Supply Chain
Technology Podcast

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

Supply chain, scalability, resilience, standardization, local customization, technology, sustainability, supplier management, agility, visibility, data integration, collaboration, automation, digital twins, AI.

SPEAKERS

Maurice Graessner, Scott Mears

Scott Mears  00:00

Can you balance local customization with a standardized global supply chain model for scale?

Maurice Graessner  00:06

Yes.

Scott Mears  00:06

You need to restructure and rehire to shift the workforce mindset from resilience to scale?

Maurice Graessner  00:10

Not necessarily.

Scott Mears  00:10

Dealing with supply chain disruptions is sometimes more predictable than predicting the weather?

Maurice Graessner  00:18

Depends maybe where you are mate.

Scott Mears  00:21

No, no, I don’t think we’ve been handed down the knowledge of weather prediction in the UK. Welcome to the Supply Chain Tech Podcast with Roambee. Scott Mears here, Senior Marketing Manager at Roambee and your host. We thank you for joining us today. In this episode, we speak with Maurice Graessner. Maurice is the Global Lead of Group Supply Chain Management at Electrolux. In recent years, companies have had to prioritize resilience, but now we find ourselves moving into the era of scale, Electrolux shares how they are navigating this shift. We debate standardized global processes versus local customization, and learn about the technology driving scalability for Electrolux globally, all whilst being conscious of sustainability. Welcome Maurice to the episode. It’s great to have you come on today.

Maurice Graessner  01:23

Yeah, Scott, thanks for having me. I’m very much looking forward to this, and I’ve been able to watch a couple of those, and very happy to be able to contribute very interesting topics you’re addressing.

Scott Mears  01:34

Brilliant and I was, you know, we met actually last year at a supply chain innovation event. And I’m so glad that we’ve made this happen. And I was going back over, you know, your LinkedIn, and really reviewing, you know, whilst preparing for this episode, and I was really impressed by your tenure at Electrolux over coming up to 17 years, 10 year lecture looks and holding over seven titles Electrolux. So I’m very excited to hear about your rich experience today on a very current topic of how we’re moving from resilience to scaling and supply chain. So I feel like you really are a key person that can show us the light on the these answers. So I’m very interested in diving into this today with you.

Maurice Graessner  02:18

Scott, I see you’re very well informed, and yes, there’s richness. No one you do change positions, market level, European level, global level, and of course, gives you different perspectives. I think what does do as well is you interact with many stakeholders, with many partners and and what it does confirm to you is, whatever you want to get done, you can only do it in a team, and not only cross functional, but as well as your partners. And I think this is going to be one of the fundamentals when we go into resilience as well. So it’s it’s really about what the essence of a supply chain is as well is to get it done in a network. And the network consists not only of processes, it does consist as well people and partner. Doesn’t it?

Scott Mears  03:12

Absolutely, I can’t wait to dive into it and but just before we do, I always like to start the episode with a bit of a fun question. And I must say, I probably enjoy writing this question the most. So I just want to kick off is what is because, you know, again, 17 years at Electrolux, you know, over two decades in in supply chain, you must have had some bizarre and unexpected items that you’ve had to track. So I’d be really interested, what was one that you’ve will always remember, maybe bizarre item that you requested to track.

Maurice Graessner  03:47

Yeah, you sent me this question up front, and I was very happy to receive it. And I really had to dig into my memory, and I thought, what was it? Was there something like, I don’t know, in the warehouse, I had to count ones. And then every day and and then, I mean, there was a period which was quite stressful. We had a bit like if a reorganization, and, and every part of the organization was reorganized. And then, and suddenly, there was a question, hey, it was all the changes. Can you make sure that your people are coming in on time? And to COVID, it goes actually against my style, and I’m trying to create environments that everybody has this role and has responsibilities. Everybody’s teams are self autonomous and people are self responsibility. So that actually was a bit of a shock for me. So I did start it, and then I I talked to my my team and, and we got it the other way, because I think, hey, micromanagement maybe needs to done occasionally, very, very, very for short period. But it’s really empowering your teams. It’s really trusting your teams setting that environment and, and. Um, so yes, it was a bit bizarre. It went a bit, I think, against the principles of Electrolux as well. And was short period, so I went out of it. So yeah, maybe it wasn’t so funny, but it was maybe good reflection to really what work environments we really want to build for people so that they really move on their own and and you really empower them, and they get a lot done. No, so maybe we should not, then track each and every item on a micromanager base. Maybe that’s a bit the learning I got out of it.

Scott Mears  05:32

That’s an interesting one, and maybe not one we expected here, but I think a really interesting one here, because, you know, especially with the remote work these you know, we’re in a world where nearly every job is, you know, everyone’s working remotely. They’re just on the laptop. I myself work remotely, and I think you know that that want to track, that their employees are checking in, doing their roles, committing to their tasks, is becoming a stronger want and a stronger for demand. So I’m, I’m not surprised hearing something like this. This is interesting tier and and interesting how it went against your morals. It seems, it seems it felt a bit uncomfortable. So that’s it really interesting answer that.

