Global trends & challenges
The pace and speed of change is no longer linear. It is exponential on a global scale across many domains namely: consumer personalization, concept-to-shelf time, and responsiveness to market change. These factors are impacting all industries.
The pace and speed of change is no longer linear. It is exponential on a global scale across many domains namely: consumer personalization, concept-to-shelf time, and responsiveness to market change. These factors are impacting all industries.
In working with many multinational organizations, we gained insight into these trends that can be leveraged to help in your ability to stay ahead of the market.
Changes in Markets and Expectations
Global Supply Chain strategies and processes are being used to increase their responsiveness and flexibility to accommodate consumer demand, new markets, sales channels and multi-channel distribution channels, flexible production, and supply chains through lean methods such as one-piece flow. As change is accelerating, so must supply chains.
The environment is becoming ever more competitive with increasing personalization experiences demanded by the consumer, dwindling consumer loyalty, and predictability. There is a high degree of supplier-side activities and integration to ensure product supply, is paced exactly as needed in the global supply chains. Global sourcing features both long supply chains while needing to increase the local content ratio. The high volatility of the markets complicates planning.
Attaining these efficiencies requires organizations to ensure effective strategies are in place to optimize the value chain while retaining their brand value with its consumers and customers. Achieving this is possible in combination with the management of processes, intelligent organizational design, along with an effective technology stack to sustain them.
Profit with Purpose
Globally, profit is no longer enough, customers demand growth and impact. Consumerism is changing as the market becomes more conscious, driving the “right” choice. Organizations need to redefine what the customer sees as value and employers are forced to look at employee satisfaction and experiences to instill a deeper sense of purpose in the services they provide; while remaining profitable.
Exploiting cost benefits through new sourcing channels, and reducing supply costs while avoiding competing on price is a challenge.
Aftermarket services entail increasing requirements and lucrative revenue potential, for instance in the field of spare parts logistics or accessories distribution. Permanent cost and performance optimization as added value for consumers and/or customers is pertinent, leading to innovation around revenue opportunities to remain competitive.
Ask yourself what types of value you can create and the kinds of customer and employee experiences you can ensure.
Global Focus on Sustainability and Environmentally Friendly Practices
Consumers are more aware of their purchases, from what it contains to where it was sourced and how it was made. It requires an expansion of services in a sustainably successful business model with environmentally friendly and sustainable initiatives to meet the increased market and consumer demand. Offering sustainable, organic, low carbon footprint products, with matching supply chains is putting pressure on natural resources and organizations to meet the market expectations.
There is also environmental pressure on transport, logistics, and warehousing, demanding quick turnaround times with minimal impact on the environment. A competitive challenge to manage is the late variant configuration through clear and optimal postponement strategies, with multi-modal transport planning and freight cost management.
Adoption Rate of Advanced Technology Increases
Cloud-based technology, Artificial Intelligence, and Machine Learning is on the rise, and more organizations are finding ways of using them to increase efficiencies, production, customer service, and overall better performance cross-industries. Our digital footprint is being converted to a physical one, through facial recognition and biometrics; creating opportunities for enhanced services. However, as the world may become more reflective, will this alter or enable our behaviors?
Just when you thought things couldn’t move faster, the next generation of mobile internet is on the brink of launching. 5G Mobile Internet connection offers faster data download and upload speeds, allowing more devices to access it at the same time. More importantly, it enables things like the Internet of Things, equipment sensors, video cameras, and other machines to increase their functionality.
Data is Insight but not Everything
No longer can businesses compete without digitizing their data. The need to effectively understand one’s data is no longer something that can be ignored. The key is using it to support business decisions.
Data provides invaluable insight into organizational operations, but consumer data needs to be handled with care. With virtual reality, digital doubles, and the dawn of digital footprints being converted to physical; understanding true consumer behavior is key. As much as data can tell a million stories, it isn’t everything and the need to combine data with traditional approaches and principles will be the competitive edge; bridging the two together with data informing decisions without devaluing the input of the human.
In a world where business becomes more agile, collaborative, efficient, and scalable; addressing privacy, digital ethics, data protection, and consent becomes more crucial in the dawn of product development.