Integrating People and Technology for Supply-Chain Advantage

For a while, from the mid-1980s through the late 1990s, some argued that IT could provide a sustainable, competitive advantage. Currently, we see that this is rarely possible. Whenever firm A adopts an IT innovation that gives it a competitive advantage, other firms quickly copy it, as the knowledge moves rapidly around the industry (the exception is an innovation that has patent or other intellectual property protection).

As a result, IT alone is almost never a source of a sustainable competitive advantage. Rather, it is through the use of IT in support of business strategies focussed on people, that an organization can gain a significant, and potentially sustainable, competitive advantage.

We find it useful to articulate the directions of a business strategy in terms of a number of specific "strategic thrusts." A thrust is a collection of coherent and coordinated actions. There is a single, overriding thrust, "Thrust 0," which serves as an overarching theme of business strategy; and five supportive thrusts ­ Thrusts 1 through 5 ­ each of which reinforces and amplifies Thrust 0. (See Table 1: Strategic Thrusts)

Thrust 0:
Enhance the Ways in Which People Work
To be effective, strategic management must bring about changes in the ways in which people, in the organization and associated enterprises, work: the target of the strategy is Peoples' Ways of Working, or WoW. This is a fundamental premise of our approach to strategy, and is especially relevant to Supply Chain Management. Since technology is relatively easy to copy, it is through peoples' ways of working, enhanced through appropriate technology support, that a firm can hope to gain advantage. Technology alone will rarely achieve this.

Thrust 1:
Build Powerful Multi-Enterprise Processes with Appropriate IT Support
One of the business innovations of the 90's is the focus on Business Process. As a first step, a business needs to focus on identifying key business processes and designing or redesigning them. Through process redesign, managers can achieve:

• integration across previously-isolated functional departments
• more efficient process performance, reflected in reduced resources required per process transaction
• more effective process performance ­ shorter times, lower error rates, higher fulfillment rates, and other aspects of service, quality and customer responsiveness

In many organizations, it is useful to integrate these "core" business processes:

• order cycle management, from receipt to entry to production to distribution to depositing the final payment
• product cycle management, from market research and product concept development through design, launch, enhancements, and product retirement
• customer relationship management, from initial contact through sales and after-sale support

In support of these top-level processes, other lower-level processes are also redesigned and integrated.

Use Structured Systems to Support "Pipeline Management Systems"
Structured systems are playing a key role in supply chain management today. We call this approach "Pipeline Management Systems (PLMS):" use of standard types of IT systems for management of processes within the firm and between firms in the supply chain. In this approach to Supply Chain Management, each organization develops its own IT to support its own internal processes, using transaction processing (TP), management information systems (MIS), and decision support systems (DSS). This is augmented with EDI and E-mail to support messaging among organizations (in addition to traditional means such as voice telephone, teletype, and fax).

TP systems may include Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), inventory management, purchase order management, and other systems for managing process and accounting data.

DSS, used for planning, forecasting, and operational decision-making, may include transportation dispatching, load planning and consolidation, forecasting, scheduling, warehouse management, and other systems.

Data interchanges may include providing access to data from outside an organization. For example, data on shipment locations and status is now usually made available to customers, so that they can track their own shipments.

Key to this PLMS approach is developing appropriate data bases and their interconnections with applications. The interconnections may use proprietary communications, or may use any of several standard network communications approaches.

The approach using TCP/IP communications protocols is called the Internet or Intranet. Many companies, whether shippers or logistics services providers, are implementing this PLMS approach in one form or another and many vendors offer useful software components. The knowledge about how to implement these components is widely available, with many vendors providing component systems, and many consultants providing support services, such as integration and implementation management. Thus, the knowledge involved in implementing a PLMS is widespread throughout the industry.

While a firm can perhaps still gain some short-run competitive advantage through PLMS implementation, the advantage will not last, because other firms can catch up readily. Thus, in most markets, PLMS implementation is no longer a source of a competitive advantage. Implementation of an effective PLMS is becoming a competitive necessity.

