transportsolutions

[transportsolutions]

Supply Chain Skill-set Catastrophe: What Can Go Wrong and How to Deal with It?

In logistics it’s all about goods? One might think so. But it is way more than that. It is about people and resources. This blog demonstrates it with absolute clarity: The success of transportation and logistics operators depends decisively on the quality and qualifications of its employees. It is likely that this prerequisite will not decrease, but increase in the future. Considering that, exactly this requirement for success already causes difficulties today. Qualified personnel determines the factors for the success and survival not only of companies, but also of entire supply chains.

Many young individuals, managers, and decision-makers do not consider the industry to be attractive enough to apply for a position in it. That is bad news. The good news is - every company whose managers are capable of remedying this existence-threatening situation, simultaneously open the door to the future. One important way to do so is through ‘employer branding’. For small and mid-sized enterprises, building a ‘recruiting alliance’ with peers can also have a major impact. Successfully handling the future entails things, which are weakly developed today, namely, adequate future awareness in the executive rankings, or implementation and regular use of techniques and tools of corporate foresight.

Thriving in the World of Supply Chain Skill-Set Catastrophe

We live in times of terrible catastrophes and surprising structural breakdowns. The world is spinning faster than ten years ago. The race is on! Good employees aren’t just a commodity anymore; they’ve become an insufficient resource. A company’s workforce is more than a certain ‘head count’ or number of ‘full-time equivalents’. It’s made up of people with a wide range of technical and soft skills and unique perspectives on their work and their employer. Diversity is increasing, with employees of different ages, genders and cultural backgrounds working together. That’s a welcome development, because mixed teams often perform better.

The starting position of transportation and logistics companies couldn’t be better. They can offer their staff varied types of work, often in an international and cosmopolitan working environment. That should translate into popularity with job seekers. But the reality is somewhat different. 

The transportation and logistics industry are confronted with an image that’s less than ideal. Work in warehouses, on ships or in trucks and trains tends to be associated with unpleasant working conditions and a less than attractive career path. The next generation of talent isn’t just concerned with salary and career development, they want to work for a company with strong values too. We need to mull over a few questions given below

Will sector companies nonetheless succeed in capitalizing on their advantages and winning the best employees?

Will they be able to build a strong employer brand?

 Will transportation and logistics companies be able to inspire them?

 How will they improve their recruiting, compensation and development strategies?

 To get some answers, I've put together a holistic scenario.

Will transportation and logistics executives be standing in the winner’s circle by 2025? - this paper by PWC local offers suggestions on how transportation and logistics companies can position themselves. One thing is clear: the race is a marathon, not a sprint. Talent management will need to be at the top of the agenda for transportation and logistics leaders for decades to come.

Studying this paper will help you get off to a running start in your company’s own race for talent.

Current Scenario:

The factor with the greatest impact on the talent shortage is changing job requirements. Today, an ideal employee has both tactical/operational expertise and professional competencies such as analytical skills. More than 50% of companies say this combination is hard to find. But tomorrow’s talent must also excel at leadership, strategic thinking, innovation and high-level analytic capabilities. 

Mostly companies say “perceived lack of opportunity for career growth” and “perceived status of supply chain as a profession” as having a high or very high impact on their ability to find, attract and retain talent.

From the viewpoint of a few companies, supply chain is as important as other disciplines. In contrast, most companies see supply chain talent’s value in a situational context – i.e., either a commodity or corporate asset, depending on the level and position.

Leading companies are working on the shortage problem. They are taking steps to create more robust talent pipelines, and develop their supply chain workforce – through clear career path, education, cultural adaptation, talent development partnerships and other means.

Take a look at some Talent Management Myths

Talent management is HR’s responsibility

Talent can neither be measured nor managed

We cannot afford to spend on talent recruitment and development

Talent development is primarily about teaching supply chain content

A one-size-fits-all solution will work for talent development. Internal (or external) resources are always better

Talent development will happen naturally and informally

We are so far behind that we should give up now.  In order to provide a broad perspective on supply chain talent development, we focused on below mentioned categories of talent management:

Specific supply chain strategies are influenced by external parameters, business plan strategies and performance expectation as tactical supply chain strategies. (External parameters force to drive corporate-level business plans while performance strategies are shaped by business plan strategies)

Top External Parameters

Changing oil/Raw material prices

Government Regulatory Changes

Increased competition from established competitors

Spot shortages of key raw materials

Changing customer requirements

Business Vision

Achieve high service quality

Reduce the cost of purchased/goods services

Reduce internal costs

Realize synergies across divisions/SBUs

Improve flexibility and responsiveness to customer demand

Tactical Supply Chain Strategies

Achieve consistent cost savings from suppliers

Ensure continuity of supply

Improve the efficiency of the supply management function

Improve all aspects of supplier performance year-over-year

Acquire new value-adding technologies & innovations

Specific Supply-Chain Strategies

Align supply-chain management with overall company goals

Decrease the number of suppliers where leverage and admin efficiency are needed

Employ a formal process to develop and manage supply strategies for important categories across organization

Align supply chain management strategy with internal customer strategies

Integrate business planning & supply chain management process

Recruit and/or develop talent with specific technical or functional expertise

Recruit and/or develop talent with broad general management expertise

Use total costs to drive decisions

Share supply chain market intelligence across units of the organization

Use multi-factor performance standards on suppliers

Opportunities:

What can transportation and logistics companies do to address talent issues and improve their human resource management and strategy?

