In
today’s world, where the market is ever more competitive and aggressive, and
customers are more and more demanding in terms of product quality, corporations
cannot do without information technology in their supply chain. Generally,
technology has affected supply chain management at least in two ways: by
increasing the quality of service offered to customers, and by decreasing
inventory costs, and consequently the entire supply chain costs [1].
Customers
these days are used to performing orders online in a matter of minutes: they
can choose the product they want, pay for it electronically, they can see when
their orders are being processed, when the items are being shipped, they can
see the expected delivery date and they can track shipments. None of this would
be possible without proper investments in information technology, and if
companies want to retain their customers, they have to be able to offer such
service, or buyers, who rightly love this service and expect it from sellers,
will simply flee to the next online vendor. Companies like FedEx and UPS have
not only embraced these technologies, but they actually contributed to
developing them, and they are in fact leaders in the shipping industry [2].
Moving
on to see how IT has helped in cost reduction, consider inventory costs. Inventory
management has taken advantage of the utilization of technologies such as
barcode and RFID. RFID allows for a surprising cut in time needed for inventory
cycles: what used to take days of work, and was only doable 2 or 3 times a
year, can be done today on a daily basis. This technology also permits to
perform an accurate re-ordering strategy, that cut inventory costs [3]. The
barcode is another helpful technological support for managing customers’
checkout process in stores. A new type of barcode, the stretched barcode, has
enhanced the checkout process even more, increasing customers’ satisfaction
(Trader Joe’s) [4].
Cost
reduction is also brought about by an efficient communication across different
sectors of the supply chain. If a problem arises at one particular stage, the
adjacent stages will be directly affected too. Similarly to Just-In-Time (JIT)
strategies for inventory management, efficient and timely notification
strategies, such as automated alerts via email or text message, will circulate
information in real time and allow for interventions when and where needed [2].
Is information technology the real asset to rely on though,
when it comes to efficient supply chain management? Is it really technology
that we have to acknowledge for the progress made in these 30 years or so of
the recognition of supply chain management as a field of its own? And is it
really technology that we have to count on in order to move forward? Isn’t the
greatness of human minds that first envisioned and then developed such
technologies that we should be thanking for the wonders they created and will
be able to create in the future [5]? The man before and beyond the machine, so
to speak.
References