Thrust 2:
Balance the Roles of People and Technology
There is a kind of implicit premise in the ways many organizations are deploying IT in SCM. Often, it appears that companies view IT as a substitute for people: build the right system, and you won't need expensive people any more. This premise ignores a number of realities of logistics, transportation, and especially Supply Chain Management:

• Fundamental weaknesses of computer methods ­
  No computer system can ever capture all of the realities of real situations. Many situations arise for which human judgement is needed, and the plans or schedules produced by the computer must be modified to reflect employee's insights and understandings.
• Contingencies and unexpected events ­
  Human judgement is required to assess sudden new conditions. Computer programs cannot be designed which will deal with every possible contingency.
• Continual adjustment of priorities ­
  Events always arise which require rapid review and possible revision of priorities to adjust to changing conditions.
• Customization of service support ­
  Each new customer or trading partner has some unique characteristics. Even when a company is successful in standardizing its PLMS and related applications to support supply chain partners, it almost always has to introduce some customized elements or modifications to support the needs of a new customer or other partner.

Lessons from the Internet:
Emerging Processes
The experiences with Internet-based businesses of all kinds serve to illuminate major new challenges to management in both traditional and Internet-based businesses. The rapid growth and evolution of businesses that exploit the Internet created a very dynamic environment. Some of the lessons which have been learned are directly applicable to Supply Chain Management:

Relationships are important
Many Internet businesses create and support "virtual communities," as key resources. Peoples' perceptions of a business are heavily influenced by whether they feel they have a unique relationship with the business and with other customers or users of the business.

To build and sustain relationships requires frequent interaction in a variety of modalities: face-to-face meetings, telephone calls, telexes and faxes, and electronic mail. Relationships go through multiple phases, from initially "feeling each other out," to building a shared set of understandings, to building a basis for a business relationship, and so forth. Sustaining a relationship requires continuous relationship management: evaluating, testing and adjusting actions to maintain the balance of the relationship. In Internet-based businesses, this is even more critical: trust is a key element in maintaining the customer-provider relationship. Furthermore, a key to success is often the building of a "virtual community" - relationships are built in a community of partners, customers, suppliers, etc.

Managing dynamically is essential
The Internet business environment is continually changing. Management must be comfortable and effective in managing dynamically in this environment. Each business must be prepared to change its business model in response to changing conditions in the competitive environment, changing customer preferences, changing financial conditions, and/or changing supplier offerings. In the past, traditional businesses did not have to deal with this type of rapidly-changing environment. However, the dynamics of continuously changing global competition, and especially the global financial "meltdowns" and other crises of 1998, have demonstrated conclusively that every business must be prepared to manage dynamically in business environment.

A business must manage strategically, maintaining a long-term vision, but must also manage dynamically, exploiting opportunities as they arise, responding to crises, and occasionally questioning and revising its strategic vision. Business processes must also be managed both strategically and dynamically: at every level of the organization, processes need to be managed explicitly so that they can be changed quickly when needed.

Knowledge management is critical
Management of an Internet firm must be effective at acquiring information quickly. Data must be converted to information and turned into knowledge useful for quick, effective management decision-making. Underlying all technical and management issues is the need to manage knowledge effectively. In recent years, the importance of information has been recognized, but too often information is defined in terms of basic data ­ e.g. data about shipments, about customers' forecasts, etc. This is not sufficient.

Important knowledge exists in the heads of people, and is often tacit ­ not articulated or expressed. Some knowledge exists in explicit form, as in reports, white papers, memos, etc. But the central issue in knowledge management is the interplay of tacit and explicit knowledge, and of knowledge held by individuals and that shared by groups or teams. In a dynamically-changing business environment, effective knowledge management is a key competitive issue. Since SCM is subject to the same rapid changes, knowledge management needs to be another critical element of management strategy.

