The Builder's Guide to the Tech Galaxy

10Supply Chain Excellence Shipping customer happiness consistently

With Matthias Wilrich

Key pitfalls to avoid for scale-up builders

• Optimizing the supply chain in silos rather than seeing it as a product.

  Contrary to popular belief, the total outcome cannot simply be maximized by optimizing the individual parts. Improvements on one dimension can hurt another; a supply chain is about balance. There should always be support and a focus on the weakest link while performing a continuous balancing act on the chain as a whole. It is important to not think in terms of silos, while also working toward creating an awareness of “supply chain as product” and then finding the optimal balance between its various multipliers.

• Not taking a granular approach to optimize order economics.

  Supply chain leaders who do not take savings seriously enough by counting down to each cent will not reach best-in-class levels in cost efficiency. Real-time tracking, analytics and the right benchmarks count here. Most B2C companies will find the biggest share of costs to lie in delivery operations (whether parcel, drivers or service staff – the “last mile”) and should focus on optimizing costs in that block instead of opening quality, speed or reliability issues due to early optimization of smaller blocks, e.g., picking, inventory keeping, packing (see Practice 85).

• Hiring supply chain specialists ...