Maurice Graessner  06:15

Yeah. And it’s, you know, it’s a bit of counterproduction. I mean, what are you we should be, we should be always empowering our people. Another means, hey, if there has any system to capture what, whatever we do, then the first person who should be able to see it and have that cockpit is the person itself, no and, and then calibrate how they’re doing, what? No, nothing. That’s that’s really the philosophy is, as much as empowering people means they should be actually seeing the same KPIs as I do. They know it’s it’s a Lean management principle. Know that we should be empowering that our people, and they should ask the question, Am I doing a good job, or do I need to improve? And there’s no manager behind them telling them this, they should be knowing that themselves, and this is, I think, a very powerful principle which then really motivates us. Other people, don’t they see themselves say, I can self direct this. I can make it happen myself. There’s nobody who tells me, Oh, do this? Do that, because that’s what we don’t really like, do we? And yeah, so that was a bit of a reflection ahead at that time.

Scott Mears  07:27

Very nice. And I want to sort of move, move direction. I feel a lot of what you’re saying is going to come back in some of these questions as well. So I look forward to hearing that. But I want to dive into first so the operational shift piece of this episode. So again, you know, the title of this is very much all around shifting from the resilience we had to build through the heavy disruption of the pandemic and now moving into, you know, how can we scale our supply chains globally? And I want to understand from you and your rich experiences when you as a company, you’re transitioning from resilience to scale in supply chain operations, what key strategies or practices need to be re evaluated or maybe even reimagined?

Maurice Graessner  08:15

Yeah. Yeah, that’s that’s really about, let’s say, to be sustainable in business, you need to scale, don’t you, and needs to be highly automated. And I think everything we are looking forward and digitization is going that direction now, I think we need to take a step back as well and say, Hey, how has the world changed? And COVID, actually, I think gave us a good example. And not only COVID, I think there’s, there’s as well the energy transition we are having worldwide right now, which is very resource intense. Now, building all the panels, and for the gathering the energy from the wind the wind wheels is highly raw material, intense and and I think what we can and then we have the technology, technology innovation, which is, yeah, it’s exponential, which is always very difficult for us to to understand exponentials, is really what we don’t understand. Now, if, if something is growing like double each day, then, you know, if you see a, I see this always in my head is, if there was a sea, and that’s how filled, and it’s, it’s any kind of planned, and you think, Oh, so it’s going to increase a bit more tomorrow, and then maybe it’s covered covered fully in a couple of weeks, but exponentially means it’s going to be covered tomorrow the entire and this is something really new for us, and we sometimes don’t understand it, but technology is going exponential and and what does it mean for us? That means actually, that we’re coming from a world. Which we had oversupply, and we won’t have it, or we don’t have it anymore. So we are, we are coming from an unconstrained environment in in many places, to a constrained environment, and it’s going to stay here, and that’s very difficult to accept, and that’s then very difficult to bring into practice, but that’s number one. So if you look at the semiconductors, there is constraints. Have been constraints in the high technology ones, but that’s where we have investments. But then you have all the automotive industry. You have the domestic appliance industry, you know, everything which is around households. And, for example, a lot as well in the energy trans transformation which is happening, all of that is not necessarily the highest inter processor which you need? It’s more older semiconductors, very importantly, very important ones, but not so much investment going in there, but, but, you know, look at, look at the electric cars. They need much more of those semiconductors. And what does it mean that actually we we are going to be running short of semiconductors again, and we will always probably have as well one and the other tendency, we do have a lot of geopolitical issues. What do you think it’s going to go away in the next five years? Well, maybe you can better hope on it, but it’s you’re probably not going to be very successful. So there’s geopolitical issues as well, and we have the environmental ones, don’t we? We see each time, more severe weather conditions impacting supply chains, like dry drying up the Mississippi, now, again and then, or Northern Europe last year. So that’s what we see. So what we can see is that we have impact. We have impact that we always will have one or the other constraint now that makes it a different supply chain requirement, which we had probably five years ago in the past. So we need to design our supply chains and manage them in mind that we will have constraints. And how can we best avoid them? How can we best in a certain situation, survive and then recover. So that’s, that’s, that’s the question. And now that there are different different designs and strategies not to embed this into your supply chain. So what we can say is, hey, the supply chain of yesterday is not going to serve us anymore. To be competitive and to be customer centric, to serve us, at least on those two aspects. Yeah, does that make sense to you, Scott?

Scott Mears  13:10

Yeah, I appreciate and I you know, you gave me a lot of background knowledge as well. It seems you know from your answer, you’re going in the direction of more. It’s less reimagining about specific processes and more always being of the mindset. We are never going to have a perfect situation. There’s always going to be a disruption, whether a sustainable disruption, a weather disruption, you know, a geopolitical disruption, the many others that is going to affect our procedures and our practices. Therefore you need to have the mindset and the flexibility to to be flexible in all of these. I feel that’s more what you were saying, rather than specific practices or strategies that have to be changed.

