Category Archives: Value Stream

A VALUE STREAM is an end-to-end business process which delivers a product or service to a customer or consumer. The process steps along the way may both use and produce intermediate goods, services and information to reach that primary end.

Analysis may suggest the removal of intermediate process steps, goods, services and information that do not move the value stream forwards to its primary end, provided they do not serve important secondary ends such as compliance, quality control or employee loyalty.

VALUE STREAM MAPPING is a lean manufacturing technique used to analyze the flow of materials and information currently required to bring a product or service to a consumer.

The Beauty, the Wonder and the Awe of the Supply Chain

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The Supply Chain is a wonderful thing; it sits behind the efforts of all companies from the smallest to the largest and attempts to make the company look great in the eyes of the customer.

It is unassuming and often considered just a ‘cost’ of doing service. Yet, without a good supply chain the whole purpose of a company can fall apart or it may just be pushed to the wayside, not by its competitors as many assume and suggest but by its customers!

Click here to read our December copy of “Thought Supply“

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Collaborative Onsite Outsourcing

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In response to the article in LinkedIn: 5 Smart Reasons Employers Should Stop Hiring for Full-time Jobs written by J.T. O’Donnell,  I wrote that companies must utilise all forms of employment including full-time, part-time, outsourced and contracted. Only this will allow companies to get the best ROI from the available and seemingly diminishing pool of Supply Chain talent (I have included my original response below).

Today I find a paper published  by C.H. Robinson stating a similar fact. Their paper “Collaborative Outsourcing: How to gain value from a strategic onsite logistics resource” is focused on Logistics and how outsourced suppliers may need to place some of their own resources on site with their customer.

Not only is this good reading but is a good guide to what and how companies can optimise their requirements.

My original response to JT’s article: There many facets to the concept of “employment”, the problem as I read it, the author seems to be extreme one way and many of the comments extreme the other way. In reality there should be more project driven roles (contract) but this does not detract from the fact that there also needs to be a large part of the organisation that remains permanent. Companies should be utilising the best people for the particular task/function in the most appropriate manner. Some tasks/projects are always better to be managed by either outsourcing or having a person contracted for that project, remembering this can be a short term or long term/extended contract, other roles should nearly always be done on a permanent basis in-house (full-time or part-time). Aside from the perceptions of individuals many companies do not analyse their requirements correctly, too many focus on an immediate requirement or need and hire to an outdated expectation for example: “THIS should be a permanent role and we will have to hire a temp for THAT one”. Also: Project driven roles should not be considered “Temps” – there is too much negative stigma attached to this title, call them Project Contractors, for that is what they are. There are far too many people not being allowed to be the best they can, or to give the best they can to the company they work for, in any capacity, due to so much inaccurate and inconsistent thinking about what a “job” is.