MGT 322 Saudi Electronic University Logistics Management Paper

User Generated

lznuanfuv97

Business Finance

MGT 322

Saudi electronic university

MGT

Description

Unformatted Attachment Preview

‫المملكة العربية السعودية‬ ‫وزارة التعليم‬ ‫الجامعة السعودية اإللكترونية‬ Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Ministry of Education Saudi Electronic University College of Administrative and Financial Sciences Assignment 2 MGT322 (3rd Term 2022-2023) Deadline: 03/6/2023 @ 23:59 Course Name: Logistics Management Course Code: MGT322 Student’s Name: Semester: 3rd CRN: Student’s ID Number: Academic Year: 1444 H (2022-2023) IIIrd Term For Instructor’s Use only Instructor’s Name: Lujain Miralam Students’ Grade: /15 Level of Marks: High/Middle/Low Instructions – PLEASE READ THEM CAREFULLY • • This assignment is an individual assignment. Due date for Assignment 2 is 3/06/2023 • The Assignment must be submitted only in WORD format via allocated folder. • Assignments submitted through email will not be accepted. • Students are advised to make their work clear and well presented, marks may be reduced for poor presentation. This includes filling your information on the cover page. • Students must mention question number clearly in their answer. • Late submission will NOT be accepted. • Avoid plagiarism, the work should be in your own words, copying from students or other resources without proper referencing will result in ZERO marks. No exceptions. • All answered must be typed using Times New Roman (size 12, double-spaced) font. No pictures containing text will be accepted and will be considered plagiarism). • Submissions without this cover page will NOT be accepted. ‫المملكة العربية السعودية‬ ‫وزارة التعليم‬ ‫الجامعة السعودية اإللكترونية‬ Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Ministry of Education Saudi Electronic University College of Administrative and Financial Sciences Logistics Management ASSIGNMENT -2 Submission Date by students: Before the end of Week- 11th Place of Submission: Students Grade Centre Weight: 15 Marks Learning Outcome: 1. Demonstrate an understanding of how global competitive environments are changing supply chain management and logistics practice. 2. Apply essential elements of core logistic and supply chain management principles. 3. Analyze and identify challenges and issues pertaining to logistical processes. Assignment Workload: This assignment is an individual assignment. Critical Thinking The global marketplace has witnessed increased pressure from customers and competitors in manufacturing as well as the service sector (Basu, 2001; George, 2002). Due to the rapidly changing global marketplace, only those companies will be able to survive that will deliver products of good quality at a cheaper rate to achieve their goal companies try to improve performance by focusing on cost-cutting, increasing productivity levels, and quality and guaranteeing deliveries in order to satisfy customers (Raouf, 1994). Increased global competition leads the industry to increase efficiency by means of economies of scale and internal specialization so as to meet market conditions in terms of flexibility, delivery performance and quality (Yamashina, 1995). The changes in the present competitive business environment are characterized by profound competition on the supply side and keen indecisive in customer requirements on the demand side. These changes have left their distinctive marks on the different aspect of the manufacturing organizations (Gomes et al., 2006). With this increasingly global economy, cost-effective manufacturing has become a requirement to remain competitive. Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Ministry of Education Saudi Electronic University ‫المملكة العربية السعودية‬ ‫وزارة التعليم‬ ‫الجامعة السعودية اإللكترونية‬ College of Administrative and Financial Sciences To meet all the challenges organizations, try to introduce different manufacturing and supply techniques. Management of organizations devotes their efforts to reducing manufacturing costs and improving the quality of the product. To achieve this goal, different manufacturing and supply techniques have been employed. The last quarter of the 20th century witnessed the adoption of world-class, lean and integrated manufacturing strategies that have drastically changed the way manufacturing firms leads to improvement of manufacturing performance (Fullerton and McWatters, 2002). Read textbook chapter 7 or secondary data on the internet and answer the following questions. Question: 1. Differentiate between lean Thinking and the JIT model. Why have Manufacturing Companies adopted Lean Thinking and the JIT model? (3.5 Marks) 2. Briefly describe major types of Waste, out of all types of waste which one is the biggest waste companies must keep in mind during production. (3.5 Marks) 3. What are the benefits from Suppliers to end users for using lean thinking? Assess the reasons (suitable examples), (3.5 Marks) 4. The arrival of artificial intelligence. The agile supply chain is a perfect concept for future SCM? Give reasons with suitable examples. (3.5 Marks) 5. Reference ((1.0 Marks)) Each answer should be within the limit of 250- 300 words. The Answer must follow the outline points below: • Lean Thinking and JIT Concept • Agile Supply chain • Their Main functions • Reasons with suitable Examples • Reference Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Ministry of Education Saudi Electronic University ‫المملكة العربية السعودية‬ ‫وزارة التعليم‬ ‫الجامعة السعودية اإللكترونية‬ College of Administrative and Financial Sciences Ans 1: Ans 2: Ans 3: Ans 4: Logistics Management & Strategy Competing Through the Supply Chain Fourth Edition Alan Harrison & Remko van Hoek Logistics Management and Strategy We work with leading authors to develop the strongest educational materials in logistics, bringing cutting-edge thinking and best learning practice to a global market. Under a range of well-known imprints, including Financial Times Prentice Hall, we craft high quality print and electronic publications which help readers to understand and apply their content, whether studying or at work. To find out more about the complete range of our publishing, please visit us on the World Wide Web at: www.pearsoned.co.uk Logistics Management and Strategy Competing through the supply chain Fourth Edition Alan Harrison Remko van Hoek Pearson Education Limited Edinburgh Gate Harlow Essex CM20 2JE England and Associated Companies throughout the world Visit us on the World Wide Web at: www.pearsoned.co.uk First published 2002 Second edition published 2005 Third edition published 2008 Fourth edition published 2011 © Pearson Education Limited 2002, 2005 © Alan Harrison and Remko van Hoek 2008, 2011 The rights of Alan Harrison and Remko van Hoek to be identified as authors of this work have been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without either the prior written permission of the publisher or a licence permitting restricted copying in the United Kingdom issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency Ltd, Saffron House, 6–10 Kirby Street, London EC1N 8TS. All trademarks used herein are the property of their respective owners. The use of any trademark in this text does not vest in the author or publisher any trademark ownership rights in such trademarks, nor does the use of such trademarks imply any affiliation with or endorsement of this book by such owners. Pearson Education is not responsible for the content of third party internet sites. ISBN: 978-0-273-73022-4 British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Harrison, Alan, 1944– Logistics management and strategy : competing through the supply chain / Alan Harrison, Remko van Hoek. -- 4th ed. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-273-73022-4 (pearson : alk. paper) 1. Business logistics. 2. Industrial management. I. Hoek, Remko I. van. II. Title. HD38.5.H367 2010 658.5--dc22 2010041143 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 14 13 12 11 Typeset in 9.5pt Stone Serif by 73 Printed by Ashford Colour Press Ltd., Gosport The publisher’s policy is to use paper manufactured from sustainable forests. To Cathi, Nick, Katie, Maryl and Ticho, with love. Contents Foreword Preface Authors’ acknowledgements Publisher’s acknowledgements How to use this book Plan of the book xiii xv xvii xix xxi xxiii Part One COMPETING THROUGH LOGISTICS 1 Logistics and the supply chain Introduction 1.1 Logistics and the supply chain 1.1.1 Definitions and concepts 1.1.2 Supply chain: structure and tiering 1.2 Material flow and information flow 1.2.1 Material flow 1.2.2 Information flow 1.3 Competing through logistics 1.3.1 Hard objectives 1.3.2 Supportive capabilities 1.3.3 Soft objectives 1.3.4 Order winners and qualifiers 1.4 Logistics strategy 1.4.1 Defining ‘strategy’ 1.4.2 Aligning strategies 1.4.3 Differentiating strategies 1.4.4 Trade-offs in logistics Summary Discussion questions References Suggested further reading 2 Putting the end-customer first Introduction 2.1 The marketing perspective 2.1.1 Rising customer expectations 2.1.2 The information revolution 2.2 Segmentation 2.3 Demand profiling 2.4 Quality of service 2.4.1 Customer loyalty 2.4.2 Value disciplines 3 3 4 6 8 12 12 15 16 17 19 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 33 34 35 35 36 37 37 38 46 50 51 53 viii Contents 2.4.3 Relationship marketing and customer relationship management (CRM) 2.4.4 Measuring service quality 2.5 Setting priorities for logistics strategy 2.5.1 Step 1: Diagnose current approach to market segmentation 2.5.2 Step 2a: Understand buying behaviour 2.5.3 Step 2b: Customer value analysis 2.5.4 Step 3: Measure logistics strategy drivers 2.5.5 Step 4: Specify future approach to market segmentation Summary Discussion questions References Suggested further reading 3 Value and logistics costs Introduction 3.1 Where does value come from? 3.1.1 Return on investment (ROI) 3.1.2 Financial ratios and ROI drivers 3.2 How can logistics costs be represented? 3.2.1 Fixed/variable 3.2.2 Direct/indirect 3.2.3 Engineered/discretionary 3.3 Activity-based costing (ABC) 3.3.1 ABC example 3.3.2 Cost–time profile (CTP) 3.3.3 Cost-to-serve (CTS) 3.4 A balanced measurement portfolio 3.4.1 Balanced measures 3.4.2 Supply chain management and the balanced scorecard 3.4.3 Supply chain financial model 3.5 Supply chain operations reference model (SCOR) Summary Discussion questions References Suggested further reading 53 56 56 58 59 60 60 63 68 69 70 71 73 73 74 75 77 79 81 85 87 89 91 92 94 95 96 97 99 101 105 105 106 106 Part Two LEVERAGING LOGISTICS OPERATIONS 4 Managing logistics internationally Introduction 4.1 Drivers and logistics implications of internationalisation 4.1.1 Logistical implications of internationalisation 4.1.2 Time-to-market 4.1.3 Global consolidation 4.1.4 Risk in international logistics 4.2 The tendency towards internationalisation 4.2.1 Focused factories: from geographical to product segmentation 4.2.2 Centralised inventories 109 109 111 114 115 116 119 120 120 121 Contents 4.3 The challenges of international logistics and location 4.3.1 Extended lead time of supply 4.3.2 Extended and unreliable transit times 4.3.3 Multiple consolidation and break points 4.3.4 Multiple freight modes and cost options 4.3.5 Price and currency fluctuations 4.3.6 Location analysis 4.4 Organising for international logistics 4.4.1 Layering and tiering 4.4.2 The evolving role of individual plants 4.4.3 Reconfiguration processes 4.5 Reverse logistics 4.6 Managing for risk readiness 4.6.1 Immediate risk readiness 4.6.2 Structural risk readiness 4.7 Corporate social responsibility in the supply chain Summary Discussion questions References Suggested further reading 5 Managing the lead-time frontier Introduction 5.1 The role of time in competitive advantage 5.1.1 Time-based competition: definition and concepts 5.1.2 Variety and complexity 5.1.3 Time-based initiatives 5.1.4 Time-based opportunities to add value 5.1.5 Time-based opportunities to reduce cost 5.1.6 Limitations to time-based approaches 5.2 P:D ratios and differences 5.2.1 Using time as a performance measure 5.2.2 Using time to measure supply pipeline performance 5.2.3 Consequences when P-time is greater than D-time 5.3 Time-based process mapping 5.3.1 Stage 1: Create a task force 5.3.2 Stage 2: Select the process to map 5.3.3 Stage 3: Collect data 5.3.4 Stage 4: Flow chart the process 5.3.5 Stage 5: Distinguish between value-adding and non-value-adding time 5.3.6 Stage 6: Construct the time-based process map 5.3.7 Stage 7: Solution generation 5.4 Managing timeliness in the logistics pipeline 5.4.1 Strategies to cope when P-time is greater than D-time 5.4.2 Practices to cope when P-time is greater than D-time 5.5 A method for implementing time-based practices 5.5.1 Step 1: Understand your need to change 5.5.2 Step 2: Understand your processes 5.5.3 Step 3: Identify unnecessary process steps and large amounts of wasted time ix 124 125 125 125 126 126 128 130 130 131 132 141 143 143 144 145 150 150 151 151 153 153 154 154 155 156 157 159 161 162 162 163 165 168 169 169 170 170 170 171 171 176 177 178 179 179 180 181 x Contents 5.5.4 Step 4: Understand the causes of waste 5.5.5 Step 5: Change the process 5.5.6 Step 6: Review changes 5.5.7 Results 5.6 When, where and how? Summary Discussion questions References Suggested further reading 6 Supply chain planning and control Introduction 6.1 The supply chain ‘game plan’ 6.1.1 Planning and control within manufacturing 6.1.2 Managing inventory in the supply chain 6.1.3 Planning and control in retailing 6.1.4 Inter-firm planning and control 6.2 Overcoming poor coordination in retail supply chains 6.2.1 Efficient consumer response (ECR) 6.2.2 Collaborative planning, forecasting and replenishment (CPFR) 6.2.3 Vendor-managed inventory (VMI) 6.2.4 Quick response (QR) Summary Discussion questions References Suggested further reading 7 Just-in-time and the agile supply chain Introduction 7.1 Just-in-time and lean