Maurice Graessner  13:55

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I mean, face it. I mean, just think about last week, or last two weeks, what you’ve seen on on television? Have you seen natural risk? I mean, like climate changes, natural disasters, natural resource shortages, epidemics this time? Yeah, you probably have heard about this. Have you heard about financial risk, where there may be some suppliers are having a problem, liquidity risk, where investment funds are putting their money, etc. Supply chain risk, of course, are the other normal ones, but maybe some supplier disruptions we had. We have all the cyber risk, don’t we, we have information distortions. Then we have all the laws. No, they, I mean the European law coming in on with their requirements and tracing, tracking the origins of the products which we procure, cultural risks. So, you know, I think, if you just think back the last two weeks, I mean, there were many of those which I just named, so it’s, it’s and all of that. Going to bring at risk our supply, don’t they? All of them do this. So yes, resilience, and that’s on some of the conferences I’ve been, is going to be a competitive advantage to if you get it right.

Scott Mears  15:19

And it you know, the list is endless. As you just say, you just named up so many challenges that you’re facing on a daily and we just don’t know what’s going to be around the corner, but maybe if we can just pull out maybe a specific, any specific, maybe operational processes or structures that you feel maybe need to be undone or modified enable to facilitate a shift from resilience to scalability. So that’s what I really want to dive into. If a company is looking to scale globally, is there anything they need to shift on, like specific operational processes or structures? When they were a minute ago, they were just focusing on, we need to just survive. And now it’s now we are, so let’s scale this.

Maurice Graessner  16:03

Yeah, it’s fair, yeah. So what is resilience, at least? How we, The definition we took out of the many definitions. It’s actually a combination of agility, and that’s very important to recognize, because agility is really something which should be able to make you more competitive, and it’s about risk management, which can make it more competitive, can cost money as well. And there’s a bit more of a balance sometimes to take, isn’t it, but it’s really consisting of both. And some say it’s like the same, you know, it’s, it’s the same coin, but different, different sides, maybe. So that’s what you need to address. And I think this is what you need to bring in. So that means, how am I be flexible? How can I aggregate demands? How can I structure products more modular, so that I can have more combinations? How can I postpone or to be to be more flexible towards the the markets. These are all classic agility strategies, which which are coming now more to the forefront, I would say, so to keep for example, stocks, eventually, I had a conversation with one of major telecommunication manufacturers, and they were very lean, extremely lean. And what they’ve done is they have now taken some stock and put them, you know, at least the runners like like, which makes 70% of their sales closer to the market. And they’re extremely rapid. They now in serving to their customers more than they were before, which gives them an advantage and and they were actually gaining, gaining market share. On the other side, it does make it as well that they had a little buffer, which, in case they have any interruption, disruption or interruption, they can sustain no because the philosophy you have in resilience or risk management is, how can I survive? How long can I survive? What is, what is the impact if I don’t and how quickly can I recover? Now, if you have then certain buffers, very classic one, but you need to strategically look where you have those points, where it really makes sense to have them. Of course, it gives you, then the first possibility to survive, and then secondly, is okay. So how do I react now to it? How do I recover my my situation? So I think agility is a big one, and it gives you done rightly, it can give you a market advantage if done rightly. So I think this is very beautiful, because it comes through and it’s actually customer facing. It’s actually customer centric, so that that is quite beautiful here. Now, if you look at it, that’s agility, and we can maybe go another question, a bit more into it, the other one, which, which comes to more importance, if you have unconstrained supply and you just supply and supply and supply, you sometimes could ask, Why should I have such a good visibility the stuff is going to be in my warehouse, Like almost anyway and and only if it’s maybe technology, tech, highly innovative material, technology, material, then obsolete is a problem. You should have better stock control, pipeline control and visibility. But otherwise it’s probably just going on and I can, I can do it without excellent visibility. Now, if you have an international and global supply chain, and you do have disruptions which are severe, or you have even inter interruptions like smaller, smaller issues, then this becomes of importance. No, you need to be able to know. Hey. Is my material? How much did my supplier confirm? My supplier is an area where we have weather problems. Is he confirming his supplies? Is he not? How do I engage proactively with him? And really gaining visibility is more important now, because I really need to know what’s going on, to be in the position to quickly, then react eventually change to it. So I think this visibility and data as well, the data that data is integrated that the data that you don’t have different data models now. So, for example, there are some companies which have implemented SAP, and then they’ve implemented differently in so you say, Okay, great. One, one system, and then you tweak it a bit in North America, and you tweak it a bit, maybe Mia, and you have a different bit of a different data model, and you call things differently, then, then you have a problem. So you need to bring this together. So this, this visibility and data, is now really coming to the forefront, independently of artificial intelligence, with your center, that’s, that’s probably another level above, but that’s that’s now coming to importance, which maybe in the past, it wasn’t and, and I would say the last part is then collaboration, because if, if we have the Red Sea, and it suddenly closes, and then you need to get good partners, no which eventually can put something additionally on on the next ship, where you have a good partner with your carriers or freight forwarders who have, I mean, they’re amazing. Know, the logistics industry is amazing, how quickly they can react and and how they always can find ways to bring your goods to where that needs to go. So if you have partners now, then that’s very important. If you have partners with with your suppliers. Maybe they having problems one of their tier, two suppliers. So how can you support them? Can you flag this early? How can we substitute it? Can we bigger companies not? Can we then, with our quality qualification, support you. So this all comes together, and I think so it’s about agility, it’s about visibility, data, and it’s about collaboration. Those are the three pillars. And there’s one pillar which is always there, which is people, that one’s always there. And and if, and then you ask, okay, what processes, I think, what, what comes, what comes to importance now is that the process, which we have always known, we need to have them seamless. So, for example, it needs to flow. It really needs to flow. And that that’s that’s now different in the past, it could more or less flow, and it was, was good enough, because there was a lot of push in there. Now there’s more pull sometimes in there, because I have a shortage. And then if you pull, then all the streams really need to get together. No, because if there’s a gap in the if you pull, then, then you’re not going to get it. If it was a push, it was getting there anyway, somehow. So that’s changing. And I think, for example, you need to have a good snlp process. You need to be able to gather and have a tactical visibility. Hey, what capacities do I have, by the way, and I’m quite surprised, because some some companies don’t have that snlp process. How much capacity do my most critical suppliers have? That’s that’s an important part, because I might have the capacities, but if my suppliers don’t, how much more capacities do they have? When do they run out of capacity? When do I need to to think about making strategic collaborations with them, no, and their investments in their capacity. So, so I think this is one of the basics, but very most, one of the most important processes, probably we have as an SNMP process. But then, of course, you that’s, that’s 1824, 36 months, no. But then it needs to be, it needs to be connected fully with the snoe process, which I see some companies don’t have that either. So because you need to say decisions I’m taking now, I really need to translate in them short term. And I have, again, I need to have cross functional alignment. I need to be on track. I need to see how I shape demand, how I maybe be able to, in an agile way, respond to a certain fluctuations demand, supply, and how do I bring in my partners and and so I think the the maturity of processes and to be seamless and to. Do this in a network is now becoming top of the agenda, which maybe in the past, hasn’t been, we talked more about it, but because it was so much push, okay, good, more or less. And now it’s becoming really one of the the wheels that that your vehicle really goes forward. So, so that’s what I could that’s what we could see.