Provide Significant IT Support to Emerging Processes
The operational significance of these lessons is that: Information Technology support in Supply Chain Management must go beyond the capabilities of Pipeline Management Systems, to provide support to relationship management, strategic, dynamic process management, and knowledge management. These activities require people and are much more "open" processes: thus, new forms of IT support, beyond Transaction Processing, MIS, and DSS are required. These new forms of exist: Groupware and Workflow Management Systems.

Figure 1.	Work flow: Administrative

Use Groupware to Enhance Unstructured Activities
Groupware is a class of IT systems that supports interactions among individuals at multiple locations. Synchronous systems provide support to individuals interacting at the same time. Asynchronous systems provide support to individuals interacting at different times. Groupware includes several types of IT systems, which may be available separately or in an integrated offering.

• Email is the most basic form of groupware. With the emergence of the Internet (actually, TCP/IP and related protocols), email is becoming wide spread. Email is useful for an interactive dialog among a small group or for broad dissemination of a specific message.
• News database is another basic form. News items are posted on an electronic bulletin board or web site, and are available for review by authorized people.
• Document database is an extension of s database, in which multiple documents are displayed and/or available for copying (downloading) by authorized viewers.
• Discussion forum is a particularly powerful form of groupware. Individuals may post a "topic," composed of an announcement, question, issue, or other form; other individuals may view this topic and then discuss it by posting subtopics, which are linked to the main topic.
• Chat forums are discussion forums that are available for simultaneous real-time (synchronous) discussions.
• Opinion polling and voting applications allow authorized individuals to express opinions or vote on particular issues.

Provide Relationship Management Support Through Groupware
Groupware provides a powerful platform for supporting relationship management processes. To manage relationships effectively, several groupware elements can be integrated with face-to-face meetings and traditional telephone and fax. Managing relationships effec tively in this way is particularly important in the "virtual work" situations of SCM.

Use Workflow Management to Enhance Semi-Structured Processes
Workflow Management Systems (WFMS) are sometimes classed as Groupware, but are also usefully distinguished. WFMS support interactions among people where processes have been previously defined. In the use of WFMS, one or more processes is defined and described operationally. A process design specifies which individuals, groups, units, or roles will perform specific functions, when, under what conditions, and in a process.

In a typical WFMS application, a number of workflow processes are defined ­ e.g., setting up a new customer, handling a standard shipment, handling a priority-shipment, etc. Once defined, the processes are executed by people, possibly with the aid of software tools. The actions at each point in the process may be wholly manual or largely computerized. Thus, a Workflow Management System serves as an overall process management system for both manual and computerized processes.

Provide Knowledge Management Support Through Groupware and Workflow Management Systems
Most current work in IT applications for Knowledge Management (KM) focus on storing, managing, updating, retrieving and displaying formal knowledge in the form of explicit data and information. Typical information includes customer data, data about services offered, shipment status information, service delivery performance information, and personnel data.

The core issues in KM in SCM revolve around soft, subtle knowledge and insights into people, processes services, situations and so forth. As described above, KM involves the interplay of tacit and explicit knowledge, among individuals and groups. Thus, groupware's role in supporting dialog and debate is central to KM. Further, when it is important to articulate new knowledge and processes, workflow management can route the information so that the appropriate individuals receive and become aware of it.

Provide Support to Strategic, Dynamic Process Management Through Groupware and Workflow Management Systems
Once a WFMS has been implemented, it provides a basis for rapid and efficient execution of standard processes. Some of these processes can be supportive of knowledge management, and can focus on monitoring and assessing external conditions and needs for change. When a need for change is identified, groupware can support dialog about the need for change and what changes to make, including changes in previously-defined processes. Then, the proposed changes can be specified in revised process designs, or definitions of new variant designs for additional special cases; the proposed changes subjected to discussion and opinion polling. Once the final change is accepted, the revised process design can be added to the library of Workflow process designs and is immediately available for operational use.

