Many of us never consider where the items we purchase everyday come from and the journey those items make to get to us. Everyday shipments of everything from petroleum and consumer goods to steel and automobiles come through U.S. ports from all over the world. Shipping goods by sea tends to be…

APQC has a new supply chain management research principal lead, Joe Tillman, and I had the pleasure of recently speaking with him. In his new role, Joe will be the voice for supply chain research, benchmarking, and process improvement. Joe has a keen interest in all things supply chain and uses…

Supply Chain Managers are often faced with several issues that they must deal with to ensure a healthy supply chain and minimize the number of fires that arise and the number that have to be put out. Yesterday, September 9th was Fire Prevention Day. In honor of this special day, I would like to…

Is your organization strategizing the best way to slay your supply chain monster? Your monster may be figuring out your processes, or it could be benchmarking your processes (these are the two I hear most often from organizations). Today, I am going to focus on the benchmarking monster.…

APQC recently spoke with Murillo Xavier, one of HP’s most acclaimed supply chain strategists and author of Strategic Sourcing- Suppliers are from Mars, Customers are from Venus. During a recent interview Xavier discusses how market leaders are redesigning their supply chains in this…

LET'S TALK PROCURE-TO-PAY Are you struggling to improve your organization’s procure-to-pay process? Is your procure-to-pay cycle time not as fast as it should be? Let me begin by saying that these are valid concerns and you are not alone. Over the past couple of years, organizations have…

The topic that is on most people’s minds in the oil and gas industry is the fact that crude oil went from $120 a barrel to under $50 a barrel. The drop in gas prices may have some excited when they go to fill up their cars at the gas tank, but has many concerned about what the industry’s future…

The evolving “Internet of Things” (IoT) is bringing about a new level of interconnectivity among devices, people, and organizations. The acceleration of IT interconnectivity in the supply chain function also creates potential risks if organizations do not ensure that they are making the right…

APQC recently spoke with Alaster Love, Vice President of Oil and Gas for Transplace, about best practices for fueling supply chain efficiency. Love has been in his role for two years and is responsible for all of Transplace’s commercial efforts. He works with exploration and production (i.e.,…

In January of this year, APQC’s supply chain management research team conducted an annual survey to understand the state of supply chain and its future. The majority of participants in that research have some degree of positivity about the future strategy and direction of their organizations’…