thinking 7.1.1 The just-in-time system 7.1.2 The seven wastes 7.1.3 JIT and material requirements planning 7.1.4 Lean thinking 7.1.5 Application of lean thinking to business processes 7.1.6 Role of lean practices 7.2 The concept of agility 7.2.1 Classifying operating environments 7.2.2 Preconditions for successful agile practice 7.2.3 Developing measures that put the end-customer first to improve market sensitivity 7.2.4 Shared goals to improve virtual integration 7.2.5 Boundary spanning S&OP process to improve process integration Summary Discussion questions References Suggested further reading 181 181 181 182 183 183 184 184 184 185 185 187 187 193 198 201 203 204 210 214 217 218 219 219 220 221 221 223 224 228 229 232 234 235 236 241 242 246 247 248 249 250 251 252 Contents xi Part Three WORKING TOGETHER 8 Integrating the supply chain Introduction 8.1 Integration in the supply chain 8.1.1 Internal integration: function to function 8.1.2 Inter-company integration: a manual approach 8.1.3 Electronic integration 8.2 Choosing the right supply relationships 8.3 Partnerships in the supply chain 8.3.1 Economic justification for partnerships 8.3.2 Advantages of partnerships 8.3.3 Disadvantages of partnerships 8.4 Supply base rationalisation 8.4.1 Supplier management 8.4.2 Lead suppliers 8.5 Supplier networks 8.5.1 Supplier associations 8.5.2 Japanese keiretsu 8.5.3 Italian districts 8.5.4 Chinese industrial areas 8.6 Supplier development 8.6.1 Integrated processes 8.6.2 Synchronous production 8.7 Implementing strategic partnerships 8.8 Managing supply chain relationships 8.8.1 Creating closer relationships 8.8.2 Factors in forming supply chain relationships Summary Discussion questions References Suggested further reading 9 Sourcing and supply management Introduction 9.1 What does procurement do? 9.1.1 Drivers of procurement value 9.2 Rationalising the supply base 9.3 Segmenting the supply base 9.3.1 Preferred suppliers 9.3.2 Strategic relationships 9.3.3 Establishing policies per supplier segment 9.3.4 Vendor rating 9.3.5 Executive ownership of supply relationships 9.3.6 Migrating towards customer of choice status 9.4 Procurement technology 9.5 Markers of boardroom value 9.6 What does top procurement talent look like? 255 255 257 258 259 260 264 270 271 271 271 272 272 272 273 273 276 278 280 284 284 285 285 290 290 291 292 294 295 297 299 299 301 302 314 316 319 320 320 321 322 324 326 326 327 xii Contents Summary Discussion questions References Suggested further reading 328 329 329 330 Part Four CHANGING THE FUTURE 10 Logistics future challenges and opportunities Introduction 10.1 Changing economics? 10.2 Internal alignment 10.3 Selecting collaborative opportunities upstream and downstream 10.4 Managing with cost-to-serve to support growth and profitability 10.5 The supply chain manager of the future 10.6 Changing chains Summary Discussion questions References Suggested further reading Index 333 333 334 336 340 343 345 347 349 350 350 350 351 Supporting resources Visit www.pearsoned.co.uk/harrison to find valuable online resources For instructors ● Complete, downloadable Instructor’s Manual, containing teaching notes, notes on case studies and teaching tips, objectives and discussion points for each chapter ● Downloadable PowerPoint slides of all figures from the book For more information please contact your local Pearson Education sales representative or visit www.pearsoned.co.uk/harrison Foreword I am delighted to introduce Logistics Management and Strategy, now in its fourth edition – a further aid in our ability to drive our understanding of such a critical part of the business environment. In Bausch and Lomb logistics remains a key area of management attention, given its central role in customer service and the opportunities it provides for cost control, two fundamental essentials for any global business today. Bausch and Lomb is built on a tradition of developing state of the art Optical products – from contact lenses to cataract surgery and the fast-growing optical pharmaceutical markets. These complex supply chains cover five continents and serve varying types of customers including hospitals, opticians and multiple retailers. They involve stock-keeping units (skus) requiring temperature control, serial traceability and sterility, and make for a diverse and challenging set of logistics demands. When you then add these challenges to a range of over 100,000 skus – with some products being offered in over 7,000 different refractive powers/pack sizes – then you can understand why utilising the very latest approaches to logistics management and strategy is absolutely crucial. In recent years we have invested heavily in automated warehouses, such as at our site in Amsterdam, recently recognised as one of the ‘top ten’ logistics facilities in the Netherlands. We have also developed our utilisation of agile logistics. This has been addressed by reducing the number of base products produced in our 17 factories, whilst increasing our customer responsiveness through postponement of labelling, bundling, promotional artwork and language compliance. In this regard, being a member of the Agile Supply Chain Research Club at Cranfield and working with Alan has been a rewarding and beneficial experience. I note that some of our experience has been invested in Chapter 7. In the last two years Bausch and Lomb has greatly reduced inventory holdings through a number of logistics initiatives – improving working capital whilst maintaining, and even improving, customer service levels. But the fight goes on, and it is with texts such as Logistics Management and Strategy in your armoury that you can continue to drive further improvements in your supply chain. The great aspect of this text is its readability – it does not seek to lecture the reader, but imparts its wisdom in a straightforward and practical manner. Fundamentally, I believe that is the essence of the science of logistics. Every element of our complex logistical environment is captured in this book with new sections covering sustainability, planning and control, and particularly the strategic role of procurement – all adding to the rich content. In introducing this collaboration between Alan and Remko my parentage springs to mind. This was another Anglo-Dutch partnership – albeit with different outcomes! xiv Foreword I have spent the last twenty-five years in logistics, working in both British and Dutch environments. The last ten of these years have been in a global role. The output of Alan’s and Remko’s partnership rings true in so many areas – and offer methods and approaches which will continue to drive our improvements in the coming years. Paul Mayhew MSc, MCILT Vice President, Global Logistics Bausch and Lomb. Preface Logistics has been emerging from Peter Drucker’s shadowy description as ‘the economy’s dark continent’ for some years. From its largely military origins, logistics has accelerated into becoming one of the key business issues of the day, presenting formidable challenges for managers and occupying some of the best minds. Its relatively slow route to this exalted position can be attributed to two causes. First, logistics is a cross-functional subject. In the past, it has rightly drawn on contributions from marketing, finance, operations and corporate strategy. Within the organisation, a more appropriate description would be a business process, cutting across functional boundaries yet with a contribution from each. Second, logistics extends beyond the boundaries of the organisation into the supply chain. Here, it engages with the complexities of synchronising the movement of materials and information between many business processes. The systems nature of logistics has proved a particularly difficult lesson to learn, and individual organisations still often think that they can optimise profit conditions for themselves by exploiting their partners in the supply chain. Often they can – in the short term. But winners in one area are matched by losers in another, and the losers are unable to invest or develop the capabilities needed to keep the chain healthy in the long term. The emergence of logistics has therefore been dependent on the development of a cross-functional model of the organisation, and on an understanding of the need to integrate business processes across the supply network. While its maturity as a discipline in its own right is still far from complete, we believe that it is time to take a current and fresh look at logistics management and strategy. Tools and concepts to enable integration of the supply chain are starting to work well. Competitive advantage in tomorrow’s world will come from responding to end-customers better than competition. Logistics plays a vital role in this response, and it is this role that we seek to describe in this book. The globalisation of logistics assumes that quality can be duplicated anywhere, that risks are relatively small, and that sustainability does not really matter. Case study 4.2 quotes an environmental activist as saying ‘we are producing food in one corner of the world, packing it in another and then shipping it somewhere else. It’s mad.’ The reality is that 21st-century supply chains are developing very different profiles from those developed by the mindsets of ten or 20 years ago. Risk will become more important. Plans will need to be in place to prevent or mitigate the impact of financial, operational and political uncertainty. It is both environmentally and economically right to focus on sustainability. Logistics stands at the heart of this debate. This text has a clear European foundation (its currency is the euro) and an international appeal. In line with the globalisation of logistics, we have included cases from other parts of the world than Europe – diverse though European logistics solutions are – including South Africa, the United States, Japan, China and Australia. xvi Preface Accordingly, we start in Part One with the strategic role of logistics in the supply chain. We continue by developing the marketing perspective by explaining our view of ‘putting the end-customer first’. Part One finishes by exploring the concept of value and logistics costs. In Part Two, we review leveraging logistics operations in terms of their global dimensions, and of the lead-time frontier. Part Two continues by examining the challenges of coordinating manufacturing and retail processes, and the impact on logistics of just-in-time and the agile supply chain. Part Three reviews working together, first in terms of integrating the supply chain and second in terms of sourcing and supply management. Our book ends with Part Four, in which we outline the logistics future challenge. This text is intended for MSc students on logistics courses, and as an accompanying text for open learning courses such as global MSc degrees and virtual universities. It will also be attractive as a management textbook and as recommended reading on MBA options in logistics and supply chain management. In the second edition, we listened carefully to students and to reviewers alike and set out to build on the foundation of our initial offering. We updated much of the material while keeping the clear structure and presentation of the first edition. There were lots of new cases and we updated others. We attempted to touch on many of the exciting developments in this rapidly expanding body of knowledge, such as governance councils, the prospects for a radio frequency identification device (RFID) and the future of exchanges. The third edition retains the clarity and up-to-date content which have become hallmarks of the previous editions. This edition continues to provide further new and updated cases to illustrate developments in the subject. This time, Chapters 6, 7 and 10 have been largely reconstructed, but you will also find many improvements to other chapters resulting from our research and work with industrial partners. The fourth edition continues to build on the foundations we have developed so far, while continuing to update the content and keep it abreast of the rapidly developing logistics body of knowledge. Many of the cases have been updated too and new ones introduced. Chapters 6 and 7 have again been largely reconstructed, and we have refocused Chapter 9 around sourcing and supply management. We have continued to develop the theme of sustainable logistics, which we classify as a competitive priority right from the start. We are grateful to Paul Mayhew of Bausch and Lomb, who has written the Foreword to this edition following the retirement of Alain Le Goff. We hope that our book will offer support to further professional development in logistics and supply chain management, which is needed today more than ever before. In particular, we hope that it encourages you to challenge existing thinking, and to break old mindsets by creating a new and more innovative future. Transformation of supply chains is a focus for everyone in the 21st century. Since we launched this textbook in 2001, it has become a European best seller – and is popular in Australia, Singapore and South Africa. It is also developing an important following in the United States. Our book has also been launched in local language formats in Japan, Brazil, Russia, China, Poland, Mongolia and the Ukraine. Authors’ acknowledgements We should like to acknowledge our many friends and colleagues who have contributed to our thinking and to our book. Cranfield colleagues deserve a special mention: Dr Janet Godsell, Dr Carlos Mena, Simon Templar, Dr Heather Skipworth, Dr Paul Chapman (now at Saïd Business School), Dr Paul Baines and Professor Richard Wilding have all made important contributions. Sri Srikanthan helped us with the financial concepts used in section 3.2. Members of the Agile Supply Chain Research Club at Cranfield also deserve special mention, notably Chris Poole of Procter & Gamble (now of B&Q), Paul Mayhew of Bausch & Lomb (who provides the foreword for the new edition), Ian Shellard and David