Use a Multi-Service Architecture (MSA) to Balance Human and Computer Roles
Basic Groupware support, such as email are particularly effective in supporting problem-solving and relationship management. They are essentially open, in that the work process does not need to be structured and designed beforehand. Some design decisions are needed, such as who will have access to which functions, whether passwords will be needed, and other design features. In the case of systems like Lotus Notes, where there is a lot of flexibility, these design decisions can be very important, and significant powerful functionality can be built into a groupware application. We can think of Groupware as providing support for unstructured processes, which support essentially people-to-people interactions.

Figure 2.	Multi-Service Architecture ­ Supply Chain Example

In contrast, the traditional integrated systems, such as Pipeline Management Systems, provide support for structured processes almost all of the design of the process is embedded in software code, in the programs which provide the Transaction Processing, MIS/EIS, and Decision Support System functionalities.

As a middle ground, Workflow Management Systems can be viewed as supporting semi-structured processes: the overall process flow is specified in a process design, but individuals play key roles in executing the processes. It is relatively easy to modify a process design and create variant processes for specific new conditions as needed.

It is important to view these as complementary alternatives in an integrated process architecture. We call this the Multi-Service Architecture (MSA). In a Multi-Service Architecture, a processing request is received and passed through a triage function. Depending on the nature of the request, it is handled as a structured process, a semi-structured process, or an unstructured process. A Multi-Service Architecture is supported by a combination of traditional Transaction Processing systems, Groupware, and Workflow Management systems.

For example, in a SCM application, consider the example of a customer request for information on a shipment. The shipment status request would be passed through a triage function and appropriate action taken:

• If the request is routine and the information is readily available, the request message can be passed to the fully-automated processes of the shipment tracking system, and an electronic message composed and sent back to the inquiring party containing the requested information. Thus, for structured processing, the transaction processing system is used.
• Consider the case where the request is somewhat problematic and requires some human interaction: the information in the request is insufficient to completely identify the shipment, or the shipment is somewhat overdue, or the account is sufficiently important that each request must be reviewed. For these types of situations, appropriate workflow processes might be triggered, in which the request is routed by pre- defined rules in a process design to appropriate individuals or customer service units for processing and review. Thus, for semi-structured processing, the workflow management system is used.
• Now consider the case where the request is highly problematic: this customer has experienced numerous service problems in the past, or the shipment is substantially overdue or its location is not known. In this case, human problem-solving and intervention is central, and multiple individuals must participate in developing an appropriate and effective response to this request. In this type of situation, Groupware applications are appropriate, including email, discussion forums, and others. Thus, for unstructured processing, the Groupware system is used.

Knowledge Management and the Multi-Service Architecture
In the MSA described earlier, we saw the integration of transaction processing, groupware, and workflow in an integrated architecture. Deciding what processes to use for particular cases requires some base of experience, but often may be lacking or incomplete.

One can view a progression of knowledge about processes in the framework of the MSA:

• When there is insufficient prior experience to know what process to follow, then group problem-solving is appropriate. In this case, the unstructured process can be supported by groupware.
• As experience is gained ­ for example, familiarity with a customer's needs, with the capabilities and idiosyncrasies of a particular carrier ­ semi-structured processes can be designed and deployed, using Workflow Management Systems to provide an appropriate mix of computer and human processing.
• As further experience is gained and responses to situations become routine ­ that is, when process knowledge is sufficiently complete to allow coding of rules and procedures completely in software ­ then structured processes can be implemented based on such software coding.

This progression can be very flexible: As new events occur that cause previous process designs to be reviewed and revised, certain processes can move from a structured level to semi-structured, or from semi-structured to unstructured. Thus, the Multi-Service Architecture provides a flexible and powerful way for supporting knowledge management in the supply chain.

Thrust 3:
Manage Multi-Enterprise Processes Flexibly and Dynamically
The extension of business processes to multiple enterprises is a key opportunity. In addition, recognizing that these processes must be managed dynamically and flexibly is also important. The ability to manage multi-enterprise processes effectively, flexibly and dynamically is a major potential source of competitive advantage.

