Monthly Archives: May 2007

The Top Three XII: Summary

Even though the analysts (Aberdeen and AMR) and vendors (Andy Monin of VendorMate and Gret Holt of CombineNet) are still recovering from ISM and other conferences, Tim Minahan of Supply Excellence and Vinnie Mirchandani of Deal Architect are still globe-trotting, and Jason Busch of Spend Matters is still catching up on ISM posts, I’m going to do an initial wrap-up. When more posts hit, I’ll update this post and add a comment.

So far, we’ve had the following great posts:

Author Post
Michael Lamoureux Culture, Complexity, and Visibility
Lisa Reisman Global Sourcing Savings Maximization, Volatile Commodities Management, and Savings Implementation
John Miller “Slow is the New Fast, The 90-mile Rule, DIYS” on Gemba Panta Rei [WayBackMachine]
Kevin Brooks Listen to Your Audience, Repeat Repeat Repeat, Keep it Simple
Doug Smock World Class Metrics, Cross-Functional Collaboration, and Value Engineering
Dave Stephens “Cost, Complexity, and Compartmentalization” on Procurement Central [WayBackMachine]
David Bush “Adoption, Adoption, Adoption” on eSourcing Forum [WayBackMachine]
Jean-Philippe Massin “Live Spend Analysis, Best-in-Class Suppliers, and Change and Culture Management” on Strategic Sourcing Europe [WayBackMachine]
Chris Jacob Abraham Forward: SCM 2.0

Supply Chain Talent

Closed Loop Supply Chain Management and Supply Chain Collaboration

Eric Hiller Design for … What?
Doug Hudgeon Dale Earnhardt
Charles Dominick “Measurement, Benchmarking, and Skills” on the Purchasing Certification Blog (now the Certitrek NLPA blog)
Randy Littleson “Strategy, Strategy, and People” on the Kinaxis Blog
Haydn Jones “Sustainability, Sustainability, Sustainability” on European Leaders

Even though it looks like the posts are all over the map, one starts to see a common theme emerge – a three C’s theme in fact, even though not the three C’s proposed by Dave Stephens. The three C’s I see emerging are: Culture, Complexity, and Collaboration. Supply chains are global – they embrace all cultures, exist at various levels of complexity, and require a great deal of collaboration to pull off – especially if one wants to do it efficiently and cost-effectively. Not to say that all of the other points made aren’t valid – they are – but it seems that these three C’s will be center of tomorrow’s supply chain and any supply chain management 2.0 solution must address, and improve the handling of, these three C’s.

Get Malled in Bangalore

According to CNN (Money), Indians are no longer satisfied with buying Pantaloons from stand-alone retailers and want to buy all sorts of gadgets from western-style shopping malls. Which is understandable, after all, how likely is it that they will get to buy Pantaloons from Christopher Walken? (Don’t get it, Google it or get out more.)

Apparently all our outsourcing in IT and services has led to the rise of a new middle class in India’s Silicon Valley and they have an urge to spend this new found wealth. As a result, developers are going mall crazy and coughing up oodles of cash for mall development. For example, Sobha Developers is spending $250 M on the Sobha Global Mall, a new shopping paradise to be built around a skylighted atrium on 16 acres and include a 13-screen multiplex, food courts, a rooftop disco, a 300 room hotel, and enough parking for 3,400 cars – in a country where only 4.5% of households have a car (even though there are 12 vehicles per 100 people – highlighting the fact that only the super rich own cars and that those that do often own multiple). Furthermore, there are only 1.5M km of paved highways as opposed to 4.2M km of paved highways in the US, despite the fact that India has 1.1B people compared to the United States’ 300B.

Which, of course, leads me to wonder about the wisdom of investing $250M on a one-of-a-kind experience for the shopper. A shopping paradise sounds great, but how likely is it to be profitable when there is a cost of maintaining a huge parking lot in a country where your average citizen cannot afford a car and where those that can don’t have the roads to drive on? And how profitable is the food court going to be with brand names such as Burger King and Taco Bell in a country where most of the citizens do not eat beef? Maybe they’re planning for the future, like 2020 when the average Indian income will be four times what it is today. But that’s a long time to wait for a return. Makes you wonder.

Technology for Procurement

ISM may be over, but that doesn’t mean that conference season is. There are still lots of events to come. One event in particular that I am going to point out is EyeForProcurement’s Technology for Procurement event coming up next month – June 19-20 at the Holiday Inn Golden Gateway Hotel in San Francisco.

In the spirit of EyeForTransport events, they are focussed on bringing together a wide range of leading industry practitioners and executives to share their stories, tactics, and strategies for success – something every practitioner can benefit from. Furthermore, their events are usually in the “decent size range” – not so many attendees that you feel lost but not so few that you feel that it was not a good use of your time. (It’s one of the few events in the first half of this year that I’m actually hoping to make. I was hoping to make Synergy, but I needed to be somewhere else at the time.)

Product Innovation Summit later this month. And if you like technology, and are an Aberdeen sponsor or subscriber, you might also want to consider attending Aberdeen’s

The Top Three XI: Dale Earnhardt

Today I’m thrilled to bring you a guest post from The Blogging Thunder From Down Under. It’s been a while since the MacQuarie Bank let him out of the vault, so I hope you enjoy Doug Hudgeon’s guest post – as it might be a while before they let him out of the vault again.

Aaah, the number three. Is there another number so pregnant with metaphor and meaning? Tripartite systems have been in vogue for centuries with everyone from Euclid (triangle) to the Christian God (Trinity) to Adam Smith (Rents, Wages and Stock Profits) speaking in threes. Given our apparently innate tendency towards triposis, Michael has chosen wisely his topic of the Top 3. I associate “Top 3” with Dale Earnhardt, who dominated the NASCAR speedways driving car number 3 – he was undoubtedly, the Top 3 of his era. And from there, I am reminded of a terrific article by David Ronfeldt, “Social Science at 190 MPH on NASCARs Biggest Speedways” on FirstMonday.org.

The article discusses the conditions under which competitors cooperate on the NASCAR circuit (cars drafting in a line travel faster) and the conditions under which they compete (a driver can ‘defect’ from the car in front by pulling aside from the lead car’s bumper thus trapping the lead car outside the drafting line causing the car to lose as many places as there are cars in the line; whilst running the risk that the third car may follow the first thus leaving the ‘defector’ hung out to dry).

The article concludes that the best strategy is tit-for-tat, cooperating with those who cooperate with you and punishing those who leave you hung out to dry. This allows you to develop allegiances with ‘friends’ and discourages your friends from defecting. The drivers viewed as most capable of leading others to the front will develop the most friends – success breeds success.

There’s lessons in this for all of us.

ISM is Over …

And even if I didn’t know the start and end dates, such dates are easily deducible by recent blog activity.  On the day ISM started, daily hits dropped by about a third.  Now that ISM has been over for a day, hits are up.  Way up – by over 50% relative to the norm as the hordes of practitioners lost in the glaring lights of Vegas find their way back onto the internet and back to their favorite blogs.  But I am curious – did any other bloggers notice such a significant effect on blog hits from this event?  And has any other event had such a significant effect on sourcing and procurement blog readership?