We live in a “Now” economy with customers that are consistently expecting faster and faster delivery service levels with the same amount of care and in-full execution. However, doing so has become increasingly complex in the supply chain. Orders are coming in with greater variability due to more front-end options and the geographies we need to service with our supply chain are growing. So it’s not just about increased speed but increased speed with more tailored supply chains across increasingly expanding geographies.

As organizations move forward with determining how to transform their supply chains, it’s critical to understand that successful supply chains aren’t driven just by more investment into static resources but about agility in the way that we use our assets, investments and partners. The one constant we know is that business changes will happen and these changes will have a direct impact on our supply chains increasing the need to adjust and adapt quickly to drive cost efficient and customer focused practices.

Supply chain control towers are often misunderstood and the term control tower itself can mean different things from different vendors. We have tried to categorize the control towers you’ll see from analytics to operational control towers in previous posts and today we want to focus on the innovation that is happening with control towers focused on the end-to-end supply chain.

This week, we examined this question in our webinar, "Making the Perfect Order in a Complex World" (view the recording!).

Everything you know about supply chain visibility is wrong or at the very least it’s limited. You may look at your supply chain today and say “I have good supply chain visibility” but I’d ask you how you define it.

Over the past decade, supply chain leaders have increasingly been asked to reduce the cost associated with fulfilling of customer orders on-time and in-full. However, in most cases, they have been asked to do so with less funding while the quantity of orders has increased. Let’s face it; that is tough position to be in.

This past Thursday, Brian Hodgson and I shared our thoughts on the evolution of control towers and what to look for when looking for a control tower to solve your business needs. You can find the on-demand recording here!

As always, we get a lot of questions during our webinars and here are our answers to attendee’s questions.

When in 1921, London's Croydon Airport introduced it’s first air traffic control tower, it did so to better manage an increasingly complex operation and ensure every pilot and passenger's safety on incoming and outgoing flights. The supply chain Control Tower has followed a similar trajectory, though what began as a simple visibility tool has advanced to encompass so much more. "Control Tower" has also become a buzzword. Though offered by many software providers, the term's meaning tends to vary depending on the source.

In this post, we’ll discuss the industry's growing complexity and how this change of pace is driving leaders to better optimize and measure their supply chains. We begin by exploring the different types of Control Towers in the market, and what you should look for based on your needs.

Supply chain visibility is one of the hottest topics in supply chain and for good reason. As our supply chains grow larger and in turn get more complex, supply chain leaders are increasingly realizing the gaps they have in their visibility across the supply chain.

Too often in supply chain we are focused on the immediate; on the execution of our orders today without as much thought on how our process and strategy should and will evolve in order to serve our operational needs as we expand our product lines, our markets and our geographic customer footprint.

The data and research is right in front of us. Whether you read Gartner’s Supply Chain research, daily articles from supply chain media outlets, or the Geodis 2017 Worldwide Supply Chain Survey, you’ll notice that a major concern for supply chain leaders is increasing supply chain complexity.

Most of the time that I hear about innovation in the supply chain, I read about robotics, Uber and self-driving trucks or the automated drones that will soon be delivering our Amazon packages.

However, while the mind-space of the media and articles trends toward these innovations, the conversations that we have with supply chain leaders usually are more grounded. They care about their operational supply chain and how to improve and optimize their flows, costs and service level to their customers. Robots are great but they have pressing need for innovation in how they execute their supply chains from how they collaborate with suppliers and partners to dynamically using inventory across their supply chain networks.

Last week, Geodis released their 2017 Supply Chain Worldwide Survey report, and if you get a chance, I’d highly recommend you download and read the report!

One of the most interesting stats in the report was on supply chain visibility. According to respondents, only 6% reported having “end-to-end supply chain visibility”. Only 6%!

In this post, I wanted to take a look at supply chain visibility, what end-to-end visibility mean and it’s impact on supply chains.

As supply chain professionals we always look forward to joining the conversation happening about supply chain’s evolution and this is why we were excited about attending the Supply Chain & Logistics Summit & Expo in Barcelona and the Chicago 3PL Summit. During the events, we had numerous conversations with supply chain professionals, listened to inspiring presenters talk about their supply chain innovations and enjoyed the informal program with great networking events.

Last week, Geodis released their 2017 Supply Chain Worldwide Survey and it’s worth the read. The findings for the report provide a wealth of information and benchmarking stats on the current state of supply chain strategies worldwide.