Exploit Emerging Standards to Extend Integrated Processes to Multi-Enterprise Processes
Emerging technical standards provide a significant opportunity in this area, enabling flexible process management in a multi-enterprise process.

Figure 3.	Software components from multiple vendors support workflow across five different organization units

Exploit Workflow Management Interoperability Standards to Support Supply Chain Processes across Multiple Organizations
In 1992, the Black Forest Group (BFG), an independent and voluntary group of individuals from major global organizations, universities and research organizations, recognized the power of the then-emerging Workflow Management Systems. In order to promote maximum flexibility in use of these systems, the BFG recognized that standards would be needed to allow multiple vendors' WFMS to operate effectively together, such as across companies in the supply chain. The BFG encouraged several major vendors to establish standards for WFMS interoperability.

As a result, the WorkFlow Management Coalition (WfMC) was established. By 1996, the WfMC included more than 170 vendor members and published specifications for interoperability of WFMS products. In June 1996, the first demonstration of interoperability of WFMS products from several vendors was held in Toronto. In this demonstration, 7 vendors showed how multiple firms interacting in a supply chain could execute a single business process.

In a related effort, a number of major vendors of Document Management Systems (DMS) joined together in the Document Management Alliance (DMA). The DMA developed standards to ensure interoperability of DMS from multiple vendors, especially important for large companies with multiple business units in multiple locations. The DMA standards were finalized in late 1997. With the assistance of the Black Forest Group, the DMA and the WfMC joined together in a joint demonstration at a major industry conference in May, 1998, sponsored by the Association for Information and Image Management (AIIM).

At the AIIM show, the DMA and WfMC demonstrated a supply chain situation involving eight different vendors. In this scenario, a supply chain process was implemented as a workflow across five different organization units and organizations, using the WfMC standards as a basis. The workflow execution involved storage and retrieval of documents from Document Management Systems from different vendors, using the DMA standards. This was a powerful demonstration of the possibility of supporting workflow processes and document management processes across multiple organization units and supply chain partners, with software components from multiple vendors.

In current work, the WfMC is working with the Object Management Group (OMG) and has produced joint specifications for standards about objects and workflows. These standards specify how:

• Workflows can call objects: objects can be full applications ("encapsulated") or components of applications
• Workflows can themselves be objects: an application can call a workflow as an object

These standards create the possibility of using WFMS as application development and execution systems, and they create a very powerful opportunity for multi-enterprise business processes, such as Supply Chain Management.

For example, two or more trading partners can define an overall process design which is mutually acceptable to all the partners. Each partner can implement its portion of the process design as a subsidiary workflow, calling appropriate applications or application components as objects, and making its subsidiary workflow appear to the partners as an encapsulated object without revealing any details of the underlying processes. This subsidiary workflow can incorporate multiple processes within its own organization (and possibly processes involving other organizations, which may or may not be known to the trading partners). Further, because of the ease of modification of workflow process designs, SC processes can quickly be adapted to changing conditions.

To achieve this flexibility, it will be very helpful if present vendors of independent SC applications move to "componentize" their applications (e.g., transportation dispatching, shipment tracking, warehouse management, ERP, etc.) and make them available as documented objects with interfaces according to the WfMC-OMG standards. These standards offer a tremendous promise but whether this promise will be achieved remains to be determined.

Use Workflow Management Systems as A Platform for Integrating Business Processes
In light of all of the preceding comments, WFMS can be a powerful platform for integrating business processes, especially the multi-enterprise processes typical of Supply Chain Management.

• Use WFMS as the overall tool for building and executing processes
• Provide multi-unit and multi-enterprise interoperability of processes by using only WFMS that are certified as in conformance with the WfMC, DMA, and OMG standards
• Provide Document Management System functionalities for enterprise- wide and multi-enterprise storage and retrieval of documents through DMS applications which meet the DMA and WfMC standards
• Provide Groupware, Supply-Chain applications, and other useful applications as components or objects, conforming to the WFMS-OMG specifications for interoperability of workflows and objects
• Provide a Groupware environment to support dialog and debate in the processes of developing, testing, using, and revising processes; Groupware and WFMS together enhance Knowledge Management, Relationship Management, and Strategic, Dynamic Process Management
• Use WFMS as an overall process manager, implement the Multi-Service Architecture as a basic process model for all relevant processes.

