Dear Industrial Engineer* The year 2020 ended without a happy ending. The SARS-CoV-2 virus had not gone away. It continues to be a global threat going into 2021. Political and enterprise leaders have done all they can to defeat the virus. There was hope. Thanks to record-breaking world-class collaboration efforts, vaccines have become realitiesContinue reading “A Letter to the IE: More than Ever, We Need to Lead the World to Productivity”
Tag Archives: industrial engineering
Six Elements to Find in a Digital Roadmap
A large producer of canned fruit items installed a brand-new radio-frequency identification (RFID) system at its manufacturing facility. The RFID system aimed to streamline the producer’s inventory management system. The canned fruit producer’s workers stuck RFID tags on every case of canned fruit and on the pallets where the cases were stacked. As forklift operatorsContinue reading “Six Elements to Find in a Digital Roadmap”
Ten (10) Examples Towards Building Better Supply Chains
For years, experts have cited the urgent need for supply chains to adapt and get better. In 2005, Paul Michelman via the Harvard Business Review wrote: “Threats to your supply chain, and therefore to your company, abound—natural disasters, accidents, and intentional disruptions—their likelihood and consequences heightened by long, global supply chains, ever-shrinking product lifecycles, andContinue reading “Ten (10) Examples Towards Building Better Supply Chains”
Twelve (12) Things Supply Chain Engineers Do for Enterprises
Supply Chain Engineers (SCE’s) are much like any other engineer. Just as engineers design, build, and install structures and systems, SCE’s do the same specifically for supply chains. Supply chain engineers shape the networks, processes, and systems that underlie product and service streams. Their projects are either big and small. Project scopes can range fromContinue reading “Twelve (12) Things Supply Chain Engineers Do for Enterprises”
Why We Need to Build Supply Chains
Enterprises are planning to rebuild their supply chains in the wake of the pandemic of 2020. Well, no, not really. Many enterprises are planning to resume production and boost inventories in the aftermath of the COVID19 pandemic.1 Some firms will narrow their product lines to those that are in high demand (e.g. toilet paper). OthersContinue reading “Why We Need to Build Supply Chains”
Seizing Opportunity and Addressing Adversity via Supply Chain Engineering
We should not focus just on adversity. We should also focus on opportunity. We tend to point to adversity when there’s disruption. But as much as there is adversity behind every disruption, there is also opportunity. This should be common business sense but it can be difficult to accept when there’s a raging disruptionContinue reading “Seizing Opportunity and Addressing Adversity via Supply Chain Engineering”
Ellery's Essays 