items – Ellery's Essays

The Need for Clarity Before AI in Supply Chains

It’s near the end of 2025. Just about everyone is talking about Artificial Intelligence (AI) and how technology firms are racing to capitalise on it. Executives want AI to be integral in just about every business area. That includes supply chains. Aside from all the automation firms are installing into their operations, executives are aimingContinue reading “The Need for Clarity Before AI in Supply Chains”

Working What We Have vs. Changing What We Work With

We who are supply chain managers have their hands full doing their jobs. The problem is we work with what we only have. Executives of enterprises determine our scopes; executives also decide what resources & assets we will have at our disposal or have authority over. Supply chains extend beyond the borders of enterprises, andContinue reading “Working What We Have vs. Changing What We Work With”

Flagships & Anchors

Every enterprise has a flagship. A flagship is an enterprise’s leading product. It’s the brand that customers identify with the enterprise or it’s the enterprise’s number one item in terms of customer popularity or sales. We know The Coca-Cola Company by its flagship namesake, Coca-Cola. Likewise, we know the Pepsico corporation from its Pepsi lineContinue reading “Flagships & Anchors”

Managing Inventory

One common priority we have as supply chain managers is managing inventories. We make items available when needed but at the same time make sure we don’t have too much that ties up our enterprises’ money. Sometimes, inventory management takes so much of our time that it dominates our job more than anything else. InventoryContinue reading “Managing Inventory”

Behold The PSI: A Basic Tool for Supply Chain Planning

The PSI or Production-Sales-Inventory is a basic spreadsheet template for supply chain planners. It looks like this: The PSI typically has three sections: production, sales, and inventories. Production represents the in-flow of an item or what’s going into inventory. A basic example is finished goods input coming from a manufacturing operation’s output. We can alsoContinue reading “Behold The PSI: A Basic Tool for Supply Chain Planning”