Scott Mears  25:26

Yeah, I really appreciate the thoroughness and really taking us through every stage there. I want to dive into the people for a moment. And you mentioned about alignment and it being such a key piece. So you know, when it comes to companies affect, how do companies effectively balance the need for local customization with a standardized global supply chain model for scale?

Maurice Graessner  25:57

Yeah, you’re right. Yeah, in essence, it’s, it’s, it’s very fair question, as you can see now I have to, I have to think a bit of how I’m going to answer because, because maybe as well what we’ve been doing in the last years, we said, oh, customers always number one, employee, you know, employee and customer. Let’s put them both, both together. It’s not the question of discussing that one customers have so different needs and so on and and eventually, what, from my perspective, we have over emphasized is that the customer so different, and so the market has so many different requirements. And maybe this gives a bit of a discussion. What I’m saying here is my experience is not that the customer so different. My experience is not that the market is so different. And if you look at from a supply chain, I’m more and more coming to the conclusion that eventually 90% we do the same stuff. And the 10% is very important now, but the 10% is not a 90% so the 90% you do you we should be able to standardize quite a lot. And why is that standardization important? Because we have so much innovation. I talked about exponential capabilities now with AI, which we’re going to come, which are coming to come in, and the importance now of data, which in the past wasn’t that much. Now, imagine you’re not standardized. So try to, try to now to bring in the data model for Mexico, which is different than the one for Canada. Try to bring in the the Indonesian which was different because somebody said, Oh, the market is so different. But on the underlying machine, it’s, it’s probably very maybe to car. No, it’s still a car. Then the traffic is different, and you need to take care of this. And maybe the language is different. But this is all quite superficial. You need to, it’s very important to get it done. And as well, there’s no question that the most different parts is no question, customs, yes, you need, you need to cater for that. You need to cater for a different logistics, local market. Yes, you know the DHL you find in in the UK is not the DHL which is going to serve you in Argentina, so yes, and the and the provider maturity, or the landscape, the maturity is, for sure, different, and you need to, you need to adapt to that. And the customs, you need to adapt to that. And you have some fiscal questions in each market, and you need to adapt for it. Okay, good. And this is the 10% but the rest, Scott, and maybe I’m happy to have any discussion with anybody who’s listening to this. The rest, there’s big potential to standardize it. And what’s the beauty of standardizing this? We talked about collaboration and people don’t you think it’s very good to bring together people working in the US with the one which work in Singapore, if they use the same processes, if they use the same systems, if they use the same naming conventions, if they use the same KPIs, and suddenly you’re really elevating the teams, and they get together and and that’s, that’s very beautiful to see it, and that’s really what we’re trying in Electrolux.

Scott Mears  29:54

That’s, I’m sure, for some that I’ll be reassuring to hear, and for others, they may. Uh, you know, question it, you know, the it’s interesting, you say 90% is the same. 10% is that, you know, that piece where you do have to customize, and I think, you know, it’s, you’re right, you know, it’s still a car, you know, especially from the outside point of view for the customer, it’s still a car that I’m buying. But the the 10% is it can be a little bit different, and it’s just interesting to hear you say this. And I hope that people are listening to it and being reassured, and even the ones that may be questioning it are maybe thinking, you know, there is value in standardizing and not getting too lost in the detail of that 10% which I feel a lot of people do, and therefore making it much more than 90, 10% make being at 40% and you know, this is now not scalable to Indonesia, because there’s just too much complexities to scale this. This is not scalable for Singapore because there’s too much complexities. And I think that’s interesting, I’d say.