Use Objects and Management Systems to Support Managerial Commitment to Dynamic Process Change
As described previously, use the WfMC, DMA and OMG standards to support dynamic process management. In addition, and equally or more important, build a culture in the organization which supports and enjoys continuous evolution of processes. The technology is only a facilitator, appropriate management actions are key.

Manage Process Knowledge as a Key Competitive Weapon
The ability to dynamically modify process designs places a premium on efficient management of process knowledge. Workflow process designs represent only a portion of the explicit knowledge about processes; other explicit knowledge includes reasons for accepting or rejecting particular process designs, as well as other data.

Thrust 4:
Manage Knowledge Strategically
Earlier, we introduced the concept of Knowledge Management (KM). We also illustrated this concept in the discussion of process knowledge. We now return to this discussion, putting KM in a strategic context. We have been examining the concept of gaining competitive advantage through people, enhanced by information technology. One key value that people provide is their knowledge, both tacit and explicit. The knowledge that people have in their heads is a key source of competitive advantage.

Use Patterns as Knowledge Management Tools
One important form of knowledge is "Patterns", will use patterns to mean any template which people use to store information and to apply it. Patterns may be wholly mental, i.e. largely tacit; or may be visible and even shared with others, i.e. largely explicit. Examples of explicit patterns include:

• Checklists
• Step-by-step "how-to" procedures; instructions; e.g. (how to answer the telephone, how to trace a lost shipment, how to prepare for a client visit, what to do and what not to do in an interview with a prospective employee)
• Process designs, in manual forms
• Process designs, in electronic form for execution in a Workflow Management System
• Templates for a word processing document, as for an invoice or meeting agenda or a calendar
• Templates for a presentation graphics package (such as Microsoft Powerpoint or Lotus Freelance), containing both design elements and content elements
• "Best Practices" templates, summarizing results of best practices surveys and providing a guide for adoption implementation

Explicit patterns such as these may be developed by individuals, groups or organizations and the process of pattern development may involve little dialog and debate. Alternatively, it can be an intensely interactive process and serving as a major source of creative learning and invention.

People learn a rich variety of patterns as they grow from infants to adults. In the domain of personal thought and action, patterns are called "schemas:" mental structures through which people encode information and store it in memory. Most of these are tacit and some are explicit patterns, which have been learned and stored in memory and are available for rapid recall and application to new situations.

Frame Knowledge Management Strategy as an Essential Element of Overall Business Strategy
In the past, personal knowledge as schemas or patterns have not been considered important assets of a company. Today however, with increasing recognition that intellectual capital is an important if intangible asset, business leaders are paying increasing attention to personal knowledge.

A key element of overall business strategy should be Knowledge Management Strategy, and one key element of that should be a Pattern Management strategy.

An effective Pattern Management strategy has the ability to:

• Execute work tasks quickly and efficiently
• Share knowledge among members of workgroups, both inside and outside the firm
• Rapidly tailor processes to the needs of each new customer, supplier or other trading partner
• Rapidly train individuals to perform well in new positions
• Manage dynamic change
• Act quickly yet thoughtfully (through rapid execution of previously-learned, internalized patterns)
• Frame best practices in ways relevant to the organization

Thrust 5:
Enhance Individual Effectiveness
The effectiveness of individual participants, at all organizational levels, is key to the effectiveness of a supply chain strategy. Shouldn't actions to increase the effectiveness of individuals be a key element of Supply Chain Management strategy? Can IT play a role in helping people be more effective as individuals? Personal effectiveness, through Personal Action Management, is a key element of success in SCM.

