For those of you who may not know, there's lots of additional editorial that I've written for APICS magazine located at "Past Articles" on http://daveturbide.com/consulting-services/past-articles/
Most recently I wrote a two-part article on reverse logistics entitled Round and Round and a second one called Gold-Medal Reverse Logistics on achieving a winning supply chain program. Let me know what you think ...
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
Living on the Edge
Just about everyone has heard of the "leading edge," that mythical place where technology is changing the way business has always been done. While it may be an exciting place to be, there is considerable risk in being a pioneer. After all, the guy out front in the battle is the most likely to collect bullets. Or, as a friend of mine likes to say, "The lead dog has to eat a lot of rocks." But, then, if you're not the lead dog, the scenery never changes. In the spirit of our ever-evolving language, here are several variations on the leading edge theme that may become commonplace as we head into the second decade of this century:
bleeding edge - not so new, but perhaps more accurate than ever. Yes, it's dangerous out there at the head of the pack. Many pioneers have found that the technology isn't really as advanced as they thought it was when they committed to the project. Unfortunately, most of the blood on the ground belongs to the poor customers who believed the engineers and sales reps. To be fair, the engineers sure thought it would all work. The sales reps trusted the engineers because they really didn't understand the technology, only the commission plan.
feeding edge - High-tech market leaders have to stay ahead of their competition. New technologies generate the high margins that feed the research and development that develops more new technologies. Once a product is no longer alone on this edge, margins drop as me-too products compete on price. The me-too’s don't have to fund the research that developed the product in the first place, so they can afford to sell for less.
fleeting edge - Now you see it, now you don't. It looked great in the ads and the press releases but by the time you call the vendor, it (either the product or the vendor) doesn't exist any more. Count your blessings. Someone else took the bullets.
greeding edge - From the customer's perspective, the high margins demanded for new-technology products may seem excessive. This is an edge vendors want to avoid.
needing edge - If there wasn't a need (at least in someone's mind) there wouldn't be any advancement in technology. If the technology doesn't develop quickly enough, there could be potential customers out there who can't get what they need at any price. Here's where greed (or enthusiasm) may overtake prudence, and hype overtakes reality. See bleeding edge.
pleading edge - Often associated with many of the other conditions mentioned above, the pleading can go in both directions. Customers beg for promised function, announced improvements or fixes, and implementation help. Vendors pray for miracles, understanding or more time.
reading edge - This is a first cousin to vaporware: you've read about it, but it doesn't exist yet. Maybe vendors have started promoting the product but are still months or more away from release. This is particularly common in the medical arena, where promising research results are published years before the necessary validation and approvals can be obtained.
weeding edge - It's rough being in the forefront. One misstep and the whole enterprise may go down the drain. High-tech companies come and go with alarming frequency. This Darwinian weeding out of the weaker contenders is also hard on the brave souls who put their trust in new products that end up as orphans. See bleeding edge.
bleeding edge - not so new, but perhaps more accurate than ever. Yes, it's dangerous out there at the head of the pack. Many pioneers have found that the technology isn't really as advanced as they thought it was when they committed to the project. Unfortunately, most of the blood on the ground belongs to the poor customers who believed the engineers and sales reps. To be fair, the engineers sure thought it would all work. The sales reps trusted the engineers because they really didn't understand the technology, only the commission plan.
feeding edge - High-tech market leaders have to stay ahead of their competition. New technologies generate the high margins that feed the research and development that develops more new technologies. Once a product is no longer alone on this edge, margins drop as me-too products compete on price. The me-too’s don't have to fund the research that developed the product in the first place, so they can afford to sell for less.
fleeting edge - Now you see it, now you don't. It looked great in the ads and the press releases but by the time you call the vendor, it (either the product or the vendor) doesn't exist any more. Count your blessings. Someone else took the bullets.
greeding edge - From the customer's perspective, the high margins demanded for new-technology products may seem excessive. This is an edge vendors want to avoid.
needing edge - If there wasn't a need (at least in someone's mind) there wouldn't be any advancement in technology. If the technology doesn't develop quickly enough, there could be potential customers out there who can't get what they need at any price. Here's where greed (or enthusiasm) may overtake prudence, and hype overtakes reality. See bleeding edge.
pleading edge - Often associated with many of the other conditions mentioned above, the pleading can go in both directions. Customers beg for promised function, announced improvements or fixes, and implementation help. Vendors pray for miracles, understanding or more time.
reading edge - This is a first cousin to vaporware: you've read about it, but it doesn't exist yet. Maybe vendors have started promoting the product but are still months or more away from release. This is particularly common in the medical arena, where promising research results are published years before the necessary validation and approvals can be obtained.
weeding edge - It's rough being in the forefront. One misstep and the whole enterprise may go down the drain. High-tech companies come and go with alarming frequency. This Darwinian weeding out of the weaker contenders is also hard on the brave souls who put their trust in new products that end up as orphans. See bleeding edge.