Evans of Rolls-Royce, Mark Brown of Pentland Brands (who updated the apparel cases 4.4 and 8.1) and Joe Thomas of Tesco (who updated Case study 1.1). We have picked the brains of several who have recently retired from the industry, including David Aldridge (formerly of Cussons UK), Philip Matthews (formerly of Boots the Chemist) and Graham Sweet (formerly of Xerox, Europe). A number of professors from other universities have contributed ideas and cases, including Marie Koulikoff-Souviron (SKEMA Business School, Nice), Jacques Colin (CretLog, Aix-en-Provence), Konstantinos Zographos (Athens University of Economics and Business), Huo Yanfang (University of Tianjin), Thomas Choi (Arizona State University), David Bennett (Newcastle Business School) and Corrado Ceruti (University of Roma Tor Vergata). Many of our MSc graduates, such as Steve Walker and Alexander Oliveira, also made important contributions. Professor Yemisi Bolumole (University of North Florida) helped us to re-draft earlier versions of the first edition. Dr Jim Aitken (University of Surrey) contributed to our supply chain segmentation thinking in Chapter 2, and we have used his work on supplier associations in Chapter 8. We also acknowledge the encouragement of Matthew Walker and Sophie Playle at Pearson Education in the preparation of this text and their encouragement to meet deadlines! Also, we thank the reviewers who made many valuable comments on earlier editions of this book. We are very grateful to all of these, and to the many others who made smaller contributions to making this book possible. Cathi Maryon helped to research several of the cases and to project manage the manuscript. Finally, we thank Lynne Hudston for helping wherever she could – in addition to helping to run our Supply Chain Research Centre at Cranfield! Publisher’s acknowledgements We are grateful to the following for permission to reproduce copyright material: Figures Figure 1.2 from Operations Management, 2nd ed., FT/Prentice Hall (Slack, N, Chambers, S., Harland, C., Harrison, A. and Johnston, R. 1997); Figure 1.5 from Initial conceptual framework for creation and operation of supply networks, Proceedings of 14th AMP Conference, Turku, 3–5 September Vol. 3, pp. 591–613 (Zheng, J., Harland, C., Johnsen, T. and Lamming, R. 1998); Figure 1.6 from JIT in a distribution environment, International Journal of Logistics and Distribution Management, Vol. 9, No. 1, pp. 32–4 (Eggleton, D.J. 1990), © Emerald Group Publishing Limited all rights reserved; Figure 1.7 from www.supply-chain.org; Figure 2.4 from Understanding customer expectations of service, Sloan Management Review, Spring, pp. 39–48 (Parasuraman, A., Berry, L. and Zeithaml, V. 1991); Figure 2.5 from The impact of technology on the quality-valueloyalty chain: a research agenda, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Vol. 28, No. 1, pp. 168–74 (Parasuraman, A. and Grewal, D. 2000), With kind permission from Springer Science and Business Media; Figure 2.6 from Relationship Marketing for Competitive Advantage, Butterworth Heinemann (Payne, A., Christopher, M., Clark, M. and Peck, H. 1995); Figure 2.8 from Developing Supply Chain Strategy: A management guide, Cranfield University (Harrison, A., Godsell, J., Julien, D., Skipworth, H., Achimugu, N. and Wong, C. 2007); Figures 2.10, 2.10, 2.13 from Developing Supply Chain Strategy: A management guide, Cranfield University (Harrison et al 2007); Figure 2.14 from Logistics – the missing link in branding: Bacalhau da Noruega vs. Bacalhau Superior, ISL – Logistics Conference Proceedings, Lisbon (Jahre, M. and Refsland-Fougner, A-K 2005); Figures 3.1, 3.3, 3.7, 3.8 from Sri Srikanthan; Figures 3.9, 3.10 from Understanding the relationships between time and cost to improve supply chain performance, International Journal of Production Economics (Whicker, L., Bernon, M., Templar, S. and Mena, C. 2006), with permission from Elsevier; Figure 3.11 from Using the balanced scorecard to measure supply chain performance, Journal of Business Logistics, Vol. 21, No. 1, pp. 75–93 (Brewer, P.C. and Speh, T.W. 2000), Reproduced with permission of Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals in the format textbook via Copyright Clearance Center; Figure 3.12 from The Influence of Supply Chains on a Company’s Financial Performance, Cranfield University (Johnson, M and Templar, S.); Figure 3.13 from http://www.tesco-careers.com/home/about-us/visions-and-values; Figures 4.11, 4.12, 4.13 from Reconfiguring the supply chain to implement postponed manufacturing, International Journal of Logistics Management, Vol. 9, No. 1, pp. 95–110 (van Hoek, R.I. 1998); Figure 6.1 from Manufacturing Planning and Control for Supply Chain Management, 5th Ed., McGraw Hill (Vollman, T.E., Berry, W.L., Whybark, D.C. and Jacobs, F.R. 2005), Reproduced with permission of the McGraw-Hill Companies; Figure 6.8 from ‘Relationships in the supply chain’ in J. Fernie and L. Sparks (eds) Logistics and Retail Management: Insights into current practice and trends from leading experts, Kogan Page (After Fernie, J 1998); Figure 6.9 from Shrinkage in Europe 2004: a survey of stock loss in the FMCG sector, ECR-Europe, Brussels (Beck, A 2004); Figure 8.6 from The impact of modular production on the dynamics of supply chains, International Journal of Logistics Management, Vol. 9, 25–50 (van Hoek, R. and Weken, H.A.M. 1998), © Emerald Group Publishing Limited all rights reserved; Figure 8.9 from www.santonishoes.com, xx Publisher’s acknowledgements reprinted by permission of Santoni Shoes; Figure 8.12 from An empirical investigation into supply chain management, International Journal of Physical Distribution and Logistics Management, Vol. 28, No. 8, pp. 630–650 (Speckman, R.E., Kamauff, J.W. and Myhr, N. 1998), © Emerald Group Publishing Limited all rights reserved.; Figure 8.14 from The pervasive human resource picture in interdependent supply relationships, International Journal of Operations and Production Management, Vol. 27, No. 1, pp. 8–27 (Koulikoff-Souviron, M. and Harrison, A. 2007); Figure 9.6 from McKinsey Quarterly 2007/1, Excerpt from McKinsey Quarterly 2007/1. www.mckinseyquarterly.com Copyright © 2010 McKinsey & Company. All rights reserved. Reprinted by permission.; Figure 9.10 from An integrative framework for supplier relationship management, Industrial Management and Data Systems, Vol. 110, No. 4, pp. 595–515 (Park, J., Shin, K., Chang, T-W., and Park, J. 2010), © Emerald Group Publishing Limited all rights reserved; Figure 9.15 from Vendor rating for an entrepreneur development programme: a case study using the analytic hierarchy process method, Journal of the Operational Research Society, Vol. 50, pp. 916–30 (Yayha, S. and Kingsman, B. 1999) Tables Table 2.5 from Strategy formulation in an FMCG supply chain, Proceedings of the EurOMA Conference, Copenhagen (Godsell, J. and Harrison, A, 2002); Table 2.6 from Logistics service measurement: a reference framework, Journal of Manufacturing Technology Management, Vol. 15, No. 3, pp. 280–90 (Rafele, C. 2004), © Emerald Group Publishing Limited all rights reserved.; Table 3.1 from Management Accounting, Official Terminology, CIMA (1989); Table 3.2 from Sri Srikanthan; Table 3.6 from www.supply-chain.org; Table 4.7 from www.rlec.org, reprinted by permission of Reverse Logistics Executive Council; Table 4.8 from CSR Guideline for Suppliers, revision 2, October 2006, www.nec.co.jp/purchase/pdf/sc_csr_guideline_e.pdf, reprinted by permission of NEC Corporation Text Case Study 1.2 from JIT in a distribution environment, International Journal of Logistics and Distribution Management, Vol. 9, No. 1, pp. 32–4 (Eggleton, D.J. 1990); Case Study 1.5 from Backing the future, Marketing (00253650), pp. 16–17 (Barry, M. and Calver, L. 2009), Reproduced from Marketing magazine with the permission of the copyright owner, Haymarket Business Publications Limited.; Case Study 2.4 from Based on an article by John Arlidge, Sunday Times, 26/10/2003; Case Study 2.6 from Logistics – The Missing Link in Branding: Bacalhau da Noruega vs. Bacalhau Superior, ISL – Logistics Conference Proceedings, Lisbon (Jahre, M. and Refsland-Fougner, A-K. 2005); Case Study 4.2 from Sunday Times, 20/05/2007 (Jon Ungoed-Thomas); Case Study 4.2 from www.cranfield.ac.uk/cww/perspex, Reprinted by permission of Cranfield University; Case Study 6.1 from Dr. Heather Skipworth, after an original by Dr Paul Chapman; Case Study 8.3 from Integration of the Supply Chain: The effect of Inter-Organisational Interactions between Purchasing-Sales-Logistics, PhD thesis, Cranfield School of Management (Aitken, J. 1998); Case Study 8.5 from Professor Huo Yanfang, Tianjin University School of Management; Case Study 8.7 from The pervasive human resource picture in interdependent supply relationships, International Journal of Operations and Production Management, Vol. 27, No. 1, pp. 8–27 (Koulikoff-Souviron, N. and Harrison, A. 2007) In some instances we have been unable to trace the owners of copyright material, and we would appreciate any information that would enable us to do so. How to use this book This book is divided into four parts, centred around a model for logistics. The model for logistics is introduced in the first chapter of Part One, which places logistics in terms of its contribution to competitiveness, customer service and the creation of value. Part Two of the book focuses on leveraging logistics operations within the context of quality of service and cost performance objectives. Part Three focuses on working together, and Part Four pulls together four elements of leadingedge thinking in logistics, homing in on future challenges for the subject. Part One Part Two Competing through logistics Leveraging logistics operations Part Three Part Four Working together Changing the future The book has been arranged to take you through the subject in logical stages. The limitation of a text presentation is that the subjects are then arranged in sequence, and links between stages have to be made by the reader. We have set out to facilitate cross-linkages by including: ● activities at the end of many of the sections, which are aimed at helping you to think about the issues raised and how they could be applied; ● discussion questions at the end of each chapter to help you assess your understanding of the issues raised, and give you practice in using them; ● case studies, which draw together a number of issues and help you to think about how those issues are linked together in a practical setting. Use the study questions at the end of each case to guide your thinking. We have sought continually to break up the text with figures, tables, activities and case studies, so you will rarely find two successive pages of continuous text. You should therefore regard the activities and case studies as an integral part of the method used in this book to help you to learn. xxii How to use this book Where possible, discuss the activities and case study questions in groups after you have prepared them individually. Discussion helps to broaden the agenda and create confidence in handling the issues. While you are studying this book, think about the logistics issues it raises – in your own firm or ones that you know well, and in articles in newspapers such as the Financial Times and magazines such as Business Week. Follow up the website addresses we have included in the text and again link them with the issues raised in the book. A few words on terminology are appropriate here. We have taken the view that logistics and supply chain management (SCM) are sufficiently different for separate definitions to be needed. We have included these definitions in Chapter 1: logistics is a subset of SCM. ‘Supply chain’ and ‘supply network’ are used interchangeably, although we favour ‘chain’ for a few organisations linked in series and ‘network’ to describe the more complex inter-linkages found in most situations. Again, our position is explained in Chapter 1. A summary is provided at the end of each chapter to help you to check that you have understood and absorbed the main points in that chapter. If you do not follow the summary points, go back and read the relevant section again. If need be, follow up on references or suggested further reading. Summaries are also there to help you with revision. We have designed this book to help you to start out on the logistics journey and feel confident with its issues. We hope that it will help you to improve supply chains of the future. Plan of the book Part One COMPETING THROUGH LOGISTICS Chapter 1 Logistics and the supply chain Chapter 2 Putting the end-customer first Chapter 3 Value and logistics costs Part Two LEVERAGING LOGISTICS OPERATIONS Chapter 4 Managing logistics internationally Chapter 5 Managing the lead-time frontier Chapter 6 Supply chain planning and control Chapter 7 Just-in-time and the agile supply chain Part Three WORKING TOGETHER Chapter 8 Integrating the supply chain Chapter 9 Sourcing and supply management Part Four CHANGING THE FUTURE Chapter 10 Logistics future challenges and opportunities Part One COMPETING THROUGH LOGISTICS Focal firm Information flow Time End-customer Downstream Upstream Material flow (supply) End–customer Raw material Raw material Our model of logistics structures the supply network around three main factors: the flow of materials, the flow of information and the time taken to respond to demand from source of supply. The scope of the network extends from the ‘focal firm’ at the centre across supplier and customer interfaces, and therefore typically stretches across functions, organisations and borders. The network is best seen as a system of interdependent processes, where actions in one part affect those of all others. The key ‘initiator’ of the network is end-customer demand on the right: only the endcustomers are free to make up their mind when to place an order. After that, the system takes over. Chapter 1 explains how networks are structured, the different ways in which they may choose to