Consider this hypothetical situation. Joseph is a senior manager in a global logistics service provider. He is responsible for customer relationships with several key global shipper accounts and also has overview responsibilities for operations in support of services provided for these shippers. He is supported by a team with members in multiple functions in his organization ­ sales, operations, quality, EDI, IT, finance, etc. ­ and in its supply chain partner organizations ­ air carriers, ocean carriers, trucking companies, warehouse companies, customs brokers. It is a virtual team in that members are working at locations all over the world, in different time zones and countries. This logistics services team is supporting a virtual shipper's organization, with members at multiple production sites, vendor sites, distribution locations, marketing and sales offices and other locations.

Joseph is sitting at his desk in Chicago when an email message comes in, reporting a major service failure in a shipment from Malaysia to France: an airfreight container has been offloaded from an aircraft in error and is now 72 hours overdue. This late shipment will cause a production line halt at a key manufacturing facility of one of Joseph's key customer accounts. Since this is the third major service failure for this account in the last six weeks, Joseph has a major problem on his hands.

Some of the questions he must address are these:

• Where is the missing container? What are the possibilities for recovering it in time to meet the customer's production schedule? Who, in which organizations, can be asked to help address these questions?
• Are there alternative supplies enroute to the customer's facilities somewhere else in the world which could be rerouted to meet the production need in France? Who could answer this question in his or the customer's organization or in supplier organizations?
• What caused this operational problem? Is it the same as previous problems in the last few months? Or is there a variety of different operational problems in the field? Or are there problems with the performance of one or more strategic partners? Who, in which organizations, can be asked to help address these questions?
• What can be done to put in motion a significant, in-depth program to improve quality of operations fulfillment? How could this be done effectively? By whom? Who needs to be persuaded that this is now a critical need?
• What can be done to rebuild the confidence of the customer that we are working hard to solve this problem and prevent any future recurrences?

The Basic Process: Observe Reflect Act (ORA)
In approaching this problem and trying to develop a plan of action, Joseph wrestles with many issues and many options. He engages in problem-solving, working alone and in collaboration with members of his organization and his virtual team on:

Observation:
Joseph and his colleagues pull together all the information they have, review their notes and memories of past meetings and events, conversations, emails, etc.

Reflection:
Joseph reflects on what he knows, conjectures about missing information (such as: what could be the cause of the operational failure), begins considering alternative options open to him and begins planning a course of action:

• He jots down personal notes, mentally or on paper or in his computer. These "Jottings" are the basic material of his reflections.
• He identifies "Issues" to be considered, "Opportunities" to be pursued, "Concerns", "Ideas" to be pondered
• He identifies "Goals" to be achieved, and "Actions" to be pursued to achieve these goals, short-term or immediate actions, as well as longer-term actions and goals
• He reviews all of the "Stakeholders" in this situation ­ the people and organizations who have a real or potential concern with the results of his actions ­ people in his own organization, in the various elements of his virtual team, in his customer's organization, in the members of the virtual teams in the shipper's organization, and others; he assesses the key concerns of the stakeholders most critical to him
• He discusses these reflections with colleagues and others, perhaps even with key external stakeholders; he uses face-to-face, telephone, fax, teletype, email, other Groupware, and other means
• He prepares for meetings and discussions
• He prepares to act: to travel to critical operating locations; to meet with the customer; to meet with others in his own organization

Act:
Joseph assigns some actions to others, takes some actions himself, and monitors the situation on a continuing basis.

This process of ORA ­ Observe/Reflect/Act ­ is a critical and ongoing process. Joseph iterates this process many times an hour and throughout days, weeks and months. Observe/Reflect/Act is a core activity for a supply chain manager like Joseph. Can Information Technology play any role in assisting Joseph in this type of predominantly-mental process?