Maurice Graessner  30:58

Yeah, maybe just one word more. That means not everything fits to everybody. But we need to see as well that if you have international or global supply chain, you do have different channels. You know you have, like a direct to consumer channel. You have a retail channel. You have a special retail channel, which is a niche one. You do have, maybe distributor, you have service operations, which, which is a channel as well, for example, and and then you segment the channel at the core, honest, you have that in the majority of markets. And it’s, you know, and this is what you need to be able that capability you need to have and and that is then applied to different extent in different markets. And that’s fine, but it’s still the standard because, because you do have a you had, do have a retail channel in North America, and you have it in Australia, and you have it in Singapore, and you do have a construction one in China and in North America and Argentina. So you need to be able and that has specific characteristics, and they’re very similar. But of course, then the lead time might be different. When you confirm an order might be different, but all of that is configurable, but the standard is can can be established, then globally, if you understand what I’m saying. So within your supply chain, of course you have to have segmentations. You need to be able to respond to different channel requirements. Of course you have to do all of that. But that not does not mean that everybody has to figure it out by themselves. And somehow does. It’s slightly different. And I think this is was a bit bit of a tendency in the past, and many companies, then we should, should as well, see that not every, everybody has grown organically, no. So as well, there was some, some, some merging of companies and that, that is probably the difficult part. No. So we have a lot of legacy. Everybody we have, not everything is grown organically. And the question so, how do I do this harmonization? And that’s that’s in and if you want to get to scale with digitization, with resilience, no, just to name a few, mentioning a global supply chain. Then, then that is probably one of the big challenges. So how do you do that? Yeah, you just put everything on data lake. Make sure that with attributes. Everything is matched firmly, that’s right, but there are always needs as well. So, so, for example, what we do is we have quite a need based approach, and if we have a need, then we utilize that event for harmonization, for example. So that’s, that’s how we do it. Harmonizing everything just for the purpose of harmonization, is probably very expensive and maybe not, not recommended. So so you need to find your ways of doing that, but it’s difficult on bigger companies to get to a harmonized process system and data model state, but then that’s quite important to be able to scale.

Scott Mears  34:25

And you mentioned earlier, at the core of this for to to achieve this shift of scale. And you said it’s really comes with the people. And you said at the start, also to the first question about, you know, wanting to empower people to come to you and say, How can I do better? How can I evolve, you know, having that right mindset for their own, for the company, how at Electrolux, what are you doing to shift the workforce mindset globally, from that resilience to scale mind? Set in, not just the company, but in their role as individuals.

Maurice Graessner  35:05

Yeah, that lies with our foundation, where we have value people a lot, and that is reflected as well in the our electrics manufacturing system, so our excellent system, really, and management system as well. So it’s lean principles, lean methodology, which we have, which which value people and partner as well. So I think this comes natural to us and and has been implemented decades now ago as well. I think this is our Electrolux mindset and shape living for the better. So this all is, I would say, one of the characteristics of Electrolux. Now, how do we do this in practice, and as well is, there is some power man is, for sure. What we have on the agenda, how we can as well create self, autonomous teams. That’s what we try to give quite a lot of autonomy. We as well, try to, yeah, to motivate people to take risks. That’s, that’s for sure, some some teams, as well as the budget, which is not needed to justify, so that they can try out some stuff to certain degree. That’s, that’s important, I think. And and then we be quite clear as well. Hey, this is so we always divide, actually, our agenda on perform. These are the key performance targets which we have. That’s where we need to perform. So that’s every day. Everybody is standing on it. We have frequent feedback. Then you have your storyboards where it’s displayed, normally on a weekly base, sometimes on a daily depends. And everybody checks, there, are we on track? Are we not on track? What can we do? You’ve continuous improvement initiatives going from there, kicked off by the teams was an a three, so very, very lean, not from that perspective as well, in sales, by the way, you know. So that’s, that’s as well. What we have, not only in supply chain, and then we’ve, we have transform, and how do we do that? I think this is a bit your question that goes more into we have strategic planning. Then, of course, we have our annual planning, which we do, business plan deployment, which is Hoshi and can read. So it’s business plan, deployment methodology. And for example, if I then take my part so we determine, hey, that’s what we want to achieve strategically. Once a year we make our annual plan. This is a line then cross functionally. That’s very important. And those are the few things which we want to get done in a project or transformation, all right, and then the next step, okay, good. So how I do bring this now to the different teams, and I can give you the now an example on I’m responsible for the global transformation. This is then made visible, and we then subdivide this by the work streams which are involved, and we use Objective key results. So it’s it’s quarterly process, the annual one, we break down the quarterly and why is that so good? Because within a quarter, you should be achieving a certain partner, you should be starting and closing. This is really what we try. Because I don’t know if you have had it. I think it’s some something maybe. Yeah, is it epidemic that you start a lot of stuff but you don’t close them? Yeah? And and, let’s say what, what that has driven us towards? We looked at different ways of doing it. And, okay, that’s my experience over the last I would say eight to 10 years is actually quite good, because it does tell you, hey, in that quarter, what needs to be started, what needs to be finalized, and how that does the finalization look like? And and we close it off, and we either achieve it or not, but, but, but 90% is actually not good enough. You should be trying to get it really closed now. The other thing is to do it in a quarter. Scott is you give a lot of freedom to the to the to the team working on it, and then you don’t do micromanagement. And each week follow up on a waterfall list of actions, which is highly maintenance and. Expensive, sometimes a bit annoying, because you really need to go and go on actions. And what we do is this shift in Okar where you say, Hey, what is the key result? The few ones, know the three ones and three objectives, so maybe nine, which we really want to get done and nail in this quarter. What are those? And by the way, you know, all the actions which you need to take, and you you do this confidence level, for example, every two weeks. That’s what we have. So every two weeks they say, Hey, how confident I am to achieve that key result on 100% by, you know, normally, the end of the of the quarter. And that’s quite nice, because that confidence level you can do in, well, maybe not in seconds, but in one minute. You know, hey, because I work on this every day, don’t I? So how confident I am are this? And if, if I have some struggles, if the confidence level is below, I can list, hey, this are my roadblocks I foresee right now, and that’s why I need to support or not. And this is quite nice, because the drive is really with the people doing the job. And they report the confidence level, and then for the work stream leader, anybody supporting them, they say, Hey, this going down a bit. Is there anything I can support you with? And and I think it’s quite nice, because it’s low administration, so low it’s, it’s not very intensive in making big charts, etc, etc, you have a conversation every two weeks, or every week depends a bit on the one to ones, and you have exchange and how things are going. You’re checking in with the person, very important, I think, and, and you have a qualified conversation on his confidence level. And if it’s higher than, hey, it’s it’s done, we can talk about many other things, if needed. And, and that’s how we bring it across. And that’s actually working quite quite nicely in the transformation program, which we are running and which I’m running now, for the last two and a half years,

