World Trade - March 2009 - (Page 32) SUPPLY CHAIN AND THE ENTERPRISE A Common Sense Approach to Transportation Fleet Management To make the right fleet decisions, ‘look at the business value of everything you do.’ BY GAIL DUTTON O wn your own assets? Out-source? Lease a dedicated fleet? Truth is, when it comes to running land transportation, getting goods from Point A to Point B is just the starting point. In a very tough business climate, with scarce little margin for investments that don’t pay their way (and then some), transportation managers have taken on a much higher profile. While getting the goods to their destination on time remains as important as ever, the corporate conversation is likely to be more concerned with minimizing the expenses associated with transportation—and even transforming it from a cost center to a possible revenue generator. Any way you cut it, there’s no one-size-fits-all philosophy for determining the best way to run a fleet. Enter consultants like Brooks Bentz, partner at Accenture in charge of supply chain transportation. “Do the right thing,” is how Bentz defines his general philosophy about transportation managing. Which trans2009 lates into ”looking at the business value of everything you do.” That means, in simple terms, a “profit and loss model: as the metric with which to gauge decisions. Implementing this standard requires developing a holistic approach that analyzes the cost and benefit of every element involved in transportation. Looking at the total cost of ownership, he insists, “…is a common sense approach…a sound, pragmatic approach,” that focuses on the fundamentals. And, as he advises his clients, such an approach can drive substantial cost savings and service improvements. Total cost of ownership The big talk for the last 18 months has, of course, been fuel prices. Soaring upwards, crashing back to the ground—leaving transportation managers caught in the uncertainty of no-man’s land. But Bentz insists that the care and feeding of the transportation budget line goes beyond just monitoring prices at the pump. 32 WORLD TRADE MARCH
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