Figure 4.	Personal Action Management ­ Organization of Personal Information by Constructs

Personal Action Management with Patterns
Computers cannot think for people, but they can provide powerful assistance, which enhances peoples' ways of thinking and acting. We call computer tools that provide this kind of support "Personal Action Management" systems (PAMS). PAMS provide these functionalities:

1. They enable an individual to make lots of loose, informal personal notes, called Jottings

2. They enable the user to formulate a set of Constructs that are useful in personally organizing notes. Constructs may include:

• Stakeholders ­ Joe, Mary, Pedro, Shipper CEO, Air Carrier VP Operations, etc.
• Issues ­ Quality? Cost? Image? Need for management shakeup?
• Goals ­ Solve the missing container problem; rescue this account
• Actions ­ People to see; to call; tasks to delegate to others

3. They enable the definition of multiple Views, in which information in jottings is sorted, filtered and displayed in ways that are meaningful to the user. Examples of views:

• Things to discuss at tomorrow's staff meeting
• Concerns to review with the CEO
• Elements to cover in my presentation to the Customer CEO
• Potential remedial actions which I could take

Figure 5.	Personal Action Management ­ Views of Results, Based on Constructs

Continuing the example with which we introduced this discussion, some of the Views, which Joseph might find useful, are:

• View: Possible sources of these service failures
• View: Items to review with Station Manager
• View: Top Priority Actions

Thus, a PAMs supports an individual's processes of Observe/Reflect/Act by providing support for the user to manage a large quantity of "soft," personal information and display it in ways that are meaningful and helpful to the user. Many people already do this, making their jottings in personal notebooks or on their daily agenda and planner. However, paper-and-pencil is a very limited medium for managing the large volume of dynamically-changing information that must be managed in complex situations such as this supply chain example. Only computer support can help to do this.

The power of the computer in a PAMs is particularly effective with these additional functionalities:

• Assignment Agents review the user's jottings and semi-automatically assign jottings to constructs and views, with or without user review: For example, any jotting which has "Mary" or "Pedro" in the text will be assigned to the view, "Items to discuss at meeting in Buenos Aires," based on rules specified by the user.
• Information Acquisition Agents go out and seek information to bring back for the user's review. For example, information about "Buenos Aires" may be sought in the company's database of details on company operations and key customers in that location; and general travel and weather conditions may be sought in commercial databases on the Internet.
• Information Sharing Agents support the sharing of designated portions of the personal database with others, such as team members, under strict security and access control. For example, Joseph probably keeps his Jottings very private, but he does want to share certain Views with his support team, such as views showing tasks assigned to team members.
• Pattern Library functionalities support the rapid application of previously developed patterns for viewing personal information and for managing personal and delegated actions, including links to Workflow Management Systems for task delegation and follow-up, and links to Groupware to support launching problem-solving and discussion activities. Some of these functionalities exist in very limited forms in Personal Information Managers (PIMs) such as Lotus Organizer, Microsoft Outlook, Starfish' Sidekick, and others. A few PIMs have assignment agents, such as Lotus Agenda (an orphaned DOS product), NetManage ECCO, and Zoot Software's ZOOT (www.zootsoftware.com). No product with the full functionalities proposed here yet exists.

CONCLUSION
In this paper. we began with the basic idea that the role of computer support in Supply Chain Management is to enhance the ways in which people work, not to replace them. We have shown that people are essential in SCM. We have also shown a number of concrete and realistic ways in which computer support can be helpful in enhancing the work people do:

• Presently-available technologies such as groupware and workflow management systems provide immediate payoffs, especially when integrated in a Multi- Service Architecture
• The emerging standards for workflow management systems, document management systems, and objects provide a very significant opportunity for building dynamic and flexible process support across multiple organizations in the supply chain
• Emerging Personal Action Management systems offer a very significant promise of major improvements in individuals' per sonal effectiveness.

About the Author
By Marvin L. Manheim
Northwestern University
Email: mlmanheim@nwu.edu

William A. Patterson Distinguished Professor of Transportation Kellogg Graduate School of Management, McCormick School of Engineering, and The Transportation Center, Northwestern University