Scott Mears  42:06

I feel people need to really listen to that answer, especially towards the end of it, because I’ve seen OKR programs be implemented in varying ways in companies. And one of the key, you know, downfalls I find of it in a lot of companies, is where they they forcefully ex want reporting on all the individual items like you were saying what you don’t do on a weekly basis, and to a level of detail that is just not necessary to maybe the person, even you know, receiving the information. And it can be, it can become very taxing. It is time consuming. And like you said, it’s very I guess it leans to that micromanagement, whereas you, instead of doing that, you change it to a confidence level every two weeks, which I have not seen that before. So I like that. I think that also is a clear picture of where you stand on the OKRs for the quarter. And it seems that you give them a lot of freedom to, you know, a lot of trust in their capabilities to move forward and Excel. So I think that’s refreshing way that you’re applying the OKR program. And I’m sure a lot of people companies listening to this now minor, I can bet, is not applying it in that way. So I, I do challenge people to listen out to just that minor change can make a big difference in the mindset of the workforce and and the output of them as well.

Maurice Graessner  43:36

Yeah, that’s good. That’s that’s good that you have this initial impression. And for us, it’s always important to be very pragmatic and practical as well, not overload people with follow up tools, as sometimes been done, which that’s number one, and then, and then you need to good, have a leadership culture as well. Now, which is, which is trust based, collaboration based, but hey, it’s as well. Demanding base, no, so don’t get me wrong. Probably, when do we grow the most with what customers? Probably the ones which were very demanding but supportive and and I think this is as well the question. So that’s what we are as well. So when we have our one to ones, yes, of course, the demand is there? This is a key result, which we agreed. And of course, you ask one of the other challenging questions to see, hey, did you really think about everything? Was it maybe something I’ve, I’ve seen, and you have a conversation as well. Hey, he can as well ask you. And why did you ask that? So that’s an interesting conversation as well. So that’s, that’s, I think it’s important as well. It’s, it’s a situational leadership culture, which we have, it’s in a trustful conversation which we have. But this check in this one to one is important, and sometimes it’s important as well to drill down a bit. So that’s just for I think. Yeah. A bit, a bit of a positive tension, which you need to create. And in a good working relationship, you have no and then it’s always what is our aim? Our aim is to grow our people, so no question that they are successful then in delivering the key results. No, because then everybody’s happy,

Scott Mears  45:18

Absolutely. And that leans straight into what we’re doing. We’re trying to answer on this episode is, how are we scaling how are we growing the company? And it all starts with growing the people first. And want to dive in away from the people now into a bit of a risk management question, because, of course, you know, we’ve scaling our supply chain, risk is going to increase. So I just want to understand for you, maybe one technique or process that you find is really crucial when scaling a supply chain across different regions.

