each industry. For the past four years, as we have done our work, we have tracked Novo Nordisk’s continued improvement against the pharmaceutical peer group. Note that neither company is making progress at the intersection of operating margin and inventory turns. Performance of BMS and Merck at the Intersection of Inventory Turns and Operating Margin. MORE
” Here is an excerpt from the article: “…it isn’t by becoming more efficient that the supply chains of Wal-Mart, Dell, and Amazon have given those companies an edge over their competitors. First, great supply chains are agile. Supply Chain Planning. MORE
Many people are talking about Key Performance Indicators, Metrics, Analytics, and other indicators of performance. The importance of selecting the right metrics or “measures” as I prefer to call them, is critical as we all know that metrics drive behaviors. Rather then selecting a plethora of meaningless metrics, it is always better to focus on a critical few, and select them wisely. Step 2 – Develop Metrics and Data Sources. Inventory Goal. MORE
Groups Inventory Metrics Supply Chain Supply Chain Shaman
SEPTEMBER 3, 2018
” Here is an excerpt from the article: “…it isn’t by becoming more efficient that the supply chains of Wal-Mart, Dell, and Amazon have given those companies an edge over their competitors. First, great supply chains are agile. Supply Chain Planning.
Logility
MAY 22, 2020
User adoption is a challenge that often arises during the rollout of supply chain analytics solutions. The obvious danger of this is that business rules and data governance often don’t exist from department to department or user to user, leaving an overall picture into the health of the business that is foggy because KPIs and metrics do not correlate across the organization.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Supply Chain Shaman
JULY 22, 2019
I feel that topic of supply chain management is analogous to the downward cycle of the news channels. What Drives Supply Chain Excellence? I analyze supply chain management. The broader the definition of end-to-end strategy and the alignment of supply chain processes drives value. Over the last month, I have been working on the 2019 Supply Chains to Admire analysis. They want to know, “What drives supply chain improvement?
Supply Chain Shaman
MAY 13, 2015
Manufacturing is the foundation of my interest in supply chain management. Supply Chain and Design. This was the beginning of my journey from manufacturing to understanding larger supply chain concepts. I knew nothing about the world of logistics, inventory management and order optimization. Much to my chagrin, when I entered into the world of supply chain, the processes of source, make and deliver were usually not designed.
AIMMS
FEBRUARY 20, 2015
Interview with Lora Cecere, Founder and CEO of Supply Chain Insights and Author of Supply Chain Metrics that Matter ( published December 2014 ). Lora Cecere is the founder and CEO of the research firm Supply Chain Insights. She is the author of the enterprise software blog Supply Chain Shaman , which attracts 5,000 readers weekly. Currently, Lora’s research focuses on supply chain sensing and revenue management.
Supply Chain Shaman
JULY 19, 2015
In my work with Supply Chain Insights , I immerse myself in learning. I continually question my long-held beliefs on supply chain excellence. . When readers finish a Supply Chain Shaman blog, I want to drive a set of unique takeaways. Today, I am going to share five insights that I have gleaned from our work on Supply Chain Planning Benchmarking. Figure 1: Supply Chain Planning Benchmarking Methodology Overview.
.jpg)
|
Supply Chain Shaman
JUNE 19, 2018
This afternoon, I poured myself a cup of tea to pen congratulation emails to the Supply Chains to Admire award winners. Each year, based on feedback from supply chain leaders, we refine the methodology. Supply Chains to Admire Award Winners.
Kinaxis
DECEMBER 3, 2014
Over the years, working for and with numerous manufacturing companies, I’ve seen many supply chain practices that cost companies money. Reason #3 Not having end-to-end supply chain visibility. Reason #4 Making key decisions by modelling the supply chain in Excel. Reason #5 Not having a supply chain risk management process. Reason #6 Not effectively managing inventory. Reason #8 Keeping supply chain information in silos.
Supply Chain Shaman
SEPTEMBER 9, 2015
Tomorrow, I present the Supply Chains To Admire 2015 Analysis at the Supply Chain Insights Global Summit in Scottsdale, AZ. The theme is “Imagine the Supply Chain of 2025.” At the event, we will also announce the winners of the Supply Chains to Admire methodology for 2015. Today, supply chain excellence is easier to say than define. Sharing of the Supply Chains to Admire Work.
Logility
JANUARY 26, 2017
The second part of Drucker’s quote, “if you can't measure it, you can't improve it,” really brings home the importance of having the right set of metrics. In the field of supply chain management, we have created an abundance of metrics and key performance indicators (KPIs). For the past 30 years I have been involved with multiple efforts to build a set of supply chain metrics and have learned a few things along the way.
