Supply chain management is a key factor in your company’s prosperity, expansion and ability to remain competitive.
Read on to find out everything you need to know about supply chain management, how to optimize it, and how to foresee future changes.
Logistics covers all activities and processes required between the initial request for a product and its final reception by a customer. It therefore involves administrative, organizational and management-related aspects.
SCM (Supply Chain Management) designates the set of tools, resources and techniques used to manage a supply chain as efficiently as possible. Supply chain management can be divided into three stages: scheduling, restocking, and closure of orders once the customer is satisfied.
Each of these steps contains numerous smaller steps, all serving a single purpose: to make the right product available at the right time, as rapidly as possible and with the best possible quality.
Logistics and supply chain management are strategically important, therefore, and can cover numerous areas, including:
Logistics directly impacts a company's bottom line and its revenue, so it's essential to track performance and optimize each process.
To measure the efficiency of your supply chain, the key metric is OTD (on time delivery).
OTD allows you to determine the global efficiency of your supply chain by comparing, over a given period, the number of orders delivered on time against the number of orders placed. The higher your OTD rate, efficient your organization.
Other KPIs highlight the various strengths and weaknesses of your supply chain, including:
To optimize logistics management, KPIs obviously have to be tracked and analysed to identify all possible areas for improvement. But there are other ways to optimize your supply chain:
This will allow you to link your logistics strategy to the management of your supply chain. By identifying each of the cogs in the greater mechanism you’ll have a clear vision of where you need to optimize.
Your employees provide valuable support in driving change. By involving them in changes and informing them of the benefits for them and the company, they’ll be more inclined to accept change and will in turn encourage other employees to do the same.
Introduce cross docking to reduce the movement of products and increase the productivity of your employees, or deploy a Warehouse Management System (WMS) for tracking and tracing products in stock and orders in transit.
The global outbreak of Covid-19 in 2020 was a severe shock for e-commerce. Faced with the health crisis, companies had to take quick measures to adapt (changes in return policy, employee protection etc.).
Supply chain management was directly impacted. While many emergency measures were introduced, this health crisis of unprecedented magnitude also provided us with some important lessons for the future of logistics management.
Many tools - some already widely used, others whose potential remains to be explored and deployed - offer a way to respond to such a situation.
Logistics management looks set to undergo many changes in the coming years. Look out for the following emerging trends:
These coming changes will pose real challenges, but they will also signify real advances for businesses, their employees, consumers, and the planet. All of these emerging trends and technologies will make it possible to offer an ever-faster and more efficient service while better serving everybody’s needs.
Precipitated by the Covid-19 crisis, the changes that will occur over the next few years are a step in the right direction. While many of the technologies needed to effect these changes have yet to be developed or made available to the wider market, others already exist and are making a difference.
One technology that’s available right now and helps you rise to the challenges facing today’s logistics sector - a comprehensive robotics and software package to automate your logistics platform with gains in:
Artificial intelligence, robotics and process automation are going to revolutionize the supply chain. To meet new and emerging logistics needs, adaptation is the key. That is why it's essential to opt for a scalable solution that’s capable of adapting to your requirements, with reliable real-time supervision.
Such a solution lets you optimize management of your supply chain and get ready for the changes that will take place in the coming years, in your enterprise and all over the world. More than a challenge, it's an investment in the future.