compete, and how their capabilities have to be aligned with the needs of the end-customer. Chapter 2 places the end-customer first in logistics thinking, and develops the theme of aligning logistics strategy with marketing strategy. Chapter 3 considers how value is created in a supply network, how logistics costs can be managed, and how a balanced measurement portfolio can be designed. CHAPTER 1 Logistics and the supply chain Objectives The intended objectives of this chapter are to: ● identify and explain logistics definitions and concepts that are relevant to managing the supply chain; ● identify how supply chains compete in terms of time, cost, quality and sustainability. Also, how there are supportive capabilities and soft objectives; ● show how different supply chains may adopt different and distinctive strategies for competing in the marketplace. By the end of this chapter you should be able to understand: ● how supply chains are structured; ● different ways in which supply chains may choose to compete in the marketplace; ● the need to align supply chain capabilities with competitive priorities. Introduction It only takes only 17 hours or so to assemble a car, and a couple more days are needed to ship it to the customer via the dealers. So why does it take more than a month for a manufacturer to make and deliver the car I want? And why are the products I want to buy so often unavailable on the shelf at the local supermarket? These are questions that go to the heart of logistics management and strategy. Supply chains today are slow and costly in relation to what they will be like in the future. But let us start at the beginning, by thinking about logistics and the supply chain in terms of what they are trying to do. It is easy to get bogged down in the complexities of how a supply chain actually works (and very few people actually know how a whole supply chain works). We shall address many of those details later in this book. First, let us focus on how a supply chain competes, and on what the implications are for logistics management and strategy. The overall aim of this chapter is to provide an introduction to logistics and set the scene for the book as a whole. The need is to look outside the individual organisation and to consider how it aligns with other organisations in a given 4 Chapter 1 • Logistics and the supply chain supply chain. This is both a strategic and a managerial task: strategic, because it requires long-term decisions about how logistics will be structured and the systems it will use; managerial, because it encompasses decisions about sourcing, making and delivering products and services within an overall ‘game plan’. Key issues This chapter addresses four key issues: 1 Logistics and the supply chain: definitions, structure, tiering. 2 Material flow and information flow: the supply chain and the demand chain. 3 Competing through logistics: competitive criteria in the marketplace. 4 Logistics strategies: aligning capabilities across the supply chain. 1.1 Logistics and the supply chain Key issues: What is the supply chain, and how is it structured? What is the purpose of a supply chain? Logistics is a big word for a big challenge. Let us begin by giving an example of that challenge in practice, because that is where logistics starts and ends. CASE STUDY 1.1 Tesco Tesco is the UK’s largest food retailer, with a Group sales turnover of more than €67 billion. It has over 2,100 stores in the US, central Europe, Ireland and the Far East, and over 2,300 in the UK alone. This number has increased rapidly as Tesco entered the convenience store market with its Tesco Express store format. The product range held by the stores has grown rapidly in recent years – a larger store can hold up to 20,000 products – as Tesco broadens its presence in the ‘non-food’ market for electrical goods, stationery, clothing and the like. This massive range is supported by thousands of suppliers, who are expected to meet agreed service levels (correct time and quantities) by delivering to Tesco within specific time ‘windows’. Volumes are impressive. In a year, some 2.1 billion cases of product are shipped from suppliers to the stores. Mindful of its responsibilities, Tesco is the UK’s market leader in the use of bio fuels and works hard to reduce its CO2 emissions per case delivered, through initiatives including rail, barge and alternative fuels. The company also buys considerable numbers of double-deck trailers to move more cases per trip. Tesco states that its core purpose is ‘to create value for customers to earn their lifetime loyalty’. A wide product range and high on-shelf availability across that range are key enablers of that core purpose. So how do you maintain high availability of so many product lines in so many stores? This question goes to the heart of logistics management for such a vast organisation. Logistics is about material flow, and about information flow. Let us look at how Tesco deals with each of these in turn. An early reform for supermarket operation was to have suppliers deliver to a depot rather than to every store. During the 1980s, distribution to retail stores was handled by Logistics and the supply chain 26 depots. These operated on a single-temperature basis, and were small and relatively inefficient. Delivery volumes to each store were also relatively low, and it was not economic to deliver to all stores each day. Goods that required temperature-controlled environments had to be carried on separate vehicles. Each product group had different ordering systems. The network of depots simply could not handle the growth in volumes and the increasingly high standards of temperature control. A new distribution strategy was needed. Many small depots with limited temperature control facilities were replaced by Fresh Food depots which can handle many products at several temperature ranges. The opportunity is to provide a cost-effective daily delivery service to all stores. Typically, a Fresh Food depot can handle over 80 million cases per year on a 40-acre site. The warehouse building comprises 36,000 square metres divided into three temperature zones: ⫺25°C (frozen), 1°C (chilled) and 12°C (semi-ambient). Each depot serves a group of between 48 and 335 retail stores. Delivery vehicles for Fresh Food depots use insulated trailers divided into chambers by means of movable bulkheads so they can operate at different temperatures. Deliveries are made at agreed, scheduled times. Grocery and Non-Food goods such as cans and clothing are delivered separately. So much for the method of transporting goods from supplier through to the stores, but how much should be sent to each store? With such a huge product range today, it is impossible for the individual store to reorder across the whole range (store-based ordering). Instead, sales of each product line are tracked continuously through the till by means of electronic point of sale (EPOS) systems. As a customer’s purchases are scanned through the bar code reader at the till, the sale is automatically recorded for each stock-keeping unit (sku). Cumulative sales are updated every four hours on Tesco Information Exchange (TIE). This is a system based on internet technology that allows Tesco and its suppliers to communicate trading information. The aim of improved communication is to reduce response times from manufacturer to stores and to ensure product availability on the shelf. Among other things, TIE aims to improve processes for introducing new products and promotions, and to monitor service levels. Based on cumulative sales, Tesco places orders with its suppliers by means of electronic data interchange (EDI). As volumes and product ranges increased during the 1990s, food retailers such as Tesco aimed to de-stock their depots by ordering only what was needed to meet tomorrow’s forecast sales. For fast-moving products such as types of cheese and washing powders, the aim is day 1 for day 2: that is, to order today what is needed for tomorrow. For fast-moving products, the aim is to pick to zero in the depot: no stock is left after store orders have been fulfilled. This means that the same space in the depot can be used several times over. Deliveries to stores are made in two waves, at specific times and within defined windows. This helps to improve product availability at stores throughout the day, and thus support changes in demand. Updated by Joe Thomas (Tesco) 2010 Questions 1 Describe the key logistics processes at Tesco. 2 What do you think are the main logistics challenges in running the Tesco operation? 5 6 Chapter 1 • Logistics and the supply chain So why is Tesco growing in an intensely competitive market? It describes its core purpose as being ‘to create value for customers to earn their lifetime loyalty’. Loyalty is an important term that we return to in the next chapter. In order to achieve loyalty, Tesco has to understand customer needs and how they can be served. Its products must be recognised by its customers as representing outstanding value for money. To support such goals, it must ensure that the products that its customers want are available on the shelf at each of its stores at all times, day and night. Logistics is the task of planning and controlling the purchase and distribution of Tesco’s massive product range from suppliers to stores. Logistics is concerned with managing two key flows: ● material flow of the physical goods from suppliers through the distribution centres to stores; ● information flow of demand data from the end-customer back to purchasing and to suppliers, and supply data from suppliers to the retailer, so that material flow can be accurately planned and controlled. The logistics task of managing material flow and information flow is a key part of the overall task of supply chain management. Supply chain management is concerned with managing the entire chain of processes, including raw material supply, manufacture, packaging and distribution to the end-customer. The Tesco UK supply chain structure comprises three main functions: ● distribution: the operations and support task of managing Tesco’s distribution centres (DCs), and the distribution of products from the DCs to the associated stores; ● network and capacity planning: the task of planning and implementing sufficient capacity in the supply chain to ensure that the right products can be procured in the right quantities now and in the future; ● supply chain development: the task of improving Tesco’s supply chain so that its processes are stable and in control, that it is efficient, and that it is correctly structured to meet the logistics needs of material flow and information flow. Thus logistics can be seen as part of the overall supply chain challenge. While the terms ‘logistics’ and ‘supply chain management’ are often used interchangeably, logistics is actually a subset of supply chain management. It is time for some definitions. 1.1.1 Definitions and concepts A supply chain as a whole ranges from basic commodities (what is in the ground, sea or air) to selling the final product to the end-customer, to recycling the used product. Material flows from raw materials (such as a bauxite mine as a source of aluminium ore) to the finished product (such as a can of cola). The can is recycled after use. The analogy to the flow of water in a river is often used to describe organisations near the source as upstream, and those near the end-customer as downstream. We refer to firms that are involved in supply chains as partners, because that is what they are. There is a collective as well as an individual role to play in Logistics and the supply chain 7 the conversion of basic commodity into finished product. At each stage of the conversion, there may be returns which could be reject material from the preceding firm, or waste such as the finished can that needs to be recycled. Sometimes, the whole product is wasted because the consumer throws it away. A supply chain is a network of partners who collectively convert a basic commodity (upstream) into a finished product (downstream) that is valued by end-customers, and who manage returns at each stage. Each partner in a supply chain is responsible directly for a process that adds value to a product. A process: Transforms inputs in the form of materials and information into outputs in the form of goods and services. In the case of the cola can, partners carry out processes such as mining, transportation, refining and hot rolling. The cola can has greater value than the bauxite (per kilogram of aluminium). Supply chain management (SCM) involves planning and controlling all of the processes from raw material production to purchase by the end-user to recycling of the used cans. Planning refers to making a plan that defines how much of each product should be bought, made, distributed and sold each day, week or month. Controlling means keeping to plan – in spite of the many problems that may get in the way. The aim is to coordinate planning and control of each process so that the needs of the end-customer are met correctly. The definition of SCM used in this book is adapted from the Council of SCM Professionals (CSCMP, 2010): SCM encompasses the planning and controlling of all processes involved in procurement, conversion, transportation and distribution across a supply chain. SCM includes coordination and collaboration between partners, which can be suppliers, intermediaries, third party service providers, and customers. In essence, SCM integrates supply and demand management within and between companies in order to serve the needs of the end-customer. ‘Serve the needs of the end-customer’ has different implications in different contexts. In not-for-profit environments, such as public health and local government, serving implies ‘continuously improving’, ‘better than other regions/countries’, ‘best value’ and the like. In the commercial sector, serving implies ‘better than competition’, ‘better value for money’ and so on. In either situation, the focus of managing the supply chain as a whole is on integrating the processes of supply chain partners, of which the end-customer is the key one. In effect, the end-customer starts the whole process by buying finished products. It is the buying behaviour of the end-customer that causes materials to flow through the supply chain. The degree to which the end-customer is satisfied with the finished product depends crucially on the management of material flow and information flow along the supply chain. If delivery is late, or the product has bits missing, the whole supply chain is at risk from competitors who can perform the logistics task better. Logistics is a vital enabler for supply chain management. We use the following definition of logistics in this book: The task of coordinating material flow and information flow across the supply chain to meet end-customer needs. 