As I've been going through my hundreds of articles to put together the 100 tips, it's become obvious as to which topics resonated with me as those essential to delivering bottom line business results. Here are a few highlights from supply chain management: Demand Planning - It starts here. [...]
Lisa Anderson, president of LMA Consulting Group and known as The Manufacturing ConnectorTM, celebrates her 100th newsletter, Profit Through PeopleTM and her 10th year in business by releasing a list of best practices, strategies and tips for manufacturers, distributors and supply chain managers. This compilation of elite ideas was [...]
As the holidays come to a close work looms depressingly larger for some. Business leaders have to step in to hike motivation levels and bring goals back into focus so that 2015 starts on a strong productive note. Published in ProjectTimes, January 8, 2014 Often, the holiday aftermath can [...]
Technological innovations are abundant, even overwhelming. Rather than trying to modernize at every turn seek to leverage your I.T. department to provide maximum efficiency without non-value added work. We hear a lot about lean, Toyota Production System and the like; however, I rarely hear about Lean I.T. A friend [...]
CLAREMONT, Calif., June 17, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Lisa Anderson, president of LMA Consulting Group and a supply chain management expert, reports that over two-thirds of manufacturers and distributors participating in her service gaps research study have reported having to respond to the elevated service standards established by companies like Amazon. [...]
Business moves fast as customers demand more and competitors look for an edge to beat you. Excelling in this environment requires a proactive approach with continuous process improvement at the heart. Take any business process. I have no doubt there will be hidden opportunities for process improvement. When is [...]
American businesses may have miscalculated costs and benefits when they joined the outsourcing bandwagon. With the tide rolling back, what direction should you take? For many years, companies outsourced as a natural course of activity. Unfortunately, often times, they didn't even perform an analysis of the total benefit; instead, [...]
Collecting lots of data isn’t enough to improve service levels. A successful manager tracks relevant metric trends and puts the information into action. One of the keys to success for any business is to watch metrics trends. In my experience, if a client watches key trends, they tend to [...]
Communications can get muffled in a busy work environment, but effective leadership makes information delivery a key component in daily operations. In my almost 25 year-career in manufacturing and distribution, I've yet to see a company with "perfect" communications. I've seen a few stars (unfortunately the 20% of the [...]
Harvey Mudd College won first prize in the undergraduate division of the APICS West Coast Student Case Competition and now moves on to national competition in San Antonio in October. The APICS Southwest District recently hosted 23 teams in San Diego from the Western United States, Hong Kong and [...]
