Jim D’Addario, Director of SCM Product Marketing, wrote about how Oracle CEO Mark Hurd backs the idea that transparency is the key to supply chain efficiency and success. Oracle Supply Chain Management (SCM) Cloud can help drive this transparency and help organizations break down silos within their business.
The Problem: Silos and Fragmentation
Many high-functioning organizations recognize that in order to operate efficiently, they need to break down the informational and organizational silos that often hinder communications and transparency.
Oracle CEO Mark Hurd’s 2004 book The Value Factor recognized that avoiding the compartmentalization of information can positively impact businesses. Fragmentation decreases knowledge sharing, which can be detrimental to an organization’s supply chain operations. Communication breakdowns can lead to frustrated employees, delayed order fulfillment, and ultimately, dissatisfied customers.
“Every company in every industry can benefit from eliminating fragmentation.”
—Mark Hurd, CEO of Oracle
For companies that deliver products to an end customer, transparency in their supply chain processes is a key component to achieving efficiency. As consumers apply similar weigh to product quality and order-fulfillment speed, efficiency is more important than ever. A recent study by Voxware, a company that delivers analytic solutions for distribution operations, confirmed that when the survey showed that 69 percent of respondents were must less or less likely to shop with a retailer in the future if a purchased item is not delivered within two days of the date promised.
The Solution: Oracle SCM Cloud
The more perceptive organizations see this shift in consumer expectations as an opportunity to update their supply chain processes. Companies that increase inner-organizational transparency within supply chains can:
- Realize operational efficiencies
- Decentralize decision-making
- Positively impact their bottom line
In order for companies to fulfill obligations to consumers, they must present employees with a single repository for information. Storing information in a universally accessible system allows stakeholders throughout the supply chain to share and receive information. Oracle Supply Chain Management (SCM) Cloud can help with exactly that. Oracle recently updated the Oracle SCM Cloud to facilitate communications between customer service and field technicians, align orders and invoicing with proper projects and organizations, and improve orchestration of vendor-managed inventory—all while reducing operational costs. Presenting a single version of truth, like Oracle SCM Cloud, to employees can help organizations leverage technology to break down barriers between departments and avoid fragmentation.
Hurd also recognized the importance of disseminating consistent and accurate information in The Value Factor by saying, “Companies require a unified understanding of the business—a single version of the truth.”
By increasing information sharing across departments, companies can achieve and maintain efficiency within their supply chains. When customer service representatives, logistics personnel, field personnel, and financial personnel are using the same system to access information, they are working from a single version of the truth. When everyone works from a single version of the truth, they can then share that truth with customers. Transparency is the key to supply chain efficiency and success.
“Organizations need an efficient and responsive supply chain to stay ahead of constantly changing expectations and that requires trust, transparency, and open lines of communication across the entire value chain.”
—Jon Chorley, Chief Sustainability Officer and Group Vice President, Supply Chain Management Product Strategy
Oracle CX Cloud + Oracle SCM Cloud
Advancements in technology aren’t just bolstering efficiency in internal supply chain operations. They are also augmenting the customer experience. Oracle recently introduced the Oracle Service Logistics Cloud, an end-to-end solution that connects customer experience, field service, and supply chain operations through an integrated Cloud solution. This first-of-its-kind solution will help service-based organizations seamlessly manage operations and provide a unified experience for the customer by joining Oracle Customer Experience (CX) Cloud and Oracle SCM Cloud. Different service departments can now work together in real time to provide customers with a single point of contact and a universal buying experience.
Emerging technologies will continue to increasingly support other aspects of the supply chain. Companies can use solutions like Oracle Service Logistics Cloud to optimize parts logistics by ordering and shipping parts directly to the customers and technicians who need them. This solution can also help companies manage a technician’s stock, which would increase the accuracy of service and billing. Oracle Service Logistics Cloud could help companies better manage their field service departments by matching a technician’s skills and inventory with customer requests.
Customer-centric companies will continue to use emerging technologies to gain efficiencies in their supply chain operations. Those who have transparent end-to-end supply chain operations will increase employee and customer satisfaction.
When employees can use enterprise-wide, Cloud-based systems to inform logistics, remove information silos, and drive decision-making, they can increase efficiency and their bottom lines.