8 Chapter 1 • Logistics and the supply chain Logistics has both strategic (long-term planning) and managerial (short- and medium-term planning and control) aspects. Tesco has a clear view about the opportunities here. A breakdown of costs in Tesco’s part of the UK supply chain is as follows: ● Supplier delivery to Tesco distribution centre (DC) 18% ● Tesco DC operations and deliver to store 28% ● Store replenishment 46% ● Supplier replenishment systems 8% Nearly half of supply chain costs are incurred in-store. In order to reduce these in-store costs, Tesco realises that the solution is ‘to spend more upstream and downstream to secure viable trade-offs for in-store replenishment’. If a product is not available on the shelf, the sale is potentially lost. By integrating external manufacturing and distribution processes with its own, Tesco seeks to serve the needs of its customers better than its competitors. 1.1.2 Supply chain: structure and tiering The concept of a supply chain suggests a series of processes linked together to form a chain. A typical Tesco supply chain is formed from five such links. Material flow Dairy cooperative Cheese factory National DC Retailer DC Retailer store and end-customer Information flow Figure 1.1 From cow to customer In Figure 1.1 milk is produced by a dairy cooperative and shipped to a cheese factory. Once made, the cheese is shipped to the manufacturer’s national distribution centre (NDC), where it is stored and matured for nine months. It can then be shipped in response to an order from the retailer, and is transported first to the retailer’s regional distribution centre (RDC). From there, it is shipped to the store. Looking at the arrows in Figure 1.1, material flows from left to right. Information is shared across the chain: it is demand from the end-customer that makes the whole chain work. If we look more closely at what happens in practice, the term ‘supply chain’ is somewhat misleading in that the ‘chain’ represents a simple series of links between a basic commodity (milk in this case) and a final product (cheese). Thus the Logistics and the supply chain 9 cheese manufacturer will need packaging materials such as film, labels and cases. Cheese requires materials additional to milk in the manufacturing process. So the manufacturer deals with suppliers other than the milk cooperative alone. Once made, the cheese is dispatched for maturation to the supplier’s NDC, and then dispatched to many customers in addition to Tesco. Once at a Tesco RDC, the ‘chain’ spreads again because up to 100 stores are served by a given RDC. The additional complexity prompts many authors to refer to supply networks rather than supply chains, a point we return to shortly. Logistics today is also concerned with what happens after a product has been sold. Two major concerns are: ● Reverse logistics: the return of unwanted goods and packaging in the opposite direction (from right to left) to the normal flow shown in Figure 1.1. ● Waste: the discarding of product at any stage in the supply chain due to quality problems – for example, the disposal of out-of-date or damaged stock by a retailer or by an end-customer. We consider waste more generally in Chapter 6. A more realistic representation of the supply chain is shown in Figure 1.2, where each link can connect with several others. A focal firm is shown at the centre of many possible connections with other supplier and customer companies. Upstream First tier customers Second tier customers End-customers First tier suppliers Primary manufacturers Second tier suppliers Downstream Focal firm Inbound logistics Internal logistics Outbound logistics Supply chain management Figure 1.2 Supply network (Source: After Slack et al., 1997) The supply chain can be seen in this diagram as a number of processes that extend across organisational boundaries. The focal firm is embedded within the chain, and its internal processes must coordinate with others that are part of the same chain. Materials flow from left (upstream) to right (downstream). If everything is as orderly as it seems, then only the end-customer (to the extreme right of the chain) is free to place orders when he or she likes: after that, the system takes over. 10 Chapter 1 • Logistics and the supply chain The supply chain is tiered, in that supply side and demand side can be organised into groups of partners with which we deal. Thus if we place an assembler such as the Ford plant at Valencia as the focal firm, inbound logistics comprises tier 1 suppliers of major parts and subassemblies that deliver directly to Ford, while tier 2 suppliers deliver to the tier 1s and so on. Outbound logistics covers the supply by the Ford Valencia plant to national sales companies as tier 1 customers, which in turn supply to main dealers at tier 2 and so on. Internal logistics covers the planning and control of parts movements within the Ford Valencia plant. The ultimate aim of supply chain management is to integrate inbound, outbound and internal logistics into a seamless whole, focused on meeting end-customer needs with no waste. Other terms that are used to describe aspects of managing the supply chain are: ● Purchasing and supply deals with a focal firm’s immediate suppliers (upstream). ● Physical distribution deals with the task of distributing products to tier 1 customers (downstream). ● Logistics refers to management of materials and information. Inbound logistics deals with links between the focal firm and its upstream suppliers, while outbound logistics refers to the links between the focal firm and its downstream customers. Internal logistics deals with planning and control of material flow within the boundaries of the focal firm. Supply chain management thus appears as the ‘end to end’ (or ‘cow to customer’ as we have expressed it in Figure 1.1) management of the network as a whole, and of the relationships between the various links. The essential points were summarised long ago by Oliver and Webber (1982): ● Supply chain management views the supply chain as a single entity. ● It demands strategic decision making. ● It views balancing inventories as a last resort. ● It demands system integration. A natural extension of this thinking is that supply chains should rather be viewed as networks. Figure 1.3 shows how a focal firm can be seen at the centre of a network of upstream and downstream organisations. Focal firm Figure 1.3 A network of organisations The terms ‘supply chain’ and ‘supply network’ both attempt to describe the way in which buyers and suppliers are linked together to serve the end-customer. Logistics and the supply chain 11 ‘Network’ describes a more complex structure, where organisations can be crosslinked and there are two-way exchanges between them; ‘chain’ describes a simpler, sequential set of links (Harland et al., 2001). We have used the terms interchangeably in this book, preferring ‘chain’ to describe simpler sequences of a few organisations and ‘network’ where there are many organisations linked in a more complex way. Figure 1.3 takes a basic view of the network, with a focal firm linked to three upstream suppliers and three downstream customers. If we then add material flow and information flow to this basic model, and place a boundary around the network, Figure 1.4 shows the network in context. Here we have added arrows showing the logistics contribution of material and information flows, together with the time dimension. Material flows from primary manufacture (for example, farming, mining or forestry) through various stages of the network to the end-customer. Material flow represents the supply of product through the network in response to demand from the next (succeeding) organisation. Information flow broadcasts demand from the end-customer to preceding organisations in the network. The time dimension addresses the question ‘How long does it take to get from primary source to the end-customer?’ That is, how long does it take to get the product through the various stages from one end of the supply chain to the other? Time is important because it measures how quickly a given network can respond to demand from the end-customer. In fact, the concept of flow is based on time: Focal firm Information flow Time End-customer Downstream Upstream Material flow (supply) End-customer Raw material Raw material Flow measures the quantity of material (measured in input terms such as numbers of components, tonnes and litres) that passes through a given network per unit of time. Figure 1.4 The network in context Activity 1.1 Figure 1.5 shows an example network map of a chocolate bar. Draw a network map showing how your organisation, or one that you know well, links with other organisations. Explain the upstream, downstream and internal processes as far as you can. We expect you to address at least the first tiers of demand and supply. You will derive further benefit from researching additional tiers, and by developing the linkage of relationships that is involved. Explain how these work in practice, and how materials flow between the different tiers. 12 Chapter 1 • Logistics and the supply chain Printed materials Wheat Flour Praline Wafers Chocolate Confectionery manufacturer Aluminium Fibreboard Multiple retailers Packing Wholesalers Endcustomers Others (hospital, etc.) Creamery (milk) Cocoa beans Sugar Vegetable oil Cocoa butter Lecithin Emulsifiers, salt, etc. Figure 1.5 Example of a confectionery network map (Source: After Zheng et al., 1998) An important point here is that the supply network should be viewed as a system. All processes within the network need to be understood in terms of how they interact with other processes. No organisation is an island: its inputs and outputs are affected by the behaviour of other players in the network. One powerful, disruptive player can make life very difficult for everyone else. For example, several auto assemblers optimise their own processes, but disrupt those of upstream suppliers and downstream distributors. The effect is to increase total system costs and reduce responsiveness to end-customer demand. 1.2 Material flow and information flow Key issue: What is the relationship between material flow and information flow? As we have already seen, logistics is about managing material flow and information flow. In this section, we examine material flow and information flow in more detail. 1.2.1 Material flow The aim within a supply chain is to keep materials flowing from source to endcustomer. The time dimension in Figure 1.4 suggests that parts are moved through the supply chain as quickly as possible. In order to prevent local Material flow and information flow 13 build-ups of inventory, flow must be orchestrated so that parts movement is coordinated. The term often used is synchronous. Caterpillar Inc. makes complex earth-moving equipment, and there are literally thousands of component parts and subassemblies that must come together in the final assembly processes. The vision is that parts and subassemblies should flow continuously through the supply chain, all orchestrated like a ballet (Knill, 1992: 54): The goal is continuous, synchronous flow. Continuous means no interruptions, no dropping the ball, no unnecessary accumulations of inventory. And synchronous means that it all runs like a ballet. Parts and components are delivered on time, in the proper sequence, exactly to the point they’re needed. Often it is difficult to see the ‘end to end’ nature of flow in a given supply chain. The negative effects of such difficulty include build-ups of inventory and sluggish response to end-customer demand. And sheer greed by the most powerful members of a supply chain often means that it is weaker partners (notably small to medium-sized enterprises – SMEs) who end up holding the inventories. So management strategies for the supply chain require a more holistic look at the links, and an understanding that organisational boundaries easily create barriers to flow. Case study 1.2 describes how one company – Xerox in this case – re-engineered material flow in its distribution system. CASE STUDY 1.2 Xerox Once the problems of introducing ‘just-in-time’ production systems (internal logistics) had been solved at the Xerox plant making photocopiers at Venray in Holland, attention shifted towards the finished product inventory (outbound logistics). Historically, stocks of finished products had been ‘managed’ by trying to turn the sales ‘tap’ on or off as stocks developed. This was characterised by the familiar ‘feast or famine’ situations. The objective of the next move for Xerox became clear: making only what you need when you need it, then shipping direct to the customer. But the key question had to be answered: just-in-time for what? The answer is – the end-customer. And customer surveys showed that three types of delivery were needed: ● ● ● Commodity products should be delivered ‘off the shelf’. Middle-range products were required in five days. Larger products that had to be integrated into existing customer processes and systems had to be planned months ahead, but the quoted delivery date had to be met 100 per cent. It was envisaged that this