No vertical market appears to be immune to the hardships and challenges resulting from the unprecedented uncertainty and volatility of today’s geopolitical strife, climate disasters, and global pandemics. Which makes it even that much more challenging for organizations to try to meet consumer preferences and requirements that are always changing.

All of this uncertainty underscores the importance for organizations to focus on optimizing all facets of their supply chain costs—including cost-to-source, cost-to-procure, cost-to-manufacture, logistics, and handing. Supply chain optimization must also factor in the direct labor that drives supply chain activities in manufacturing, distribution, and retail. Total cost has never been more critical to understand and control—regardless of an organization’s industry or sector.

Digital technology is changing the world, one industry at a time. With these changes comes a reimagining of the supply chain, from the systems businesses use to communicate and interact, to the strategies they deploy to move goods around the world. Along the way, our expectations for speed, service, and quality go up, forever altered.

Digitalization gives rise to new business models, in which real-time connectivity, greater visibility, reactivity, and anticipation become the underlying characteristics of our supply chains. But this kind of change isn’t easy, and transformation doesn’t happen overnight. While many businesses have adopted technology to augment or enhance existing processes, they’ve still got a long journey ahead.

By taking a staged approach to digital transformation, and building greater connectivity across the supply chain, businesses can pave the way toward a fully-connected future, while still being able to tackle the biggest challenges they face right now.

The year 2020 approaches with promise amidst a backdrop of innovation and transformation occurring at a speed never witnessed before. We’re experiencing a digital revolution that is changing the way we live, work and interact with one another. The power of information is just beginning to blossom as more of our decisions are based on data and use cases for artificial intelligence are delivering significant value. Meanwhile, global movements to protect the planet and operate responsibly continue to grow in importance. And an undercurrent of de-globalization continues to change the way countries and companies interact with each other.

Here’s a look at some of the emerging trends and themes you can expect to take shape in 2020. 

For the longest time, procurement and supply management teams have focused on cost-savings and providing accurate supply for their businesses. More specifically, their value was primarily limited to efficiency (the minimization of cost for procurement services) and effectiveness (the maximization of business value). In recent years, there is an increased focus beyond price reduction, with concentration towards contribution to total cost of ownership (TCO), and the management of overall value and demand.

Today, it’s about the value experience: the optimization of procurement relationships, engagement and collaboration for employees, customers and suppliers. In doing so, start to consider ways procurement and supply management teams provide value to the rest of the organization, outside of cost cutting.

This time last year, we looked at the Fashion Revolution movement and its clarion call for transparency across fashion supply chains. Since then, the movement has gained even more momentum; 2017 numbers reflect greater participation on social media with more consumers asking #whomademyclothes, and more workers posting photos of themselves replying, #imadeyourclothes. 

Crucially, more brands are responding to the demand for transparency. 2017’s Fashion Revolution Week had over 1,000 mainstream clothing brands respond to #whomademyclothes, up from around 400 the previous year. It’s a safe bet that this form of engagement will keep growing in the coming years. So the real question becomes, what’s next?

Eight out of 10 consumers expect to receive regular updates about the status of their orders, according to a new survey from YouGov and the Infor GT Nexus Commerce Network. In this episode of Supply Chain Radio, Matt Gunn and Greg Kefer dive into the data and discuss why supply chain visibility is more important than ever.

By Greg Kefer, VP marketing, Infor

OK, I realize the headline is a bit loaded, but I got inspired after coming across a market study by Geodis that found only 6% of companies claim to have “full visibility” across their supply chains. This mirrors other studies that point to a consensus that while visibility is universally desired, few companies have it completely figured out.

Part of the challenge is defining what supply chain visibility actually is. According to Gartner, it has more than 100 software vendors on its radar that claim to have some kind of supply chain visibility offering, which means visibility into a distribution center, or plan, or plant, or region, or transport mode, or some performance KPIs would count.

Some companies have figured out visibility, and are driving tens of millions of dollars in value. But a lot of companies are on a long journey to achieve a vision. The complexities of any global supply chain are daunting, but the cost of doing nothing is too great to ignore. You cannot compete if you operate in the dark.