Supply Chain Shaman
OCTOBER 5, 2018
At the Supply Chain Global Summit 2018 , Francois discussed the impact of digitalization, Industry 4.0, and L’Oréal’s approach to business that has allowed the company to continuously rank as a Supply Chains to Admire winner for four consecutive years.
|
Supply Chain Shaman
OCTOBER 22, 2015
I was moving from a position where I led a manufacturing operation to being a part of a team to design supply chain software to improve planning decisions. The tension I felt reading the brochure on the plane is what I believe every supply chain leader feels every day. That is one of my primary drivers at Supply Chain Insights. As a team we conduct quantitative research of supply chain leaders to help gain clarity of the answers.
Supply Chain Shaman
MAY 3, 2015
When it comes to the management of inventory in value chains, frustration abounds. Executive, after executive, lament, “They have purchased many technologies and sponsored many projects to reduce inventories, but they are not seeing results.” ” I have been studying the evolution of inventory technologies as an industry analyst since 2002. The supply chain is a complex system with increasing complexity. The Inventory Management Journey.
Supply Chain Shaman
MARCH 18, 2018
The traditional supply chain leader focused only on cost reduction. Snow fell last night as I worked on my last Supply Chain Metrics That Matter report. This is number 15 in a series that looks critically, industry by industry, to understand relative improvement of peer groups on the Effective Frontier. Ironically, most companies are very entrapped in measuring and rewarding functional metrics which degrades overall improvement.
Supply Chain Shaman
AUGUST 7, 2019
Time For A Supply Chain Check-Up? When a company contacts me to help them with their supply chain, the pain is usually a gap in customer service. They tend to have many pretty PowerPoint slide decks–full of acronyms, pretty pictures and E2E commitments–but they lack a common definition of supply chain excellence. To complete a supply chain diagnostic, I take these four steps: Step One. As a group, we drill into root issues.
Supply Chain Shaman
SEPTEMBER 4, 2017
At Supply Chain Insights, we have been actively working in our own mine sweeping project. We loaded 493 financial metrics from balance sheets and income statements for each company into the data lake for the period of 2004-2016 using YCharts data. The company was then assigned to one of 37 peer groups based on the Supply Chains to Admire methodology. Does Supply Chain Planning Drive Value? Mine sweeping is essential to warfare.
Supply Chain Shaman
JULY 25, 2016
This morning, we announced the Supply Chains to Admire Winners and Finalists for 2016. Selfishly, we need standard for our research, but we also want to help supply chain leaders gain new insights from a deep data-driven analysis. There is no agreed standard for supply chain excellence. The Supply Chains to Admire analysis is now in its third year. Figure 1: Supply Chains to Admire Methodology. Five months of analysis.
Supply Chain Shaman
APRIL 15, 2015
In the presentation, I shared data on the evolution of supply chain planning and the results on user satisfaction. Neither technology vendor is an industry leader in delivering a solution that fits the needs of the supply chain planner. The common perception is that SAP and Oracle supply chain planning solutions are superior to best-of-breed Advanced Planning Solutions. Summary Data of User Satisfaction with Supply Chain Planning Applications.
Supply Chain Shaman
NOVEMBER 28, 2016
To drive global scale, companies need to design the supply chain to buy globally and execute locally. The design of the supply chain is fundamental to making this happen. In our interview of the Supply Chains to Admire Winners, we found a unique approach at Carter’s. For this case study we interviewed Peter Smith, currently the EVP of Supply Chain for Carter’s. The company is one of 15 winners in the 2016 Supply Chains to Admire Research.
Supply Chain Shaman
MARCH 6, 2015
In the process of compiling the Supply Chains to Admire report for last year’s Supply Chain Insights Global Summit , the research team at Supply Chain Insights calculated the rate of supply chain improvement of companies by industry for the period of 2006-2013 and 2009-2013. We wanted to see which companies were driving the fastest rate of improvement on the supply chain metrics that matter.
Logility
AUGUST 25, 2020
A quick scan of the Internet will yield a long list of “the biggest-ever supply chain disasters”. in inventory write-down and 20% drop in stock value. Would access to better supply chain and IT performance information have helped avert or mitigate these failures?
Supply Chain Shaman
MARCH 28, 2016
The average manufacturing company’s supply chain organization is 15 years old. Historically, the traditional supply chain focused on improving costs. Today, more mature supply chain teams focus on delivering value. While companies want to improve supply chain performance and drive value, it is easier said than done. It usually takes at least three years for a supply chain to make an impact on financial balance sheet results.
Supply Chain Shaman
AUGUST 10, 2018
“someone must have their mojo working over at the record company” In the 1990s supply chain had MOJO. Improvement on the key metrics of growth, inventory turns, operating margin and Return on Invested Capital (ROIC) is elusive. mo·jo: noun.