would lead to a radically different inventory ‘profile’ in the supply chain. Figure 1.6 shows a traditional inventory profile on the left. Most of the stock was held in local depots waiting for customer orders. If the mix had been incorrectly forecast, too many of the wrong products were in plentiful supply, while needed products were unavailable. Further, a batch of replacement products would take a long time to fight their way through the pipeline. A new ‘just-in-time’ strategy was conceived to make the supply chain much more responsive. This strategy had a profound effect on the inventory profile, pushing much of the inventory upstream. The closer that inventory 14 Chapter 1 • Logistics and the supply chain is located towards the end-customer, the higher the value added – and the more that it is committed to a given finished product specification. Instead, inventory was mostly held further upstream. This was a more flexible solution, where product could be finally assembled to known orders, and where it had lower value. Of course, it has since been possible to remove several stages of the distribution process, thereby eliminating some of the sources of inventory altogether. For commodity products, Xerox coined the term deliver JIT: that is, the product had to be delivered out of stock. Where sales forecasts are traditionally poor, the challenge was one of flexibility, simplicity and speed of manufacture. For mid-range products, it was unrealistic to hold ‘just-in-case’ inventories of products that are too complex to be assembled quickly. Instead, finish JIT was the term coined to describe the new policy of building semi-finished products with the minimum of added value, consistent with being able to complete and deliver the product in the five-day target. Finally, build JIT was the term used to describe the new philosophy of building larger products quickly within a defined lead time. The impact of the new build philosophies on the downstream supply chain processes can be judged from Figure 1.6. While the traditional inventory profile shows a maximum number of days of stock (shown in the shaded area) at finished product level, this is risky. It always seems that demand is greatest for the very items that are not available! Postponing the decision on exact specification until as late as possible in the process, when we are more likely to know precisely what the end-customer wants, helps to create the much flattened inventory profile to the right of the diagram. These are issues to which we return in Chapter 6. (A development of this case, tracking ‘what happened next’, is Case study 7.4.) (Source: After Eggleton, 1990) Traditional Inventory location: Just-in-time Customer Local depot National depot International depot Inventory position WIP at Rank Xerox Parts stores Days of stock In transit WIP at supplier Days of stock Supplier Inflexible Flexible Notes: WIP = work in progress, i.e. products being worked on, but not yet ready for sale. Shaded areas indicate days of stock: the wider the area, the more days of stock in that position. Figure 1.6 Xerox: the impact on inventories Question 1 How did inventory reduction in the supply chain lead to improved competitiveness at Xerox? Material flow and information flow 15 1.2.2 Information flow As asked in the Xerox case study, just-in-time for what? It is all well and good to get materials flowing and movements synchronised, but the ‘supply orchestra’ needs to respond in unison to a specific ‘conductor’. The ‘conductor’ in this analogy is actually the end-customer, and it is the end-customer’s demand signals that trigger the supply chain to respond. By sharing the end-customer demand information across the supply chain, we create a demand chain, directed at providing enhanced customer value. Information technology enables the rapid sharing of demand and supply data at increasing levels of detail and sophistication. The aim is to integrate such demand and supply data so that an increasingly accurate picture is obtained about the nature of business processes, markets and end-customers. Such integration provides increasing competitive advantage, as we explore further in Chapter 8. The greatest opportunities for meeting demand in the marketplace with a maximum of dependability and a minimum of inventory come from implementing such integration across the supply chain. A focal firm cannot become ‘world class’ by itself! Figure 1.7 gives a conceptual model of how supply chain processes (source, make, deliver) are integrated together in order to meet end-customer demand (based on SCOR, 2010). Demand planning information (‘plan’) is shared across the chain rather than being interpreted and then changed by the ‘sell’ process next to the market. Demand fulfilment is also envisaged as an integrated process, as materials are moved from one process to the next in a seamless flow. Information is the ‘glue’ that binds supply chain processes together, and which coordinates planning and fulfilment. (We explain the SCOR model in more detail in section 3.5.) Demand signal Plan Supplier’s Supplier Return Make Deliver Source Return Return Supplier: internal or external Make Deliver Source Return Return Make Deliver Plan Focal firm Sell Return Customer: internal or external Demand fulfilment Figure 1.7 Integrating demand and supply chains Activity 1.2 Write a brief (200 words) appraisal of material and information flow in the supply network affecting one of the major products in the response you gave in Activity 1.1. Perhaps the current situation is different from the above ideals? Customer Source Customer’s Supply 16 Chapter 1 • Logistics and the supply chain 1.3 Competing through logistics Key issues: How do products win orders in the marketplace? How does logistics contribute to competitive advantage? There are many potentially conflicting demands on an organisation today. All those unreasonable customers seem to want it yesterday, at lower prices and to be compensated if it goes wrong! Within a given supply chain, it is important that each organisation understands how each group of products competes in the marketplace, and that it aligns its capabilities with those of its partners. A ‘product’ is actually a combination of the physical product (for example, a 200g pack of Camembert cheese) and its accompanying service (for example, how it is merchandised in the store – easy to find, always available, attractive presentation, lighting, temperature). While the physical product is determined by marketing and research and development (R&D), service is heavily influenced by logistics. It is impossible to be outstanding at everything, and supply chain partners need to give priority to capabilities that give each product group its competitive edge. These are the advantages where supply chain partners ‘dig in deep’ by giving priority to investment and training, and by focusing product development and marketing efforts. They need only to match industry average performance on other criteria. Let us now look at the competitive priorities that can be delivered by logistics in the supply chain. There are various ways in which products compete in the marketplace. Perhaps a given product is something that no one else can match in terms of price. Or maybe you offer a product that is technically superior, such as Gillette razors. While new product development has logistics implications, the key advantage provided by logistics – as suggested in Case study 1.1 about Tesco – is availability of conforming product in the marketplace at low cost. Logistics supports competitiveness of the supply chain as a whole by: meeting end-customer demand through supplying what is needed in the form it is needed, when it is needed, at a competitive cost. Logistics advantage thus shows up in the form of such competitive factors as better product availability in the marketplace and low product obsolescence. Defining logistics advantage means that we need to set goals that are clear, measurable and quantifiable. We distinguish three ‘hard objectives’ for creating logistics advantage: quality, time and cost. There are three further important ways of creating logistics advantage: controlling variability in logistics processes, dealing with uncertainty and sustainability. We have called these ‘supportive capabilities’, and they can be just as important as hard objectives. Finally, there are ‘soft objectives’, which relate to service aspects such as the confidence customers develop in the way the logistics operation is performed. Let us look at each of these ways of creating advantage in turn. Competing through logistics 17 1.3.1 Hard objectives Traditional ways of competing are to offer the end-customer advantages related to product quality, the speed with which it is delivered, and/or the price at which it is offered. We refer to quality, time and cost as ‘hard objectives’ because they are easy to measure and relatively obvious to the end-customer. The quality advantage The most fundamental objective – in that it is a foundation for the others – is to carry out all processes across the supply chain so that the end product does what it is supposed to do. Quality is the most visible aspect of supply chain performance. Defects, incorrect quantities and wrong items delivered are symptoms of quality problems in supply chain processes that are all too apparent to the end-customer. Such problems negatively influence customer loyalty. Robust processes are at the heart of supply chain performance. Internally, robust processes help to reduce costs by eliminating errors, and help to increase dependability by making processes more certain. When quality was positioned second to sales growth and cost, even the iconic Toyota Motor Company’s brand suffered – as a string of recalls and safety concerns in recent years has shown (see, for example, Cole, 2010). While conformance quality in the factory may be controlled to defect levels that are below 25 parts per million (ppm), a product may end up on the retailer’s shelf with between 2 and 5 per cent defects, which is 10,000 to 20,000 ppm. This huge escalation takes place as the result of cumulative problems in successive supply chain processes. Cases may be crushed when shrink-wrapped at the manufacturer’s NDC. In the back of the retail store, cases may be cut open with a sharp knife – despite instructions to the contrary. The end-customer sees the product on the retail shelf at its worst state of quality performance, and that is where the buying decision is made that drives the supply chain as a whole. In many logistics situations, ‘quality of service’ is concerned with selecting the right quantity of the right product in the right sequence in response to customer orders. For example, store orders must be picked from a range of thousands of skus (stock keeping units) at a Tesco RDC. This must be carried out accurately (correct sku, correct quantity) against tight delivery schedules day in and day out. Pick accuracy (for example, 99.5 per cent correct sku and correct quantity) is widely used to measure the quality of this operation. And increasing requirements for in-store efficiencies mean that categories of product (for example, shampoos and toothpastes) need to be picked in a set sequence to facilitate direct-to-shelf delivery at the store. Logistics service providers who can implement and maintain the highest standards of service quality place themselves at an advantage over those who cannot. The time advantage Time measures how long a customer has to wait in order to receive a given product or service. Volkswagen calls this time the customer to customer lead time: that 18 Chapter 1 • Logistics and the supply chain is, the time it takes from the moment a customer places an order to the moment that customer receives the car he or she specified. Such lead times can vary from zero (the product is immediately available, such as goods on a supermarket shelf) to months or years (such as the construction of a new building). Competing on time is about survival of the fastest! Time can be used to win orders by companies who have learned that some customers do not want to wait – and are prepared to pay a premium to get what they want quickly. An example is Vision Express, which offers prescription spectacles ‘in about one hour’. Technicians machine lenses from blanks on the premises. Staff are given incentives to maintain a 95 per cent service level against the onehour target. Vision Express has been successful in the marketplace by re-engineering the supply chain so that parts and information can flow rapidly from one process to the next. Compare this with other opticians in the high street, who must send customer orders to a central factory. Under the ‘remote factory’ system, orders typically take about ten days to process. An individual customer order is first dispatched to the factory. It then has to join a queue with orders from all the other high street branches around the country. Once the order has been processed, it must return to the branch that raised the order. While this may be cheaper to do (a central, highly productive factory serves all of the branches), it takes much longer to process an order. The time advantage is variously described as speed or responsiveness in practice. Speeding up supply chain processes may help to improve freshness of the end product, or to reduce the risk of obsolete or over-aged stock in the system. Time is an absolute measure, that is, it is not open to interpretation as quality and cost are. By following a product through a supply chain, we can discover which processes add value and which add time and cost but no value. We explore this further in Chapter 5, which is about managing time for advantage in the supply chain. The cost advantage Cost is important for all supply chain processes – that goes without saying. Low costs translate into advantages in the marketplace in terms of low prices or high margins, or a bit of each. Many products compete specifically on the basis of low price. This is supported from a supply chain point of view by low cost manufacture, distribution, servicing and the like. Examples of products that compete on low price are ‘own brand’ supermarket goods that reduce the high margins and heavy advertising spend of major brands. They also perhaps cut some of the corners in terms of product specification in the hope that the customer will consider low price to be more important than minor differences in product quality. The pressure to reduce prices at automotive component suppliers, and hence costs to the assemblers, is intense. The assemblers have been setting annual price reduction targets for their inbound supply chains for some years. Toyota announced demands for a 30 per cent reduction in prices on many components by the time that new models are launched in 2013. But unless a supplier can match reduced prices at which products are being sold by means of reduced costs, that supplier will gradually go out of business. As a result, many suppliers are cynical about the ‘price down’ policies of the assemblers. Reduced prices are the reward Competing through logistics 19 of cost cutting, and that is most often a collaborative effort by several partners in the supply chain. So suppliers are unlikely to meet Toyota’s demands on their own: ‘Toyota is going to have to do a lot of work itself, by switching more quickly to global platforms and using more common parts’ (Soble, 2009). As indicated in section 1.1, Tesco can make only limited inroads into its in-store costs without the help of its supply chain partners. 