What Our Superiors Expect

Customers expect perfection in service.  But what do our superiors expect? For those among us who are supply chain professionals or managers, we answer to our employers, our superiors or bosses, the owners and executives who rule the enterprises we work for.  And as much as customers expect us to be perfect in serving them,Continue reading “What Our Superiors Expect”

The Order-Winning Operations Strategy

We, whether we are executives, entrepreneurs, or employees, face challenges and disruptions every day.  Most of us have goals or at least have things we want to realise or get done.  We hate it when we run into obstacles.  We therefore develop strategies to anticipate and overcome them, if not get around them. Goals areContinue reading “The Order-Winning Operations Strategy”

Why There are No Patron Saints for Modern Business

The Jesuit priest in his homily for the Catholic mass service I was attending with fellow high school students many years ago declared there were no Catholic patron saints for business people.  At least there weren’t any who could be a model for those who led corporations and enterprises.  In the Roman Catholic Church, patronContinue reading “Why There are No Patron Saints for Modern Business”

Don’t Forget Productivity in Promoting Resilience

When the coronavirus pandemic in 2020 catastrophically caused a sudden global economic recession, enterprises went on the defensive to keep their businesses afloat; executives promised stakeholders they would transform their organisations to become more resilient.  Risk management was the popular precursor to resilience.  In risk management, managers laid out possible threats and prepared for them. Continue reading “Don’t Forget Productivity in Promoting Resilience”

Two Tactics That are Better than “No”

Most managers (and white-collar workers) face barrages of requests, if not directives, just about every day.  Executives and peers ask managers to do many things such as write reports, attend meetings, do feasibility studies, pay suppliers, or test new products.  Many managers would find themselves busy responding to these requests.  So much so that they’dContinue reading “Two Tactics That are Better than “No””

The Four (4) Priorities of Business

San Miguel Corporation (SMC) is the largest business enterprise in the Philippines and is among the top 2,000 global firms listed by Forbes magazine.  SMC’s gross revenue was PhP 384 billion ($USD 7.6 billion approximately) in 2018 earned from its diversified portfolio that includes food & beverage products, real estate properties, and infrastructure & energyContinue reading “The Four (4) Priorities of Business”

Competitive & Non-Competitive Priorities and How to Deal with Them

In several firms I’ve worked with, I couldn’t help but notice that supply chain managers would sometimes be engrossed with priorities regarding compliance to government-mandated occupational safety & health standards.  They would have long meetings and spend much time on the nitty-gritties of reports to be filed and procedures to follow. But in the followingContinue reading “Competitive & Non-Competitive Priorities and How to Deal with Them”