. ADVANCED SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT REQUIRES

As a firm and its most trusted and closest business allies prepare to enter this
fourth level of the maturity model, they realize that a solid plan of attack is
necessary for success. It is not enough just to link firms that have completed
their internal homework and begun to work with external partners. There must
be a coordinated effort aimed at optimized conditions across the extended
enterprise and a willingness to share the vital knowledge that leads to differentiating
processes. Advanced supply chain management, therefore, cannot be
accomplished without a clear roadmap that identifies where the network is
headed and how the participants can measure the progress made and show the
results on the financial statements.
A series of obstacles will be encountered as this planning begins. First, there
will be the natural resistance to sharing valuable data over any electronic system.
This problem is dealt with by an early agreement on what can and will
be shared, what will be kept protected and proprietary within the various businesses
systems, and what security features will protect the data that are not to
be shared at all. Second, some of the participants will view the sharing of
knowledge as valuable, but will balk at the work necessary to bring BPMS to
their existing methodology as they lack the understanding of the values or
perceive the application as too difficult to accomplish.
Since all of the key players must be involved in network connectivity, time
should be spent to train, if necessary, and to develop the capability of all
constituents to participate in the data sharing. Key to this is the identification
and, if necessary, simplification of the interfacing processes. We strongly advise
the establishment of diagnostic labs or demonstration labs to discuss, explain,
and show the potential values to be added from such data sharing. These labs
serve the dual purpose of explaining what activities the participants will be
pursuing, while allowing them to test their hypotheses and get a feel for the end
results. In Chapter 9, we will explain how the participants can go further and
simulate the changed processes that result from the knowledge sharing, before
investing too heavily in execution.
Third, initially there will be poor understanding of how to deploy the tools
and methods, resulting in poor definition of what the early gains might be and
delays in execution. Once again, time spent on clarifying the roadmap and
establishing a set of driving metrics will aid immensely in getting the necessary
buy-in and provision of key resources to move forward. Fourth, there will be
some confusion regarding the central purposes, especially as some participants
view BPM as a means to drive automation and eliminate personnel, rather than
the route to process optimization and the best possible customer satisfaction.
Each of these complications can be defeated through an adequate plan for
BPM deployment and a roadmap that defines the resolution of fundamental
business issues plaguing each of the network members. While most of the
solutions will derive from interactive discussions and planning between the
participants, as will be described shortly, several software suppliers can add
value in this part of the effort and could play a role in development of the plan.
As mentioned, Manugistics was very helpful to Diageo.
Fuego, Inc. offers another example. This firm provides �templates for more
than 60 sets of processes across the financial-services, insurance, manufacturing,
and telecommunications industries.� Pegasystems, Inc. has �rolled out a
series of process templates that accelerate deployment by automating common
back-office processes while letting companies manage exceptions� (Greenfield
et al., 2004, p. 68).
For our purposes, we have selected Yantra as a service provider to follow,
as we use its experiences and cases studies to document what can be done across
enterprises and to establish the kinds of improvements that can be deployed and
the type of savings to be found after the effort is completed. Yantra has headquarters
in Tewksbury, Massachusetts and has a proven track record with such
firms as Best Buy, Allders Department Store, Rockport, Target, and US Transcom.
Its extensive suite of applications runs the gamut of supply chain needs, from
distributed order management and flow through provisioning to synchronized
fulfillment and reverse logistics. As we develop our deeper analysis into the
final levels of the maturity model and the best use of the SCOR� model, we
will use Yantra as an example to bring a sense of reality to what can and does
happen.