HUMAN RESOURCES
AS A RISK FACTOR
FOR SUPPLY CHAINS:
POLISH EXPERIENCE
Danuta Kisperska-Moroń
Department of Business Logistics
University of Economics
Katowice, Poland
AGENDA
1. NEW CHALLENGES FOR SUPPLY CHAIN
MANAGEMENT
2. THE SPECIFIC CHARACTER OF SUPPLY
CHAIN MANAGEMENT QUALIFICATIONS
3. OUTLINE OF PRESENT QUALIFICATIONS
OF SUPPLY CHAINN MANAGERS IN
POLAND
4. CONCLUSIONS
Phenomena that seem to
account for the intensity and
scale of changes:
– transforming political systems,
– emerging virtual networks of global influence,
– growing market competitiveness leading to a
surge of company mergers,
– a new quality of customers’ expectations,
– shorter life cycles of products,
– rapid development of the service sector.
COMPETITION
PRICE ?
“Freshness” of the offer:
•constantly changing
assortment,
•newest fashion
•best opportunity
Supply chain management is characterised
by exceptional dynamics
The quality of human resource
The leading
companies
invested 44%
more into their
work force than
their competitors
NEW CHALLENGES FOR
SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT
• SC more customer specific and less static
– small orders, longer hours of business opening and
seven days operation in three shifts
• The future will belong to “lean” organisations
– team work, flexible, flat-structured, quality-focused,
maintaining close links with their customers and
suppliers, and operating globally
• Companies ready to abandon their vertical
functional organisational structure
– introduce horizontal and cross-functional frameworks
supporting process management
NEW CHALLENGES FOR
SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT
• Virtual corporation and virtual leadership
systems
– The amorphous character of virtual organisations
– Performance evaluation on the basis of agility and
responsiveness
• Departure from traditional resource
management and simple report generation in
favour of seeking improvement in performance
by enhancing the actions of company personnel
SPECIFIC QUALIFICATIONS OF
SC MANAGER
• The ability to look from the specific perspective of supply
chain management
– profound understanding of integrated processes within a
business and between the partners
– decison-making skills
• Become members of operating teams and exhibit an
exceptional capability of adaptation (flexibility)
• Should apply work evaluation systems, recognise
qualifications and delegate responsibilities
• Ability of non-standard thinking
• Communication skills (ability to move effectively within
networks of virtual organisations)
• Working in a fully automated logistics
How distant is the actual pattern of
qualifications of logistics and supply chain
managers in Polish companies from the
ideal concept of competecnies
and what risks
are associated with that ?
Qualifications of supply chain managers
(Polish case study 1997 & 2004)
• Two main surveys:
– 1997 examined 473 respondents
– 2004 directed to 390 logistics professionals
• The major direct decision responsibilities of surveyed
employees: transport management, purchasing,
customer service and warehousing.
• Respondents from various sectors and branches;
employed mainly in manufacturing, distribution and
service companies
• Companies of all sizes: very large, through large and
medium-sized, down to small companies.
STRATEGIC APPROACH TO
SCM
“supply chain orientation”
“the recognition by a company of the systemic, strategic
implications of the activities and processes involved in
managing the various flows in a supply chain”
(Mentzer and others, 2001)
It depends on the attitude of managers:
recognition that if final customers are satisfied and
continue to buy the product (or sales increase), every
link of the supply chain reaps the benefits.
Younger managers
the age group of 21 – 38 years
1/3 of the sample in 1997
more than 1/2 of the sample in 2004
In car manufacturing, machine engineering, IT, electro-technical industry
and distribution sector the employees of age 21 – 33 clearly prevail
better educated workforce with modern qualifications
Growing supply chain „awarness”
CAREER PATH
Promotion path :
expert --> top expert --> section manager --> department
manager --> branch manager --> vice-CEO --> CEO.
correlation coefficient between age
group and level of career equal to
0.730445
new flat organisational structures
have not been adopted yet
Money, money, money …
Positive correlation
discovered between
university education
and the level of salary
Employees with genuine
logistics or transport
educational background
Employees with general
business/economics
education.
Level of education
The share of employees with university degree
45 % in 1997
significantly improved in
manufacturing (e.g. car
making, electro-technical and
metal industry)
•
• slightly deteriorated in
distribution sector
63% in 2004
Nature of education
1997
2004
The share of
employees with
professional logistics
education
6%
12%
• The share of university graduates with economic and
business profile was also higher
Technical and engineering education in SCM
does not dominate any more
CONSTANT LEARNING
share of respondents taking part in various educational and training programmes
21% in 1997
nearly 30% in 2004
• Most of those programmes focused on
logistics, transport, inventory management
and warehousing (nearly in 45% of reported
cases)
• Around 10% of participants of those
programmes picked up general management,
finance, negotiations or project management
• Interest in further studies: IT, professional
forecasting and inventory management,
managerial issues and other general
business areas.
Additional professional aspects
• Almost 57% of respondents
claimed they are familiar
with professional logistics
and supply chain literature
• Only 1/5 declared some
forms of engagement in the
activities of professional
logistics associations
QUALITY OF STAFF IN SMEs
SME’s manager should be quite universal in his decision-making
and it requires profound knowledge of logistics and supply chain
management.
• 62% of responding SMEs focused on importance of quality,
education and skills of their personnel
• The most successful and innovative small companies managed
in 56% by people with university diplomas and academic degrees
• Less successful SMEs: only 30% of top managers received
masters or bachelors degree
• Companies founded during last two years: only 19% of managers
had university diplomas
STRATEGIC APPROACH TO
SCM in SMEs
• 88% of respondents - the founders of their
companies - businesses “young” enough
• focus on:
– satisfaction of customer requirements (90%)
– quality of provided product and/or service (87%)
• only 17% mentioned the importance of efficient
management of materials and products flows
• aware of current market requirements but not of
advanced coordinated efforts through e.g. supply
chain management.
STRATEGIC APPROACH TO
SCM
Future trends that will influence SMB businesses
• increasing competition and the need to become more flexible
• only 24% predicted a tendency of growing efficiency of
business operations
• only 43% concentrated on importance of new technologies
• 51% - on growing level of certainty of operations.
CONSENSUS ?
• most of SMBs has 3 founders,
• almost 20% of firms has been founded by
almost 5 owners
CONCLUSIONS (1)
The level of logistics qualifications in the years 1997-2004
was far from what is really needed in modern SCM
The survey can serve as
a basis for further
improvement of
educational systems in
logistics and supply
chain management
CONCLUSIONS (2)
There is a need to shape the following competencies among all levels
of supply chain management personnel:
• line management ability, i.e. their ability to manage day to day
supply chain operations and meet goals established in terms of
quality, productivity and budgeting;
• problem solving ability, i.e. ability to anticipate and diagnose
problems as well as to develop and apply new ways of cost
savings, service improvement and increased return on investment;
• project management ability, i.e. the ability to structure and manage
projects designed to improve the supply chain process;
• people management ability, i.e. the ability to develop and motivate
their employees’ technical and management skills
Thank you for Attention