In the weeks following the onset of the COVID shutdowns, most organizations were in crisis-response mode; but as things return to a normal (or semi-normal) state, business leaders should pause, take some time to assess the efficacy of their actions, and internalize the lessons learned.

On his popular TV show “The Profit,” entrepreneur Marcus Lemonis repeats this mantra frequently: successful businesses are built on the three P’s; people, product, and process. The concept has its origins in lean manufacturing, but it has since taken hold across a broader spectrum of industries.

October 12^th, 2019 was a red letter day for every athletics fan. That day, for the first time in history a human completed the marathon in under two hours! Eliud Kipchoge the current world record holder did the unbelievable and shaved off a good 2 minutes from his best time. It wasn’t just a triumph of human doughtiness and perseverance. The run was also emblematic of technology and analytics aiding humans in pushing the envelope. Specially made shoes and pacing lasers ensured energy efficiency. The chosen route and formation of pacemakers minimized wind resistance. The location was picked because of its closeness to Kipchoge’s time zone… a number of sagacious data driven decisions contributed to the feat.

The supply chain is a complicated beast. From warehouse fulfillment through to the point of sale, there are a number of processes that can break down at any time and impact your business. Supply chain management monitors the flow of goods and services so you save time, reduce costs and provide better customer service. Here are three reasons why you need OpsVeda in 2018.

It was early 2004 and I was catching up with a friend from my college days.  He was the regional head for a Consumer Goods major in India, and told me about changes they were making to streamline operations. That included consolidating the number of stockists and wholesalers. I was puzzled because the company was known for its reach even in remote rural areas, enabled in large part by these very channel partners they wanted to terminate. Our conversation went something like this:

Few weeks back, Sanjiv & I were at a meeting with a major apparel brand manufacturer to present OpsVeda solutions to their team. The operations team suggested we pick an issue that couldn’t be resolved earlier, and explain how OpsVeda will make a difference in the process. One of the experienced operations’ team member suggested "let us go with Bulk orders, they impact many things downstream…”. Then, Sanjiv explained how OpsVeda helps AFS customers manage exceptions in demand and supply planning efficiently.

Last month Gartner published an article titled “Extend Your Portfolio of Analytics Capabilities” where they discussed the four types of analytic capabilities, their usage and the human intervention needed at each level to translate the data insights to action. The framework is captured well in the below figure – also from the same article.

Effective channel management is a challenge that companies operating in almost all industries have to handle, be they in high tech, CPG or life sciences. We’re planning to talk about some of these challenges in a series of blog posts here, as we explore and learn more about channel management. We’ll also discuss how to better handle these challenges for more agile channel operations. Our focus will be mostly on high-tech enterprises here, since that is one of our areas of experience!