The Meaning of Green

Recently, the MIT center for transportation and logistics has published a material around environmental regulations and macro factors influences on supply chain among supply chain 2020 (SC2020) project, to shed a light on the greening of supply chain. This study which has been led by one of the MIT’s professor Randy Kirchain, addresses environmental issues as macro factors and the impacts of these factors on diverse aspects of supply chain such as global production system, business operations and planning in supply chains. I propose to have a look through the article ‘The Meaning of Green’.

What should we do about RFID vulnerabilties?

It’s almost been a month since researchers at the Amsterdam's Free University created a radio frequency identity (RFID) chip infected with a virus to prove that RFID systems are vulnerable despite the extremely low memory capacity on the cheap chips.

Since the release of this news, there has been a lot of discussion going on about the root causes and effects on RFID adoption strategies. Anita has also covered some aspects of RFID vulnerability in her earlier articles. But the question still remains that: Should the companies take it as a really serious threat or not?

Well, I myself like the notion by Paul Faber of Industry Week which seems more robust:

The publicity surrounding this RFID virus research is no reason to delay any planned RFID implementations. The practical lesson to learn from the research is to ask the right questions of RFID integrators and software service providers. If you are currently planning an RFID technology project for your facility, simply include your current IT experts in the technology selection process. This will go a long way towards safeguarding you from any potential problems with RFID.

Managing Service Experience

Often, the psychological behaviours of human being are very well used in the corporate world for running a successful business. In a way , it gives rise to the management philosophy.

As per the management philosophy, there are four kinds of people (customers.)

1. Those who always keep running from things and try to get something new, just to avoid thinking on what they did! = ESCAPIST

2. Those who do things for their interests and still believe in contemplating on the things they did. = ENRICHMENT AND AESHTETIC

3. Those who know right from the start what they want to do and where they are heading to! They do eaxactly that with some reasons behind. = EDUCATION AND ENRICHMENT

4. Those who are unaware of whats happening around them/ with them and who are really not bothered about it. May be bacause of their lack of ability, awareness, or some reasons. They just go by flow...join others in whatever they do! = ENTERTAINMENT

How the Management Guru's use these four categories for their strategies as Operations Strategies in Service Sector, for creating the disposition among customers, for creating organizational/business orientation, is interesting.

It is generally made sure by them that, they cater all above four categories of customers for running successfull business. It is a challenge to design and structure a business with emphasis on "Customer Experience", technically called "Managing Service Experience."


Now, the important question is- why talk about experience ?

It would give New Sources of Revenues when the needs of goods and services are essentially met.

Three sources of New Revenues are:

1. B2C - move towards providing "experience"
2. B2B - improve service, enhance work- experience ( thereby effectiveness), come up with new business processes.
3. Global Market - Provide goods and services to those who don't have them yet.


Extended examples of Designing for Experience are:

1. Frank Lloyd Wright's Unitary Temple
2. Ikea
3. Kansai Airport
4. Hard Rock Cafe
5. Outback Steakhouse

Extended examples of Desiging the Configuration of Service are:

1. Automobile sales, design and manufacturing

GM's Internet Overhaul, Technology Review

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_go1932/is_200210/ai_n7283969
http://www.manyworlds.com/default.aspx?from=/exploreCO.aspx&coid=CO104021291446

Ghosn's revival of Nissan

Carlos Ghosn; Shift - Inside Nissan's Historical Revival

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/05_03/b3916021_mz005.htm

2. Shouldice Hospital

My advice to you for reinventing your supply chain...

Based on what I have seen in different companies, usually, you can translate what your target cutomers want into measurable obejectives in these 5 factors:

1) cost
2) speed
3) flexibility
4) quality
5) dependability

The key point here is which one is the most important to create value both for customers and the company (well, that's what the management is all about). Then the next step is to form the whole supply chain around this factor to fulfill customer demands. If the company succeeds in doing this, the results will be highly rewarding.A good example is my favorite company in fashion industry: ZARA

Zara's focus from the start has been on speed: production planning, new product development, transportation and all the other things have been designed in a way to achieve this goal. By focusing on speed, the company has found its way to become the most profitable fashion company in the world.What is the most important factor in your industry?

(Source: SupplyChainer.com)

Standardization Club !

I'm a fan of standardization management. If there existed a club for fans of this idea, I would definitely join that. The thing is when I use the term "standardization management", I mean companies can benefit alot from standardizing the components of their products and services. This issue decreases complexity through supply chain significantly.One example in service area is Southwest Airlines: because their planes are only Boeing 737, if for example one pilot becomes sick, they could easily assign another pilot to that plane and the pilot is familiar with cockpit, control panel and these stuff (no training is needed). Maintenance and repair and supplier relationship would also become much more easier too. I will try to touch apon this issue more in future.