Friday, May 14, 2010
No Longer a Need to Forecast?
With the evolution of tighter supply chains, shorter product cycles and shorter lead times, along with dramatic reductions in inventory throughout the supply chain, one might be tempted to conclude that planning and forecasting are a lot less important today than they were in the pre-Internet world. Don’t you believe it!
...Keep Reading This Article on www.daveturbide.com
...Keep Reading This Article on www.daveturbide.com
Monday, May 10, 2010
Did He Eat the Steak?
Do we practice what we preach? We can talk all we want about best practices and green resource management, and few will ever know if we have achieved success in that area. Nor should they. The improvement programs you undertake are aimed at better performance, lower costs, and becoming more competitive, and as long as the result justifies the effort and expense, it doesn’t matter what you call it or who knows about it.
...Keep Reading This Article on www.daveturbide.com
...Keep Reading This Article on www.daveturbide.com
2 Big Questions
Sometimes, it’s helpful to step back and ask the ‘big question’: Why do we have xxx? Or why do we do yyy? It’s easy to get wrapped up in the details and lose sight of the overall objective. Let’s look at a couple of answers.
...Keep Reading This Article on www.daveturbide.com
...Keep Reading This Article on www.daveturbide.com
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Do You Get It?
I placed an order with Staples on the Internet the other afternoon and there was an email waiting in my in box the next morning saying that the order had already been shipped and I could expect my merchandise the next day. I placed an order with a different company two weeks ago and I'm still waiting for that shipment to arrive. Whereas that might have been acceptable, or at least expected, a few years ago, my expectations have certainly changed. Staples gets it. The other company is headed for trouble.
This is a really obvious example of how a market has changed dramatically. Market changes are not always that dramatic and not always that obvious. What worked for the last ten (or twenty or fifty) years may not continue to work in the future. The Internet has played a big role in changing markets but it’s the companies that have exploited this technology that have made the difference, not the technology itself. Who would have ever thought that a retailer could make a thriving business just selling coffee, and charging several times the going rate for it as well? Who could have predicted that someone could build a multi-billion dollar business delivering letters and small packages overnight – competing with the established, relatively reliable and very inexpensive postal service – charging eight or ten dollars to deliver a letter in one day that the post office would deliver in a couple days for less than a dollar? And the list goes on.
It should be pretty obvious that change is coming and possibly from an entirely unexpected direction. Every business must be continuously aware of market forces and competition and be ready to adapt to meet the challenges head-on. Or, better yet, think far enough ‘outside of the box’ to be the one driving its competitors out of business. Best-in-class benchmarking – looking outside of your own industry for best practices – can sometimes be the source of game-changing ideas.
Companies that don’t ‘get it’ – don’t recognize the changing landscape at the earliest opportunity and take positive action to counteract it – are doomed.
Do you ‘get it’? Are you willing and able to recognize the first signs of change? Are you willing to abandon long-held ideas, processes, products, methods, and marketing approaches?
This is a really obvious example of how a market has changed dramatically. Market changes are not always that dramatic and not always that obvious. What worked for the last ten (or twenty or fifty) years may not continue to work in the future. The Internet has played a big role in changing markets but it’s the companies that have exploited this technology that have made the difference, not the technology itself. Who would have ever thought that a retailer could make a thriving business just selling coffee, and charging several times the going rate for it as well? Who could have predicted that someone could build a multi-billion dollar business delivering letters and small packages overnight – competing with the established, relatively reliable and very inexpensive postal service – charging eight or ten dollars to deliver a letter in one day that the post office would deliver in a couple days for less than a dollar? And the list goes on.
It should be pretty obvious that change is coming and possibly from an entirely unexpected direction. Every business must be continuously aware of market forces and competition and be ready to adapt to meet the challenges head-on. Or, better yet, think far enough ‘outside of the box’ to be the one driving its competitors out of business. Best-in-class benchmarking – looking outside of your own industry for best practices – can sometimes be the source of game-changing ideas.
Companies that don’t ‘get it’ – don’t recognize the changing landscape at the earliest opportunity and take positive action to counteract it – are doomed.
Do you ‘get it’? Are you willing and able to recognize the first signs of change? Are you willing to abandon long-held ideas, processes, products, methods, and marketing approaches?
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