Maurice Graessner  45:53

Yeah, the I mean, probably one of the most critical ones is your supplier base. So I’m just imagining that we have either we either retailer or we are manufacturer, and, and then we have a couple of we have few factories, I know, each one in each market and, and there we are on side. We have a good grip on it. So that’s probably quite under control. Now, with that, then what is your most critical links is probably towards your suppliers, eventually towards your customers as well enough. But I would say the most complex part is because you’ve, you’ve much more going in and and then, and then streamline towards your, your your customer base. So I would, I would think it is your supplier management, your supplier relationship management, how you have an effective relationship management across your supplier base, your inbound supply chain, the clarity on purchase order or call offs, what you have so that this flow and the forecasting, what you share with them, that that provides clarity and as well. That needs to be transparent in a way that, oh no, I’m going to give them this number because it’s above what I really want to produce. All of that is only going to make complexity, which doesn’t serve anybody. So there’s one number that’s really what we want to do. We need to decide if we do it on a monthly base, now on the future, on a weekly, weekly spot, too short, too many fluctuations in there. So let’s do it on monthly, certain stability. Have good relationships, and work on those relationships as well as we do with our people, we do with our key suppliers. That’s the same philosophy. Those are our partners, and the partners again, now demanding but supportive. Basically the same principle. It’s only of advantage if you have somebody who’s demanding because he knows what he wants and what’s best in class in the market, that’s that’s the best partner you can have no demanding in this side and be supportive that you get there no and this is our philosophy, which we have and and then the digitization of it’s a seamless flow of it, purchase order and the confirmation and the advanced shipping, the confirmation of at the end of the advanced shipping notification, the capability to to expedite, or maybe to slow down your your pipeline. So this, this, this is, I think, I would think, with the consolation I have in my head, the most critical part and where there needs to be good investment. As well, portfolio on components, no, your face in products, faced in and faced out. So how do you make sure that you don’t have too much complexity with old components? Maybe a new one can then be a substitute. Could be a spares for for an old one and that is quite important as well across all product categories, for example. So it needs to be a holistic way from R and D to do that design. If one mic shift works, in our case, for example, for washing machine, it should work as well if it’s a similar, if it’s similar requirement for an oven. And not everybody should be doing it, also because the otherwise complexity size, so that that’s important, that we have these really holistic view on, on on ind, on quality, which is able to qualify suppliers very quickly, on, on procurement, and then supply chain. We all need to be very, very aligned then towards our manufacturing. Yeah, does that make sense, Scott.

Scott Mears  50:07

It does. Yes, it sure does. Thank you, yes, and I appreciate again, you diving through so many examples. You know, I really enjoy when the guest really brings out examples, you know, really allows us to evidence and relate to this in our real jobs within supply chain. So I really appreciate that, and I want to shift it to technology. I want to understand in your eyes, you know, in what ways do you see technology playing a role in enhancing scalability in global supply chains beyond the usual, usual solutions. I know you’ve already mentioned some and how the you know the importance of standardizing this to make the ease of scalability, but maybe we’re looking at technology beyond the usual solutions. Maybe there’s something you’re looking at, maybe you haven’t adopted right now, that you feel could really enhance scalability in global supply chain.

Maurice Graessner  51:06

Yeah. Yeah, we, I mean, we all have legacy and, you know, there’s still manual tasks being carried out now of low value, and that’s for sure, what we all want to get rid of automation is probably the the work there, because, you know, for one of the key factors, as I said it previously, is a network, is people and partner, and that requires as well, that you be able to have the right time on that subject, and make the right investments of your of your time. And that means as well that you should not rush, rush, rush, rush, rush. You should as well sometimes steps, take a step back and think, hey, what matters? What doesn’t matter? Where do I really need to focus on and and the best way to be able to do that is to take away non value adding. So that’s that’s our perspective. And so there are some legacy which we need to get automated, let’s say, rid of digital, digitize it. And then there’s a new opportunity with artificial intelligence is probably in the areas of automating scenarios and response scenarios, options which then can be can be chosen or proposed, we think, as well the way of how to interact. It was questioning and not typing or not doing one dashboard, but say, Hey, can you show me the key the 10 most important KPIs of that suppliers that will come up? I don’t need to go to maybe three dashboards or something like that. So that that we think is going to facilitate decision taking and collaboration, by the way, as well. And so that’s chat, GPT, but it’s more to identify eventually correlations which from data, the amount of data we have is not possible for an analyst. But as well, that was artificial artificial intelligence. You see the connections you didn’t see before. Digital twin is, for sure, something which we have on the agenda, and this in this environment as well. So I would say automation, getting away non value, adding digital twins scenarios and with chat GPT probably facilitating in a more agile way, the availability of qualified and maybe prescriptive information.

Scott Mears  53:43

Yeah, it’s really interesting. It’s a theme that I’m starting to see from my past few conversations is, you know, creating that ease and just less friction for our customers and our employees through the simplicity of a chatgpt. You, you brought up, you know, how you can just get your answers to those questions immediately. Maybe, if it’s even product questions, it’s general FAQs questions about, you know, inner workings of the business, that you can just get that instantly. And then the automation piece, you know, to again, just increase that ease and just allow everyone to focus their time on, really, what they need to be doing in the role. I just find that very interesting that I feel a lot of people in their roles a lot of the time, are spending a lot of their time on the admin piece. I think a stat came out for sales that recently, a normal salesperson will actually only put 20% into actually selling, and it’s 80% into the emails the admin, into, you know, uploading all the data to Salesforce. And it’s just like, that’s crazy, that that’s what they’re there to do. You know, they’re exceptional at sales, and you know, most of the time isn’t on that. So I think, you know, I’m seeing this theme also with what you’re seeing here today. So that’s that’s really key to hear. Yeah.

Maurice Graessner  55:04

I think that fits in quite well what you just said, exactly.