Supply Chain Shaman
FEBRUARY 23, 2017
Over the last two decades the company successfully leveraged global scale to define supply chain leadership. With 12,000 supply chain employees operating in 80 countries with 2400 storage facilities, supply chain excellence and innovation are the foundation of corporate performance. For this case study we interviewed Ralf Busche, Senior Vice President of Global Supply Chain Strategy and Performance. Inventory Turns.
Silvon Software
JUNE 11, 2020
The more challenging part of dashboarding, however, gets down to the actual metrics that should be included as part of a performance management strategy. As a place to start, I thought I’d provide a shortlist of both simple and more complex metrics that our manufacturing and distribution clients are using in their dashboards today. Today’s post focuses on Sales metrics only. By product or customer groupings – Brands, Categories, Type, Geography. Basic Sales Metrics.
Supply Chain View from the Field
APRIL 1, 2015
Many people are talking about Key Performance Indicators, Metrics, Analytics, and other indicators of performance. The importance of selecting the right metrics or “measures” as I prefer to call them, is critical as we all know that metrics drive behaviors. Rather then selecting a plethora of meaningless metrics, it is always better to focus on a critical few, and select them wisely. Step 2 – Develop Metrics and Data Sources. Inventory Goal.
Supply Chain Shaman
FEBRUARY 12, 2017
Each year at Supply Chain Insights we study performance and improvement of companies in each industry. For the past four years, as we have done our work, we have tracked Novo Nordisk’s continued improvement against the pharmaceutical peer group. Note that neither company is making progress at the intersection of operating margin and inventory turns. Performance of BMS and Merck at the Intersection of Inventory Turns and Operating Margin.
Supply Chain Shaman
SEPTEMBER 20, 2015
As supply chain clichés take flight, clients struggle with execution. One of these concepts that I hear a lot; but see few tangible examples, is the idea of “customer-segmented supply chain.” The discussion of customer-segmented supply chains happens often. Most supply chain planning teams do not know their customers. Spinnaker Management Group asked me to co-present on a demand-driven webinar with SanDisk.
Supply Chain Shaman
NOVEMBER 14, 2016
Financial balance sheet improvements cannot be driven by traditional supply chain processes. In the words of a supply chain leader yesterday, “Lora, please give me stories of success. I will write the case studies here, and share the dialogue with the supply chain leaders in our podcast series, Straight Talk with Supply Chain Insights. When I first met Nick, he was driving a supply chain transformation at VTech Communications.
Supply Chain Shaman
JUNE 26, 2016
In the last six months, in my travels, I have presented to supply chain teams in China, Belgium, France, Germany, Peru, Mexico, Netherlands, South Africa, Singapore, and the United Kingdom. I strongly feel that if I am going to cover the global supply chain that I need to experience it. Connectivity enabled the growth of the global supply chain opening up markets driving opportunity. Supply chain process development is slower.
Supply Chain Shaman
MAY 22, 2013
This week, Gartner is hosting their annual supply chain conference. It is now the Gartner Supply Chain Top 25. The research tries to establish “ who did supply chain best ” by looking at a weighted formula of Year-over-Year Growth, Return on Assets (ROA), and Inventory Turns for the Fortune 500 companies. Inventory Turns values are based on an average of quarterly reporting for the past year. Inventory Turns is only part of the story.
Supply Chain Shaman
AUGUST 11, 2016
Included in this post is Cummins’ digital award for the 2016 Supply Chains to Admire. I want to understand why some companies outperform on the Supply Chain Metrics That Matter while others do not. I am enlisting their support to share their stories in podcasts, blog posts and at the Supply Chain Insights Global Summit on September 6-9. The Customer-Centric Supply Chain Strategy needs both.). Supply Chain Alignment.
Supply Chain Shaman
NOVEMBER 1, 2015
Last week, I spoke on the evolution of the digital supply chains and my vision for Supply Chain 2020 at the World Trade Group Event in Miami. These will be the foundation of digital supply chain thinking that will redefine business in the next decade. In five years, I believe that we will have supply chain planning systems that learn while we sleep. Figure 1: Supply Chain 2020. Figure 4: Current State of Supply Chain.
Supply Chain Shaman
MARCH 19, 2014
You are pissy and opinionated in this world of supply chain blandness. The term supply chain excellence is easier to say than define. I have been trying to define it as a supply chain analyst for over fifteen years. When I wrote the book Bricks Matter , I wanted to write a celebratory book on why the adoption of new technologies and practices in supply chain had improved corporate performance. The Supply Chain Index.
Supply Chain Shaman
OCTOBER 25, 2013
SAP touts “best-run companies” while the Accenture ads claim “ high-performance supply chains.” I am a nomad, searching for a good definition of supply chain excellence. It is a quest and the subject of my next book, Metrics That Matter , that will publish in September, 2014. Supply chain leaders are naturally competitive, and they want to know how well they are doing. Current State: What is The Supply Chain Index?
262 
Let's personalize your content