Management

Management (228)

Cecil's SaaSy Cloud Trip

I'm making my way west over the next few weeks, taking the I-10 route across the Southern States then up the California coast. The half dozen clients I'll see along the way have more in common than their convenient location along my route (and the fact that they share my love for local cuisine). All of them are either in the midst of evaluating SaaS based solutions for their EDI processes, or have already made the change. Read more...

Sell Your Idea

Do you ever wish you could get your point across to your boss, or your boss's boss? Whether it's selling an idea you have to improve your service offering, or trying to get a raise, promotion, or addition to your team, the points in this short article can be invaluable.

Read more...

Effectively Managing an Outsourced Mapping Department

worldOver the years EDI has proven to be an integral part of the strategic vision of many companies. Gaining systems integration with our customers and vendors allows us to decide and act more quickly, with more accurate and reliable data to the fluid movements of the business environment.   This in and of itself can be a competitive advantage in the marketplace. Read more...

Seven Keys to Managing Outsourced Mapping Services

7keysFinding process efficiency in business is no longer on the wish list, but a mandatory responsibility of management. Even with the great gains that we as an EDI department give to the organization, the mandate to find more cost effective methods in operations has not passed us by.  This in turn has lead many EDI teams to utilize third parties to handle some portions of their daily function. In my previous post, I began to discuss outsourcing the mapping function of EDI, and will wrap up with seven strategies that I have found to be useful when managing a third party mapping team.

Read more...

Doing it Wrong - Get it Right!

You only hear from your 'customers' when something bad happens, your sales department complains about how long it takes to 'hook up' their customers on marketplace connections, and you're constantly given grief by the SAP team about inbound documents erroring out in the interface. Is that just the nature of the EDI beast, or are you doing something very wrong?

Read more...

Some Learnings from Mr. Jobs

Istevejobsbion my copious free time over the holidays, I managed to knock off a few of the books that had stacked up on me. Although I tend to stick to mysteries, thrillers, spy novels, and stuff like that, I occasionally find a biography that interests me. I couldn’t wait to read the Steve Jobs bio written by Walter Isaacson, and it was a winner. Even if you don’t like Apple products and you may not give a hoot about its recently deceased leader, you’ll still find it fascinating.

Read more...

Managing the "IT Genius"

geniusIT management, like any other management, requires finesse and tact. People skills are essential when dealing with anyone, but IT people are generally more withdrawn than most. People who are naturally more "people-oriented" tend to gravitate to more customer service or human resource type positions. There are frequently less conversations over the water cooler in IT than in other departments. This is not to say that either group is "better" than the other, only different.

Read more...

Marlow On Real ROI

cogI've heard from quite a few of our readers on my article in February around the ROI of trading business transactions electronically. Many of you do have an understanding of the Value that EDI provides to your Supply Chain where others know that doing EDI makes sense but can't or don't have a formal method of knowing what the true ROI is to your organization. One theme that I did hear and was surprise about, is that even those who do have a ROI calculation may not know if they are indeed getting the ROI they have reported to upper management. Read more...

Marlow - Back to the Future - Again

SignUnderDuressSince the middle of last year I've noticed a trend that I had been waiting to comment on until later, but with yet another grouping of retailers doing the same old thing, I thought it time to say my peace. This trend has to do with Retailers either requesting or requiring suppliers to use their independent portal site, or requiring suppliers to use an exclusive providers to conduct electronic trading. Many of my customers have been reaching out to me with complaints regarding letters from their customers (Retailers/Distributors) requiring them to switch to an exclusive EDI provider or to use a internally created EDI portal. Read more...

Marlow's Strategic Recommendations for 2011

2011strategyIf you're like many companies your year end is also the end of the calendar year. With the approaching new year comes new budgets and new Goals and Objectives. For some retailers, we'll start to see new store openings increase, but for most you'll continue to look within your organizations to continue to shrink the cost of operations, and that will likely include changes or continued expansion of Supply Chain initiatives and Electronic Trading. As you plan your Strategy for 2011 you may want to consider some of the things that I've been writing on over the last year. To refresh your memory below are considerations I'd expect you'd "noodle" over the following: Read more...

Visit other PMG Sites:

PMG360 is committed to protecting the privacy of the personal data we collect from our subscribers/agents/customers/exhibitors and sponsors. On May 25th, the European's GDPR policy will be enforced. Nothing is changing about your current settings or how your information is processed, however, we have made a few changes. We have updated our Privacy Policy and Cookie Policy to make it easier for you to understand what information we collect, how and why we collect it.