Here are some of the suggested activities distributed under six key topics:

Take a look at some of the traits that a Future Supply Chain Management Professional must have

 Proactiveness: Understand changes outside traditional supply management function

Integrator: Balance needs both vertically & horizontally

Core Focus: Cost-efficiency from supply chain function

Learn & Share: Capture and utilize Supply chain related knowledge base

Get in touch with us

EUROPE

Maria Montessorilaan 5, 2719 DB Zoetermeer, The Netherlands

Phone : +31 79 320 0980

Email : sales@dilx.co

[transportsolutions]

5 Key Features Any Yard Management System Should Have

If you are into commercial transport business and manage a large yard, you must be needing a large yard management system to take care of the entire business process and your vehicles. With a comprehensive and feature-rich YMS, you can easily take control of all the constituent business challenges and can manage the fleet of vehicles more easily.

But when looking for a great yard management system, you need to look for a few must-have features that you cannot do without.

Image Source :- columbianlogistics.com

1. Real-time tracking of assets

The most important feature that no YMS can do without is the real-time tracking of the yard assets. The assets generally include all that constitute and run a yard. The assets include trailers, yard drivers, yard trucks and many others. With the single click of a mouse, the yard management system should be able to take you about the location of the trailers or whether they are empty. It not only allows a yard business to run smoothly by being well informed about the assets, but it also helps third-party carriers get real-time updates about their trailers docked in your yard.

2. Enhance the performance of yard drivers

Another big challenge for any yard business is to manage yard drivers and ensure optimum output from them. This optimization of yard drivers is ensured by better task management of the yard drivers. An efficient yard management software solution always helps to manage the driver tasks in a very disciplined manner with schedule and timeliness. The yard system actually updates drivers about the trailer movements and accordingly set priorities for them and thus it ensures optimum productivity and task completion. When the trailer and truck movement does not need spending many resources, your yard management solution is just doing fine.

3. Maintaining dock schedule

Besides managing and tracking all yard assets, a yard management system actually helps in completing more tasks with small resources. But to ensure doing more and delivering more with smaller output, maintaining a dock schedule is of utmost importance. The yard capacity can only be uplifted by scheduling all the inbound and outbound loads. The scheduling down the line will also save resources for delegating trailers, containers and trucks.

4. Managing gatehouse

The gatehouse which is key to the process of arrival and departure trailers to and from a dock can also be very well managed through a yard management system. The process, when tracked by a competent software solution in the yard system, can actually help saving lot of time and accordingly helps supporting more number of trailers than without it. It also helps to track the reason for the delay and further boosts the performance of the entire system.

5. Easy integration to systems outside

Lastly, with such a system in place the yard assets, data and their resources can easily be represented and integrated into any third party system. It helps to send and to receive data electronically through other data systems.

[transportsolutions]

What you must know about transport management solutions

The transportation process involves a team focusing on offering transportation facilities ranging from various people or one person playing multiple roles for the goods to be transported. The activities range from dispatchers, finding drivers, searching for available trucks or such freight vehicles and keeping the customers intact with all the relevant updates.

Image Credit :- www.t-systems.com

Large transportation companies might hire a whole team for the above-mentioned activities, while small and mid-level companies would try to manage it all with the limited number of resources they have. Some of the areas that the transportation management solutions provider needs to be careful about is accounting. The truck-drivers have to maintain an expense-list, for the company to easily provide it to their transport IT solutions section. This is where the jobs of the accounting team start where they calculate all the expenses appropriately with the help of the transport IT solutions.

Based on this, proper invoices would be raised and sent to the clients for the payment to be processed. All the bills are then to be filed and kept safely for future reference and in case of loopholes. This whole process is a tedious one and an extremely long one, even though the transport IT solutions simplify the process. In order to hasten the transportation management process and cut down on manual labor, the transport management solutions are what a company needs. To incur more revenue and not lose out on the current revenue, this process is much required for everyone involved in the solutions - be it a shipper, carrier or the customer him/herself.

Transport Management System Requirementt

Dispatching: Instant analysis of the fleet and data for the load to be carried. Better map-reading or direction-finding facilities to avoid detours and delivering goods on time.

Finance: Keep a track of all the expenses made, accurately. A manual note should be made for load-outs and carrier charges at each stop.

HR: Take care of driver applications and make sure that the driver qualifications are most-suitable to serve as an aid in the transport management solutions.

Safety: Drivers should resume driving after taking proper intervals as and when required. Vehicles should be tracked to know when assistance is required in cases of emergency and informing the driver about accidents and high-traffic routes, so delays are avoided and drivers are notified for their safety purposes at all times.

Maintenance: Precaution is better than cure. Schedule a complete vehicle inspection and check the vehicle before it gets on the road.

IT: Update your company’s transport IT solutions and integrate it with data-entry tools in order to lessen manual work. The supply chain will move faster with the automatic fetching of data.

Incorporate upcoming technologies for a more effective solution along with accurate planning and enhanced employee training for smoother interaction and better outputs.