Professor Richard Wilding is interviewed and quoted by "Procurement Leaders Magazine" on "After the flood - lessons from Thailand".  How good is your supply chain risk management? 
http://www.procurementleaders.com/news/latestnews/0511-lessons-from-thailand/
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Time is Money in the supply chain!

We all know the saying “Time is Money” but how often when involved in making procurement supply chain decisions is time taken into account?  Henry Ford proposed in 1926 that “Time waste is more important than material waste in that there can be no salvage”.  In other words if reading this is a complete waste of time to you your time will never be reimbursed! On the other hand, if you were to print this out, you may be able to recycle the paper and salvage some material!

But when we come to supply chain, logistics, procurement and sourcing how much are we willing to pay for time?  Is time factored into the price we pay, is it considered as part of the decision?  Do you understand the true costs of time when you procure or make another supply chain management or logistics decision?

For example, it is not uncommon for a low cost global sourcing decision to extend the cash to cash cycle from 8 weeks (if locally sourced) to 19 weeks when sourced globally.  What is the cost of this to the business in terms of increased risk, the cost of funding additional inventory and the cost of reduced responsiveness?  What is the cost of having to manage highly variable ocean transit times which means your items may arrive plus or minus 10 days from the due date originally promised?   What is the cost of the increased safety stock you carry to cover this increased time and time variance?  Can your “Just in Time” systems cope with this?

As a procurement or supply chain leader the true cost of time needs to be understood and disseminated to your team.   Without considering the “T” word, TIME, the “P” word, PROFITS, will be destroyed even if you did reduce the “piece” price significantly.
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_ Managing the blood supply chain.

Today (28th December 2011) the BBC has run an article titled “Blood Bank “Perfect Storm” Threat for 2012".   It argues that blood stocks in the UK may be hit by the Olympics, Queens Diamond Jubilee and other events this year.  This is due to a potential drop in donations.   For many years I have had the privilege of working on the blood supply chain supporting NHS Blood Stocks Management Scheme, so it seems appropriate to look at the blood supply chain and understand this threat and what we can do to avoid it.

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_ Prof Richard Wilding comments published in “Procurement Leaders” on moving back from Global to Local sourcing http://bit.ly/rv3Oss
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_ It is now just under 2 weeks since the new www.richardwilding.info website has been launched.  As part of the process the freely available Google Analytics has been used to monitor the site.  Information including the number of hits, detailed demographics including the town, country, type of computer, make of mobile telephone, time spent viewing pages, entry and exit pages are monitored and analysed automatically as part of the free google analytics package. 

Google analytics also tracks the “journey” or flow a user takes on the website.  It sees the country and town the “surfer” originates from it then monitors each page viewed so a surfer may originate in Seatle, USA, access the home page for 30 seconds, then spend 2 minutes on the “About” page, 45 seconds reading this “blog”, then access the “downloads” and down load a file, then visit the “podcast page” for a further 92 seconds and then exits.

But what is the point of this abundance of this anonymous information and how can companies use it?
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Professor Wilding is interviewed in the Sunday Telegraph (U.K.) special report on Global Supply Chains. 

http://www.lyonsdown.co.uk/publications/2011/globalsupplychains.pdf  

What is the principal challenge facing supply chains today?

Severe pressure on resources. Many raw materials are in short
supply. Oil is starting to run short, so prices will keep rising. Money
is tight, so organisations can’t afford new machinery or large
inventories. Lack of space and skilled manpower can be a major
constraint. Even water is a scarce and under-appreciated resource.

What can we do about it?

One solution is to rethink the way we use resources. Instead of the
“consumption” model – buy something, use it, throw it away – we
need a more sustainable model where resources are shared or
rented. Does every household need its own lawnmower? Does
every company need its own warehouse, factory and vehicle
fleet? Or could asset sharing and collaborative working increase
efficiency and reduce wastage and transport utilisation?

What other new approaches could supply chains take?

Embrace new technologies and economies of scale – for example,
3D printing could enable spare parts to be manufactured locally
instead of being shipped around the globe. And products could
be shipped in cheap, “vanilla” forms and then tailored for local
markets.

Do we have the skills to meet these challenges?
Supply chain skills are another scarce resource. Traditional supply
chain skills were technical: inventory management, requirements
planning, transport and so on. But the order-winner today is
“emotional” intelligence: the ability to build relationships and
collaborate with suppliers, customers and even competitors to
create more sustainable supply chains.

 How can we develop these “emotional” skills?

At Cranfield, we teach both technical and emotional skill sets in
our MSc in logistics and supply chain management, and we find
that it is possible to develop emotional intelligence in people with
a technical supply chain background. Another useful approach
is to bring in people from diverse backgrounds, such as marketing
and finance, because they understand other aspects of the
business such as cost-to-serve.

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iTunesU collection reaches Number 1.
The "Supply Chain & Logistics Management" by Cranfield University iTunesU collection became the Number 1 downloaded Business Collection on iTunesU during the month of July 2011.   The collection includes many of Professor Richard Wilding's Videos and podcasts.  It is freely available through iTunes, just select iTunesU and search.  Or select iTunesU Preview Here.
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