Learn from industry experts about the future of supply chain analytics in 2016. Understand the main concerns of executives in the coming year and where the focus will be across the entire supply chain.
Supply Chain Intelligence and Analytics Executive Guidelines for Success
1. Supply Chain Intelligence and Analytics
Executive Guidelines for Success
Christopher Gopal, PhD
Global Supply Chain & Operations Consultant and Educator
Center for Supply Chain & Logistics, Drucker School of Business, Claremont
Keith Peterson, PhD
President and CEO
Halo
2. From the 2016 Supply Chain Guru Prognostications
• Dashboards and basic analytics will drive the "intelligent" supply chain.
• The focus will be on basic actionable intelligence in the supply chain, including daily dashboards
and core analytics around customers, supply, inventory, sales & operations planning, fulfillment
and finance.
• "Intelligence" will replace the "big data' hype, and companies will start placing a great deal more
attention to developing predictive and prescriptive "advanced" analytics driven by the Internet of
Things.
• However, it will be the basic dashboards, information and on-demand "what-if" analysis that will
be the main concerns of executives in the coming year.
3. It’s the data!
The biggest problem is inaccurate data, untrusted data, out-of-date data, incomplete data, and just
plain wrong data
Data Cleansing, Management, and “Class A” Accuracy will be a critical initiative
4. Any way, As I like it
Mobile, Tablet, Smartphone, Notebook, Desktop, Watch
At suppliers’ site, customer location, retail outlet, manufacturing plant, warehouse, on the
road, government and customs office
In the format and level of detail that is wanted by the user and decision maker – at the
aggregate and detailed levels.
5. From Anywhere
Suppliers, Customers, Channels, Retail, different facilities
Third Parties – Logistics, Fulfillment, Service, other providers
Multiple ERP, databases, and other systems
Sensors, RFID, appliances – the Internet of Things (IoT)
Structured and Unstructured data
6. The Answer is in the room
The people in the company are the best placed to know their needs, situation and priorities – and
information to plan, respond and execute
Outside experts with experience in the Supply Chain provide ideas and suggestions.
The software company can provide the capability and templates, but NOT the answer
And beware of canned “practices” and “methods”
7. Well-thought
out and simple beats hype
and complexity
Supply Chain Intelligence, metrics and presentation need to be thought out first in the context of
the company’s operations, structure and key decisions
Focus on Status, Projections and Impacts, and the “what if” analyses to support decision making
Basics trump complexity any time!
FIRST the company must get the information and analytics to improve visibility, velocity and
execution.
LATER, if necessary, move to more “advanced” concepts, such as Predictive and Prescriptive
analytics
8. Easy to Use and Simple to
Understand
Easy-to-configure with simple graphics and displays are most effective
Creative ways of showing information for decision support are better
than creative ways of display and visualization
Large teams of IT support and analysts with difficult-to-change
analytics make for a cumbersome and unusable system
Complex, fancy visualization is great for conferences and
presentations, not for day-to-day planning and execution