From the category archives:

supply chain

Process Improvement as Entropy Management

by Pete Abilla June 25, 2010

The ambition for most process engineers, interaction designers, and just plain, smart, business people is to create the perfect flow — whether it is flow of material in a supply chain, flow of information in a network, flow of patients in an emergency room, flow of user gestures in a software environment, or flow of [...]

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A Delightful and Fun Supply Chain?

by Pete Abilla May 5, 2010

Is it possible? Most logistics and supply chain professionals are primarily concerned with time, efficiency, and in reducing defects.  This makes sense.  After all, the end-customer wants their product or service quickly and with the highest quality possible. But, what if a dimension of delight and fun could be had in a supply chain?  What [...]

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The Source of Dirt

by Pete Abilla May 26, 2009

In Amazon’s 2008 letter to shareholders, Jeff Bezos shares about a Kaizen event he participated in: At a fulfillment center recently, one of our Kaizen experts asked me, “I’m in favor of a clean fulfillment center, but why are you cleaning? Why don’t you eliminate the source of dirt?” I’ve spoken numerous times about Bezos [...]

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The Role of The Warehouse in eCommerce and eRetailing: Trade-off and Benefits

by Pete Abilla October 20, 2008

Efficiently optimizing inventory, storage space, labor, costs, and time in eCommerce (e-retailing) is required to attain customer satisfaction and economic profit.  For the Operations Researcher, this is no easy task; for the in-the-dirt manager with competing priorities and pressures from her chain-of-command, it is even a bigger challenge. Most people are familiar with the front-end [...]

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Not Accountable, Not Responsible

by Pete Abilla August 9, 2008

Team size can make a big difference in the success of your service or product. What is counterintuitive for most people is that the larger the team size, the lower the likelihood of success for your service or product.  Why? Entropy can set in and large teams are inherently bad vehicles for communication. More insipid, [...]

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Maintain Forward Tension

by Pete Abilla July 20, 2008

One principle in Wing Chun is the maintaining of forward tension.  To explain, I’ll draw the distinction between Tension and Energy and show how this principle in Wing Chun can be applied to Change Management. Tension is a type of Energy A Wing Chun maxim goes as follows: soft and relaxed strength will put your [...]

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Fast Food Congestion

by Pete Abilla July 9, 2008

Every system has constraints — sometimes several — minor bottlenecks and major bottlenecks.  What makes managing constraints even more challenging is that bottlenecks move: up-and-down the process paths. I saw this phenomenon recently during a visit to a fast food restaurant, which I discuss in this post — but, my application of the Theory of [...]

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Student Loan Debt, Pizza, and The Supply Chain

by Pete Abilla June 17, 2008

Several months ago my wife mentioned, in a subtle way, that she misses Giordano’s Pizza. Giordano’s is our favorite pizza joint and we used to eat there daily while I was a graduate student at The University of Chicago. I’d say most of my graduate student loan debt went to Giordano’s in exchange for their [...]

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Necessary but Insufficient

by Pete Abilla June 7, 2008

Motorola (MOT), the inventor of Six Sigma, is in big trouble. Even though it invented Six Sigma, this is a clear example that shows how Lean or Six Sigma are not a cure-all for corporate woes, but that good leadership and a winning strategy are key in a competitive world — Lean or Six Sigma [...]

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