^The APQC Blog

In today’s globalized economic environment, government action on macroeconomic policy can have a significant impact on business activity. Interest rates, trade policy, and currency exchange rates are but a few areas in which a central government can make changes to improve the overall business climate. In commemoration of the thirtieth anniversary of the Plaza Accord, Rice University’s Baker Institute of Public Policy recently held a conference to examine the impact of the agreement on macroeconomic policy and lessons learned.

APQC’s Process Classification Framework® (PCF) is the best tool to standardize the language of your process steps, enabling you to accelerate your organization’s ability to:

An increasing number of organizations are using logistics processes and practices to help carry out humanitarian efforts.

In September APQC conducted a survey to provide a better understanding of how some proposed structural changes, specifically centered on the procurement and products and service delivery sections, to APQC's Process Classification Framework^® (PCF) would affect its end users. This infographic looks at findings, specifically the differences between procurement in manufacturing and service organizations.

Corey Vickers, Logistics Category Manager at Chevron, previews his 2015 APQC Process Conference breakout session on the use of the LDSS solution. Chevron has been able to improve coordination and gain efficiencies resulting in tens of millions of dollars of reduced costs, and gain enterprise-wide buy-in from multiple stakeholder groups to standardize processes.

The 2015 APQC Process Conference is October 29-30.

When a large organization rapidly grows through acquisition, it acquires more than a new book of business. It also acquires the many processes each newly acquired company has been using to do its work. Very often, these processes are different from the way the parent company has always done things, leading to inconsistencies, inefficiency, and confusion. Standardizing processes across a growing organization is a tough challenge, but when accomplished with the right framework and approach, the benefits can be tremendous.

Like many of you, as the weather cools and the summer fades, APQC is knee-deep in strategic planning. Since APQC has access to many best practices, we try to follow them. One is to conduct a premortem on planned investments, a technique borrowed from project planning, in which one attempts to imagine what could go wrong and decide how to avoid or mitigate those risks. Doesn’t this go against the socially acceptable stance of being an optimist?

What is the key to improving an organization’s manufacturing activities? My colleague Andrea Stroud and I recently spoke on a webinar focused on the steps organizations can take to assess the current state of their manufacturing processes and identify areas for improvement.

Budget season can be difficult for financial professionals. The combination of resource allocation under strict deadlines creates an unenviable, annual responsibility. While budgeting may be difficult, it does not have to be an ordeal to suffer through. Proper planning and targeted budget scope can help reduce the time organizations spend on budget iterations before finalization.

As I sat thinking about companies that have been making headlines for finding innovative ways to deliver orders on time, Amazon comes to mind. Many have heard the headlines about Amazon’s drone’s, its one-hour delivery service, and rapid expansion into transportation logistics. Next week at CSCMP’s 2015 Annual Conference  the session It’s Still Day 1 For Amazon fulfillment is taking place.