My procurement mentor exemplifies "profit through people" and can achieve more on a golf course in 2 hours than an entire team of Harvard MBA's could achieve in a year. He took all the complex terminology, confusing pricing indicators, economic trends and world events and turned it into a [...]
A few best practices for reducing inventory levels without negatively impacting customer service include the following: Put the "right" people in the "right" jobs - it is amazing how much this one point contributes to success. Managing inventory levels requires a unique skill set - analysis, seeing the bigger [...]
With more and more companies struggling to achieve plan, investor's targets, Wall Street expectations, etc, it appears as though companies are cutting costs (many times, focusing much attention on the "small stuff" such as $100 expense reports etc), asking employees to work longer hours and putting together other triage [...]
Do these hypothetical situations sound familiar? Acme Company has a large, priority customer called Wylie Company. Acme must service Wylie flawlessly to maintain the contract, so to ensure stock is always available when Wylie needs it, Acme agrees to a guaranteed safety stock level for Wylie. And, Acme ends [...]
The key to effective cycle counting is to not get bogged down in resolving every dollar, but rather focus on the significant discrepancies. The main goal of cycle counting is to cycle through your inventory to ensure inventory accuracy on a consistent basis. (In contrast, a physical inventory is [...]
Exceptional customer service and customer relations can make or break your business. A few tips to improve your customer service include: Focus on providing value - know what your customers' value (service, price, features, lead time, etc). How can you be better than everyone else in providing your customer's [...]
Meant to protect investors and increase transparency in corporate accounting, implementing the Sarbanes Oxley Act takes some organizational introspection. The 2002 Sarbanes Oxley legislation (new, enhanced standards for all U.S. public companies) was established in response to high-profile financial scandals (Enron etc) in order to protect shareholders and the [...]
As companies set priorities for 2010 or next year's budget, it is important to understand where to start. So, why should inventory accuracy be a top priority? It's required from an accounting standpoint. Typically speaking, inventory can be a substantial number on your financial statements. What could be more [...]
Liken sustainability to reducing waste, which in turn respects the environment and makes business financial sense. Sustainability is gaining traction in today’s cutting edge discussions. Whenever a topic pops up in multiple places suddenly, I take notice. I’ve read multiple articles in trade publications and magazines, attended a keynote [...]
As I'm on my way to New York to give a speech on leveraging supply chain strategy to achieve a competitive advantage, I've been thinking about common themes with my speeches, articles, surveys and client observations - customer service emerged as a vital priority in all cases. Customer service [...]
