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Successful Practices in Supply Chain Management

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The most effective practices in supply chain management are founded on the concept that organizations in the supply chain will benefit from being integrated into the process. The exchange of information that occurs between the many tiers in the supply chain can be daunting to manage and communicate. Information technology has become a vital factor in effectively managing the logistics of supply chains. One of the latest techniques being examined is cloud computing and how that technology can support supply chain integration. In cloud technology, a pool of software and hardware resources, usually managed by a third party vendor are arranged to facilitate the users to get information technology services over the internet. The hardware, software and applications are deployed over a remote server to be accessed over the internet to provide the requisite services to the users. Keeping in view the fact, the organizations utilize the cloud technology on-demand (ie as and when required) to strengthen their internal business operations without putting efforts to manage the information technology services. Adapting cloud technology in order to facilitate supply chain integration is consistent with goals such as managing organization data and applications among internal operations and external business environments. An organization's internal operations need to co-occur with external source integration, information assimilation, and communication processes in order for the supply chain to be managed correctly. Speed with which technology changes, and the necessity of constantly updated applications has motivated many organizations, large and small, global and domestic, to choose cloud computing systems. Objectives In order to complete a project successfully, first it is significant to identify the project success criteria. In this regard, the project objectives are required to identify that ultimately becomes the project success criteria. One of the main objectives of this proposal is to provide an evaluation report for the implementation of the cloud technology in an organization. However, the proposal identifies the organizational objectives of implementing the cloud technology in the department of supply chain management. The organizations implement the cloud technology to access to the supply chain data from all around the world, strengthen the internal processes of the supply chain management, and reduce the capital and operational expenditure of the organization (Chebrolu and Ness, 2012). Because cloud computing is a service, therefore, the organizations only pay for the resources and services they use. This allows them to operate with much less overhead in the technology department and a decreased investment in hardware. Smaller organizations that are the members of global supply chains can enter into relationships without the facing the challenge of assembling an internet technology staff or the often prohibitive costs involved in hardware and software acquisition. A cloud-using supply chain partner achieves a quick and cost-effective method of exchanging information and data. Organizational Governance and Structure The organizational governance emphasizes the three (3) vital components of an organization include, the people, structure and information. In order to implement the cloud technology in the supply chain management / department of the organization requires developing a specialized project structure and hierarchy to manage the implementation particularly. Keeping in view the scenario of the implementation of the cloud technology, it is proposed that the organization develops a three (3) layer structure include, a project team reports to the project manager and the project board directs the project manager to manage the cloud computing implementation. In the structure or hierarchy of the project board, project manager and project team, the project board involves the people of the higher management. In the tier or layer that is the middle management, the project management human resources are included. Operation and Services Pearlson and Saunders (2012) explain how the service-oriented architecture (SOA) model assists the existing IT departments in meeting the on-going and increasing demands of businesses and their supply chains. There are substantial advantages to using SOA models including immediate cost savings, a decrease in time-to-market waits, and the consistency of applications. Redundancy in personnel, hardware, and software is eliminated when an organization moves to an SOA system such as cloud computing. IBM and others push the cloud as a way to implement SOA quickly and easily. Pearlson and Saunders (2012) assert that the explosion of partnerships among supply chains increases the need for supply chain managers to be information technology literate and to participate actively in the decision-making process involved in collaboration schemes. Collaboration between tiers and

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