The last couple of years have seen a growing trend in the industry of “bolting on” automation or applications to businesses to make things work better/ faster/ cheaper (as ever, pick 2!). Looking into ’24 and beyond, we face a more financially reserved future. The time may well have come to be a bit more inward-looking.
Looking at core business processes such as forecasting, inventory management, and operational processes is time (and money) well spent.
It will likely uncover a series of “quick wins” that will improve business resilience and allow you to get more from any assets in the supply chain, such as automation or other augmentation you’ve already invested in, for a relatively low further outlay.
Volatility in transport costs, whether fuel, carrier rates, or ocean rates, has been a theme for the last three years, almost to the point where it has become an industry norm. Reviewing all goods movements in the business and whether they are necessary, rational, and efficient is likely to be a worthwhile task. It will provoke questions about your network design that you may need external assistance to validate, but it will yield tangible benefits.
Possibly the biggest opportunity remains in visibility. Understanding where goods are at any given time probably allows the best decisions to be made in the supply chain. Control tower approaches to transport have traditionally been the preserve of larger organisations, but as technology has matured, this is now accessible to many more businesses of all sizes with little investment.
It is not a topic that gets a huge amount of airtime among “Big Data” and“AI”, typically as it’s not as “sexy”. When we’re looking at a future where every penny counts, making sure the jobs our people do are easy, effective and engaging offers a potentially significant benefit in terms of being able to do more for less. If fatigue in container unloading can be reduced, for example, by using lifting assistance or rising platforms, the job is easier and safer for the worker and can be completed in significantly less time.
The physical movement of goods is always the first logical one to look at, but what about back-office functions? Could you streamline your invoice processing and checking of carrier movements through automated matching? How much time does that save your team and what does that do for job satisfaction? Aside from that, you may become a better payer for your suppliers and, therefore, become a more valued partner, bringing with it all of the associated benefits.
A key theme that ties all these trends together is a question we at SCCG are already seeing—“How can we make every element of the supply chain do more for less?” That is a really fun challenge. It allows businesses to really spend some time looking at how they work on a day-to-day basis, capture some small wins relatively quickly, and understand what’s out there as longer-term targets.
At the end of the day, the challenge of doing more in our supply chains for less movement, input, and cost is one we industry professionals can all get behind. Our industry is in the limelight now like never before, and 2024 presents many opportunities for us to really “move the needle” in how our businesses function without incurring high costs.
by Andy Whiting – Managing Consultant, The Supply Chain Consulting Group