1.3.2 Supportive capabilities While the hard objectives listed above are always important to competitive advantage, supportive capabilities can also be key to creating logistics advantage in the marketplace. When there is little to choose in terms of quality, time or cost, supportive capabilities can make all the difference to the end-customer. Variability refers to real and identifiable differences within a population, such as the differences in time each patient at an optician has to wait for his or her eyes to be tested. Uncertainty refers to our lack of knowledge (Thompson, 2002): in logistics terms, uncertainty results in us having to deal with events that are not known in advance. Sustainability addresses the improvement of social and environmental issues in the design of logistics systems. Controlling variability: the dependability advantage Time is not just about speed. Quality is not just about meeting defect targets. Behind both ‘hard’ objectives is the need to control variability in logistics processes. Variability undermines the dependability with which a product or service meets target. While Vision Express offers a one-hour service for prescription glasses, the 95 per cent service level is a measure of the dependability of that service against the one-hour target. Firms who do not offer instantaneous availability need to tell the customer – in other words to ‘promise’ – when the product or service will be delivered. Delivery dependability measures how successful the firm has been in meeting those promises. For example, the UK’s Royal Mail quality of service target for letters posted with a ‘first class’ stamp is that 93.0 per cent will arrive the next working day (Royal Mail, 2009). It is important to measure dependability in the same ‘end to end’ way that speed is measured. Dependability measures are widely used in industries such as train and air travel services to monitor how well published timetables are met. And in manufacturing firms, dependability is used to monitor a supplier’s performance in such terms as: ● on time (percentage of orders delivered on time and the variability against target); ● in full (percentage of orders delivered complete and the variability against target); ● on quality (percentage of defects and the variability against target). So logistics is concerned not just with the average percentage of orders delivered on time but also with the variability. For example, a manufacturer has to cope with the day-to-day variability of orders placed. In practice, this is more important than the average orders placed because of the resource implications of demand variability. Case study 1.3 explores the impact of variability on a supplier’s processes. 20 Chapter 1 • Logistics and the supply chain CASE STUDY Measuring schedule variability 1.3 A problem that is all too familiar to suppliers in the automotive industry is that of schedule variability. A vehicle manufacturer issues delivery schedules to specify how many parts of each type are required each day for the following month. And each day a ‘call-off’ quantity is issued, which specifies how many the vehicle manufacturer actually wants. The two sets of figures are not necessarily the same, although they usually add up to the same cumulative numbers for the month as a whole. In other words, the total scheduled quantities and the total call-off quantities are the same. So what is the problem? The problem is that the supplier has to cope with the variability of call-off quantities that create huge problems for the supplier’s process. Let scheduled demand ⫽ S, and call-off quantity ⫽ A. Then the difference D between schedule and actual is given by D ⫽ S ⫺ A. If the supplier produces to schedule, then S ⬎ A, the supplier will over-produce the part and end up with excess stock. Where S ⬍ A, the effects could either be a reduction in stock held by the supplier, or a shortfall of (S ⫺ A) of parts from the supplier. The two conditions (S ⬎ A and S ⬍ A) therefore have different logistics implications. Figure 1.8 shows that actual demand, totalled across four different parts at PressCo (a supplier of pressed metal components), may be up to 1,600 units above schedule, or 2,200 below schedule in the case of vehicle assembler WestCo. This range has been divided up into intervals of 100 units. The mode (0 ⫺ 99) indicates that S ⫽ A for a frequency of 18 per cent of the observations. Frequency 30 A B C D 20 10 0 ⫺1500 ⫺1000 ⫺500 0 500 1000 1500 2000 Difference (number of parts) Figure 1.8 Distribution of differences between scheduled and actual demand for WestCo Assuming that the distribution is roughly normal, the standard deviation (SD) is 573, which is characteristic of the flat, wide spread of data. Figure 1.9 shows the distribution of S ⫺ A for four similar parts from the same supplier but to a different vehicle assembler; EastCo. This time, the SD for the distribution is 95, representing a much narrower spread of differences than for WestCo. (Source: Harrison, 1996) Competing through logistics 21 80 70 S R Q P Frequency 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 ⫺1500 ⫺1000 ⫺500 0 500 1000 1500 2000 Difference (number of parts) Figure 1.9 Distribution of differences between scheduled and actual demand for EastCo Questions 1 What are the logistics implications to PressCo for delivery reliability to customers WestCo and EastCo? 2 What steps will the supplier need to take in order to satisfy call-off orders from WestCo? 3 If separate parts of the PressCo factory were dedicated to production for WestCo and for EastCo, which would be the more efficient in terms of labour costs and inventory holding? Quality is not just about meeting target pick accuracy or target defect levels. It is also about controlling variability. The same argument can be made about costs. The implication of dependability for logistics is that supply chain processes need to be robust and predictable. In Chapter 6 we develop the case for dependability in supply chains under the themes of planning and control and lean thinking. Dealing with uncertainty: the agility advantage Dealing with uncertainty means responding rapidly to unknown problems that affect logistics processes. Sometimes, problems can be foreseen – even if their timing cannot. Toyota UK manages inbound deliveries of parts from suppliers in southern Europe by a process called chain logistics. Trailers of parts are moved in four-hour cycles, after which they are exchanged for the returning empty trailer on its way back from the UK. One hitch in this highly orchestrated process means that incoming parts do not arrive just-in-time at the assembly plant. Toyota demands that its suppliers and logistics partner plan countermeasures. This means that alternative routes for suppliers to deliver to its Burnaston assembly plant in the UK have been planned in advance to deal, for example, with a French channel ferry strike at Calais. The weather is also a cause of uncertainty in logistics – for example, it may mean that Tesco has to switch between salads and soups as the result of a cold snap. Other forms of uncertainty concern events where neither the problem nor its timing can be foreseen. Case study 1.4 provides an example of such an event and how two organisations responded differently to it. 22 Chapter 1 • Logistics and the supply chain CASE STUDY 1.4 Nokia deals with uncertainty In March, 2000, a thunderstorm struck the Philips semiconductor plant at Albuquerque in New Mexico, which made silicon chips for products such as mobile phones. Damage at first seemed minor, and firefighters soon left the premises. At first, Philips told major customers such as Nokia and Ericsson that the delay to production would only be one week. But damage to some of the clean areas in the plant – created by smoke and water – was actually going to take months to remedy. Clean rooms in semiconductor plants must be spotless, and particles of more than 0.5m are filtered out. The one-week delay was quickly reported by Tapio Markki, Nokia’s chief componentpurchasing manager, to Pertti Korhonen, Nokia’s top troubleshooter. ‘We encourage bad news to travel fast’, said Mr Korhonen. While Philips initially rejected offers of help from Nokia, it soon became apparent that production delays would be much more than one week. Korhonen put together a team to find solutions to supplying the five chips that were affected by the Philips fire. Three were quickly re-sourced from Japanese and American suppliers, but the other two were only supplied by Philips. This time Philips cooperated at the highest level. Nokia’s chairman and chief executive, Mr Ollila, met with the Philips CEO Mr Boostra and the head of the Philips semiconductor division, Mr van der Poel. Factories at Eindhoven and Shanghai were rescheduled to supply the missing chips, and engineers from both Nokia and Philips worked to accelerate the return of the Albuquerque plant to full production. As a result of these intensive efforts, there were relatively minor delays to Nokia’s mobile phone shipments. Executives at Ericsson in Sweden only learned of the problem several weeks after the fire. Company culture was less proactive than at its Finnish rival. The bad news was withheld from senior management long after it became clear that delays were becoming serious. By the time that Ericsson realised the magnitude of the problem, it was too late to find alternative sources. Nokia had seized remaining world capacity, and it took nine months for the situation to be rectified. The disruption led to a 3 per cent loss of market share by Ericsson, and contributed in turn to its exit from the phone handset market (it formed a joint venture with Sony in 2001). (Sources: Sheffi, 2005; Latour, 2001) Question 1 What are the key lessons from this case for dealing effectively with disruptions to the supply chain? The implication of uncertainty for supply chain processes is that they need to be flexible. Flexibility is defined as the ‘ability to react or transform [supply chain processes] with minimum penalties in time, cost and performance’ (Upton, 1995). Flexibility comes in two basic forms (Sawhney, 2006): ● Proactive: to create the capability in advance to handle uncertainty – for example, Toyota’s counter-measures. ● Reactive: to cope with uncertainty in a focal firm’s internal or external environment – for example, Nokia’s response to the fire at Philips. Competing through logistics 23 Uncertainties, wherever they originate, may affect other supply chain partners. In Chapter 6, we develop the case for responding to uncertainty in supply chains under the theme of agility. Acting responsibly: the sustainability advantage The Bruntland report (UNWCED, 1987) defines sustainability as ‘development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs’. Logistics has increasingly been turned to in recent years because it offers enormous potential to mitigate damage to the environment in which we live. Many logistics decisions impact the environment – for example, sourcing from suppliers who use renewable raw materials and who practise ethical labour standards, and transportation modes that minimise carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. Sustainability emerges as a way of considering the environmental and social values of business decisions alongside their economic value. This thinking gave rise to the term ‘triple bottom line’ (TBL, Elkington, 1997, 2004). Taking these three ‘values’ in turn: ● Environmental: a focal firm such as Tesco is concerned with reducing consumption of non-renewable energy and materials. It is also concerned with measuring and reducing the environmental impact of processes across the SC – from cow to customer (Figure 1.1). And collection and disposal by the end-user is also factored in – what can be done to reduce the impact of car journeys and the disposal of waste such as packaging? TBL thinking states that environmental polluters should not be given a free ride any more – they should be made to pay. For example, the Australian government introduced carbon trading (Humphreys, 2007, compares tax v trading): under the carbon pollution reduction scheme, the government requires a 5 per cent reduction in CO2 levels by 2020. Accreditation...
Purchase answer to see full attachment
Explanation & Answer:
1 Paper
User generated content is uploaded by users for the purposes of learning and should be used following Studypool's honor code & terms of service.

