A good warehouse manager has to be resilient and adaptive.
They must be prepared for the unexpected while pushing for continuous improvement. That’s not easy to balance, because on top of managing inventory, staffing, and equipment, they must also navigate customer expectations and relationships with carriers and other stakeholders.
Warehouse Managers who are new to the job tend to face a trial by fire. They need to learn quickly to be able to manage the complex interplay of factors that contribute to the success of a warehouse.
Demurrage and detention fees, along with chargebacks, fines and penalties, can wreak havoc on your logistics budget, not to mention damaging relationships with customers and suppliers.
As global trade expands and logistics grows more complex, businesses must be proactive in managing their operations to avoid unplanned costs. This article will offer practical strategies for reducing or eliminating such charges at various stages of the supply chain, helping your organization stay in control.
ERP systems and all-in-one supply chain management suites sometimes don’t live up to expectations. Once you have them, they’re also hard to get rid of.
So, operations managers often respond to pressing business challenges by looking for more specialized tools. This can be messy. It might lead to data silos and frustrate efforts toward supply chain visibility.
But the solution is not to go shopping for yet another silver bullet.
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What is it? Are the Benefits Worth It? Fantasy vs. Reality Visibility Checklist Three Things Anyone Can Do The Role of the Loading Dock Academic researchers talk a lot about supply chain visibility. Logistics is changing fast, they say, because of technology, and visibility is one of the big topics.
But they admit there’s a gap between theory and practice. The sci-fi world that researchers have in mind when they write about supply chain visibility doesn’t look much like the one logistics professionals have to work in.
The best warehouse is the one that most effectively helps the business reach its objectives.
There’s plenty of advice about which metrics are the most important for warehouses to track. But none of it matters if you’re not clear on what the business as a whole needs to achieve.
Once you have that, it’s fairly straightforward to loosely define a warehouse performance strategy:
Business Strategy Common Business KPI types Warehouse Strategy Financial Health Profitability Liquidity Inventory Turnover Return on Assets Reduce Costs: per period, per volume, or per order Governance CSR, ESG and DEI Structure & Accountability Resilience & Continuity Audit Accuracy Expand Reporting, Improve Safety & Sustainability Growth Customer Acquisition Cost Sales Revenue Brand Awareness Headcount & Asset Value Free Up Capacity, Be Ready to Scale Process & System Performance Productivity & Waste Project Success Rate Output Quality Capability Adopt New Technology and Build Digital Maturity Customer Satisfaction Churn Rate Net Promoter Score Customer Lifetime Value Perfect Order Rate Ship faster, in full and with thorough documentation Culture & Effectiveness Employee Retention Participation & Satisfaction Profit per Employee Performance of Individuals Improve employee quality of life and learning opportunities.
Detention charges levied by carriers for loading delays are painful. During the supply chain chaos of 2021, many companies discovered they can be unpredictable enough to present a business risk. But an increasing number of facilities have found a way to completely avoid incurring these costs.
Shippers and receivers should understand that driver detention fees are not a profit center for carriers. Every party involved in logistics would prefer to run on time.
A shortage of experienced warehouse staff exposes your business to hidden risk. What starts as a gradual build-up of congestion can quickly turn into logistics gridlock. Sooner or later you have painful problems to deal with, like incomplete inventory, missing goods and furious customers.
Supply chain companies must become more desirable employers. In short, that means offering better opportunities for advancement. Reinforcing that with superior on-the-job quality of life adds up to a powerful incentive to stay.
Where did ‘Centers of Excellence’ come from originally? The expression has been used informally since the 19th century. But in the 1960s the U.S. government was concerned that a small number of universities were being awarded almost all of the research contracts from the Department of Defense, resulting in many of the country’s best scientists flocking to a few coastal cities.
To remedy this, Project Themis sought to establish centers of excellence at colleges throughout the country.
At its most basic level, dock scheduling is the process of optimizing and automating dock door and yard schedules.
But there’s so much more to it than that.
Because the truth is the right dock scheduling system can completely transform your operations and drastically improve your traffic flow.
And in this guide, I’ll show you exactly how dock scheduling can change everything for your warehouse. A Deep Dive Into Dock Scheduling Does your facility have lots of traffic only on Mondays and Fridays?
The most mature applications of 2022 Executive Summary Logistics and manufacturing leaders are bombarded with abstract visions for how A.I. and other leading-edge technologies might one day improve their business.
Although the theoretical possibilities really are immense, the number of machine learning solutions that can be integrated into the daily operations of a typical facility and have a tangible impact and predictable R.O.I. is still small.
Identifying these mature services demands time-intensive research, and this is not an industry with an excess of spare time for its executives.
How to get around the limitations of your Warehouse Management System The effects of the covid-19 pandemic have demonstrated some glaring vulnerabilities in global logistics. Many executives outside the operational realm had simply assumed that existing technology would be good enough to facilitate rational decision-making that could take into account what’s happening at every point along the supply chain, including in a crisis.
In reality, most operational decision-makers have little visibility outside their own domains.
Bring New Technology into Your Supply Chain A common line I hear from people is “I don’t have time…” This is probably one of my favourite lines to hear from people. This means you are either taking on too much work, managing your time inefficiently, or you are not delegating tasks appropriately - or all of the above. I’m a true believer in nothing is impossible; manage your time wisely and anything is possible.
Every Logistics Department Could Use a Tune Up, Optimize Your Shipping In a lot of organizations the logistics is one of the last departments to get the attention of the management team. A lot of managers think “hey, these processes are working okay, no need to worry about it.” However, this is kind of a backwards way of thinking. Your logistics team is either the first or last people to see your product.