Category Archives: Leadership and Management

Where does the employee fit in the value chain?

A simple start is to identify direct value chain touch points and make sure that these employees understand their roles.

Strategies in the Age of Turbulence- Dealing with Risk and Uncertainty.

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Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell- Three Takeaways

“Success” according to Gladwell is not only a function of one individual’s grit and determination but is related to a whole bunch of “preparation” that goes in by family,culture,history,date of birth and so on.

Five Differences between B2B marketing and supply chain managers

Here are five differences between B2B marketing and sales managers and supply chain managers as a sort of continuation of my earlier post:  Marketing managers being outward facing are constantly looking for opportunities sometimes without regard to what their organization can really do. Supply Chain managers first look inside before looking outside at suppliers –Continue reading “Five Differences between B2B marketing and supply chain managers”

Input-process-output and the supply-firm-marketing chain

The input-process-output ( ICT model) is a way of looking at the firm’s value chain. Supply managers handle the input coming in and the marketing folks handle the output coming out. Like:    global suppliers ->supply chain->[firm-]->marketing->global customers Supply and Marketing folks are people who sit at either end of the firm and look atContinue reading “Input-process-output and the supply-firm-marketing chain”

Complexity in the supply chain and assortment in distribution – reason for auto dealer woes ?

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MBA lessons from GM Bankruptcy

var gaJsHost = (("https:" == document.location.protocol) ? "https://ssl." : "http://www."); document.write(unescape("%3Cscript src='" + gaJsHost + "google-analytics.com/ga.js' type='text/javascript'%3E%3C/script%3E")); try { var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker("UA-857684-6"); pageTracker._trackPageview(); } catch(err) {} MBA classrooms across the world will reverberate with lessons from the GM Bankruptcy for future MBA's. Strangely though,since MBA's starting working for GM  in the 1970's the lessonsContinue reading “MBA lessons from GM Bankruptcy”

G-20 summit a success – is the world really getting “flat” ?

var gaJsHost = (("https:" == document.location.protocol) ? "https://ssl." : "http://www."); document.write(unescape("%3Cscript src='" + gaJsHost + "google-analytics.com/ga.js' type='text/javascript'%3E%3C/script%3E")); try { var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker("UA-857684-6"); pageTracker._trackPageview(); } catch(err) {} It is not just travel,communication and the Internet -that's turning the world flat as Thomas Friedman famously pointed out. The most amazing  image from the G-20 summit isContinue reading “G-20 summit a success – is the world really getting “flat” ?”

Mumbai Terror and Upstream Risk

The events of the past week brings to sharp focus of fixing problems upstream in supply chains and also for management in general. Generally, for services there is this whole “redundancy” thing that allows for delivery from alternative locations in case of sudden disruption. Explicit planning for contingencies ahead of time, right at the contractual stage, is a good idea. Disrupted operations or liquidated damages don’t really solve business problems.

And change in modern cultures- Barack Obama

var gaJsHost = ((“https:” == document.location.protocol) ? “https://ssl.” : “http://www.”); document.write(unescape(“%3Cscript src=’” + gaJsHost + “google-analytics.com/ga.js’ type=’text/javascript’%3E%3C/script%3E”)); var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker(“UA-857684-6”); pageTracker._trackPageview(); Barack Obama is the President Elect of the USA. Not many “young” cultures or countries or even “older” ones can claim to usher in such change. Remarkable and only in the USA !Continue reading “And change in modern cultures- Barack Obama”