Explanation & Answer

Attached.

‫المملكة العربية السعودية‬
‫وزارة التعليم‬
‫الجامعة السعودية اإللكترونية‬

Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
Ministry of Education
Saudi Electronic University

College of Administrative and Financial Sciences

Assignment 2 MGT322 (3rd Term 2022-2023)
Deadline: 03/6/2023 @ 23:59
Course Name: Logistics Management
Course Code: MGT322

Student’s Name:

Semester: 3rd

CRN:

Student’s ID Number:

Academic Year: 1444 H (2022-2023) IIIrd Term
For Instructor’s Use only
Instructor’s Name: Lujain Miralam
Students’ Grade: /15

Level of Marks: High/Middle/Low

Instructions – PLEASE READ THEM CAREFULLY




This assignment is an individual assignment.
Due date for Assignment 2 is 3/06/2023

• The Assignment must be submitted only in WORD format via allocated folder.
• Assignments submitted through email will not be accepted.
• Students are advised to make their work clear and well presented, marks may be reduced
for poor presentation. This includes filling your information on the cover page.
• Students must mention question number clearly in their answer.
• Late submission will NOT be accepted.
• Avoid plagiarism, the work should be in your own words, copying from students or other
resources without proper referencing will result in ZERO marks. No exceptions.
• All answered must be typed using Times New Roman (size 12, double-spaced) font. No
pictures containing text will be accepted and will be considered plagiarism).
• Submissions without this cover page will NOT be accepted.

‫المملكة العربية السعودية‬
‫وزارة التعليم‬
‫الجامعة السعودية اإللكترونية‬

Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
Ministry of Education
Saudi Electronic University

College of Administrative and Financial Sciences
LOGISTICS MANAGEMENT
ASSIGNMENT -2
Question:
1. Differentiate between lean Thinking and the JIT model. Why have Manufacturing Companies adopted
Lean Thinking and the JIT model? (3.5 Marks)
Answer
Lean thinking and the JIT (Just-in-Time) model are both techniques that aim to increase the
efficiency and effectiveness of industrial operations (Harrison & Hoek, 2011). However, there are some
significant differences between the two. Lean thinking is a broader strategy that focuses on detecting and
eliminating waste in several forms, such as overproduction, waiting periods, excessive processing,
excessive inventories, unnecessary movement, flaws, and underutilized talent (Harrison & Hoek, 2011).
It also entails ongoing improvement with the participation of all employees in the process. The goal is to
foster a culture of continual improvement that results in t...


Anonymous
Goes above and beyond expectations!

Studypool
4.7
Trustpilot
4.5
Sitejabber
4.4

Related Tags