Having the right logistics strategy is essential for organizations that are committed to process improvement, cost savings, increased customer satisfaction, and increased profits. The top tip for an organization looking to create an effective logistics strategy is to determine which key performance…

How often do we start something only to discover we have to go back to square one because we overlooked an important stakeholder? We’ve all been the victim of email spamming, and I’d like to start this by apologizing for any part I may have ever played in spamming your inbox. Years ago, in a…

In APQC’s continuing series “Keys to Making Change Management Last” Robert Paterson, President of The Renewal Consulting Group, explains why culture change is easiest when people are desperate. He also explains the rules of culture change, how difficult it was to convince a bank to use email, and…

Recent surveys of supply chain executives have shown that attracting and retaining talent in the supply chain is a big concern, especially in light of the impending retirement of baby boomers who have long made up the bulk of supply chain professionals. Last week at the Supply Chain and Logistics…

The end-of-year holiday season is a time for friends, family, parties, and gifts, but it is also a time for project close-outs, strategic planning, and budgeting for the next fiscal year. Juggling all of these home and work demands at the same time can be stressful. To help take the pressure off…

"Painful," "too much effort," "not popular," "a necessary evil"—when employees use these kinds of words to describe a particular process you know that process is broken and needs to be improved. These were the words that APQC employees used to describe APQC's pre-2012 employee performance…

I’m lucky. I get to work with organizations using benchmarking data and best practices to improve. This also affords me the opportunity to talk to individuals just starting their benchmarking journey. Those that are successful, and see improvement, are those that take benchmarking data and…

People are always asking me for a better way to find the APQC knowledge management best practices and guidance they’re looking for. Now there is one! This month we launched APQC’s Interactive Knowledge Management Program Framework, a one-stop shop for the best resources to help you envision, design…

The Process Excellence Network just came out with an article focusing on six process excellence pitfalls to avoid, written by Andrew Spanyi.  Organizing improvement in silos Focusing on cost instead of customer value creation Having the method overshadow the outcome Redesigning the…

On Wednesday, December 4, APQC and the Edison Awards will be hosting a Webinar presentation by Caterpillar Inc. on the development of an innovative product. Randy Peterson, advanced technology development manager for Caterpillar, will be discussing how the organization developed the game-changing…