Scott Mears  55:08

Yeah. And I want to move on to our last bit of a segment. I love to do a bit of a thumbs up, a thumbs down. And all I need you to do is I’m going to say some statements to you, which are yes or no questions, and you just give me a big thumbs up or a big thumbs down, and if you could say thumbs up or thumbs down, for the audio listeners to also know what you said to the question. Are you, are you ready?

Maurice Graessner  55:34

Let’s go.

Scott Mears  55:36

Oh, wonderful. Can you balance local customization with a standardized global supply chain model for scale?

Maurice Graessner  55:46

Yes

Scott Mears  55:48

You need to restructure and rehire to shift the workforce mindset from resilience to scale?

Maurice Graessner  55:56

You restructure rehire?

Scott Mears  55:58

Yeah, you need to restructure and rehire to shift the workforce mindset from resilience to scale. Do you feel that you need to restructure and rehire?

Maurice Graessner  56:10

Not necessarily.

Scott Mears  56:12

No. Yeah. Some of these are curveballs, some of them are clear, but it’s always interesting see what the guest says. Cultural Awareness is integral to scaling your global supply chain.

Maurice Graessner  56:27

Big thumbs up there.

Scott Mears  56:30

Sustainability goals hinder global supply chain scalability?

Maurice Graessner  56:35

Hinders?

Scott Mears  56:37

Hinders. Would you say that’s a yes or no?

Maurice Graessner  56:44

Can you elaborate a bit more on that question?

Scott Mears  56:47

So this is just the scenario again, it’s saying. So this particular statement, it again, is just there to be yes or no. Is, does sustainability goals hinder global supply chain scalability in your in your experience, do you find it hinders it?

Maurice Graessner  57:06

No, I mean, there’s a bit of a beauty as well. No, no, no. I mean, then, like, there’s no, it doesn’t hinder.

Scott Mears  57:13

Yeah no. Big thumbs down.

Maurice Graessner  57:15

Yeah, yeah. No, no. I mean, the first of all, it’s our duty, you know, as a good. This is one of the person which we live here on this planet. That’s our mission here as well. We need to take care of the environment. But then, as well, the there’s, there’s a bit of a correlation as well about energy, you know, and we know that as well, energy is constrained, it’s can be harmful. So the better you are on the resources, which is energy, but which is also raw materials, that’s going to be beneficial for the planet. On the other side, it’s beneficial for the business. Now, the less resources you need. So of course, it’s not a one to one relationship, and it’s not as easy as this sounds, but it’s actually quite a beautiful connection there.

Scott Mears  58:20

I appreciate you adding a bit more information to the question. I couldn’t agree more. You know, sustainability goals is is integral to us as a human race, to factor these in and really take these seriously. So I couldn’t agree more. Number five, emerging technologies are underutilized in enhancing the scalability of global supply chains?

Maurice Graessner  58:41

At this stage, under utilized? Yes, under utilized.

Scott Mears  58:45

Big, thumbs up. And finally, dealing with supply chain disruptions is sometimes more predictable than predicting the weather.

Maurice Graessner  58:56

Oh, my depends maybe where you are mate. No, no, I wouldn’t say, um, our experience with the weather, at least it depends on what horizon you’re talking about. My horizon, yes, yeah, my horizon’s a week. And I think that hasn’t proved a hell of a lot. I don’t know over there, but at least where I’m living.

Scott Mears  59:15

Oh, well, maybe I should have put the UK in there, because it’ll one day, it says it’ll be sunny tomorrow, and I can guarantee you it’ll rain at some point.

Maurice Graessner  59:23

Seriously, yeah, with this reference point, because it’s, it’s not like I’m located here in Madrid, I must say, I’m amazed how well they get the weather done since the last maybe two years previously, it was a bit more, maybe like, but I think it has improved so much so, yeah, it’s maybe even it’s a bit relative from your personal experience.

Scott Mears  59:46

Yeah, I don’t think we’ve been handed down the knowledge of weather prediction in the UK. We get it wrong all the time.

Maurice Graessner  59:59

Yeah.

Scott Mears  1:00:02

But I want to thank you so much Maurice for coming on to the podcast. Please let everyone know on the podcast, you know, where can everyone find you?

Maurice Graessner  1:00:12

Yeah, just reach out to me on LinkedIn, and you can just connect there with me. And I’m very happy as well. If any any question of what I’ve said, any discussion you would like to have? Very happy to have that. It’s always very enriching to have a conversation on the on the topic, especially as well when you have a different view. Very happy to do that. Just reach out to me and LinkedIn.

Scott Mears  1:00:34

Thank you, Maurice. So we’ll just give the camera a little wave and say goodbye. Thank you very much everybody.

Maurice Graessner  1:00:39

Thanks, Scott.

Scott Mears  1:00:41

Hi, my name is Scott Mears, and I’m one of the hosts of the Supply Chain Tech Podcast with Roambee. On this podcast we talk to supply chain heroes from around the world about everything, ranging from the disruptions related to supply chains, their personal experiences with tracking technologies, strategies to build resilience, and much, much more. We already have some recommended videos for you to the side of me, and if any of this sounds interesting to you, do subscribe to our Youtube channel and hit the bell icon so you don’t miss another Roambee video. I’ll see you next time.