Managing Automation - February 2009 - (Page 27) World Wide Web, Web 2.0 technologies, and Web services, the automation of seamless collaboration is widely available for the first time. For years, manufacturers have relied on private networks, spreadsheets, faxes, e-mail, and electronic data interchange (EDI), which is the transfer of structured data via a messaging standard that is not based on standard Web technology. Those delivery methods are fine, but they have drawbacks. For example, data exchanges do not always occur in real time. And that is becoming archaic in a world where business is conducted faster than the speed of light. Factor in a new generation of workers — called Gen Y — who routinely use Facebook, LinkedIn, and MySpace Web 2.0 social networking sites to connect with friends, family, and co-workers, and it becomes increasingly clear that a technology evolution is upon us: Manufacturers must adopt social networking tools to keep driving business forward. And, ultimately, using Web 2.0 technologies in the workplace could make collaboration easy as well as commonplace. “Collaboration is not a new concept, but it’s just the way you approach it [that matters],” says Sean Rollings, vice president of marketing at Amitive Inc., a maker of community supply chain management software. Rollings, who writes a blog called “The New Chain,” asked in one of his latest entries, “Does the world really need another supply chain application?” He wrote, “There are plenty of great supply chain applications out there ser ving a host of industries and manufacturing types. And they’ve been honed for decades to address complexity and deliver value. The problem is, the world has changed significantly and these solutions simply haven’t.” With outsourced manufacturing, a new focus on product and brand management, and unexpected economic dynamics, companies need to rethink how they collaborate internally and with par tners and customers, Rollings says. Business is no longer about a CEO barking orders at the minions. It’s about creating a community of people who care. “You have to work with suppliers, logistics managers, and customers,” Rollings says. “You have to manage by influence. You need to build out working relationships among that community [emphasizing] the common goals you are trying to achieve, both in the short and long term.” Amitive, founded in 2003 as an on-demand community for supply chain management, was built specifically for companies that depend on outsourced manufacturing. The community data hub is a platform for planning, executing, and collaborating with many trading partners and manufacturing relationships. For example, a supply and demand synchronization capability enables the hub to assess the upstream and downstream impact of a specific event. If, for example, one supplier falls short on inventory, all parties have visibility into an alternate supplier and the impact on shipping. “It is beyond simple mathematical analytics,” Rollings says. “It brings back the human element of decision making.” Building this type of close-knit community starts within a manufacturer’s own IT infrastructure. Applications in the plant, supply chain, and enterprise must be updated to accommodate the new collaborative way that manufacturers have to do business. To that end, vendors, including Amitive, SmartTurn, WorkLight Inc., Xora Inc., and Central Desktop Inc., are introducing applications built on Web 2.0 technology for everything from the enterprise, to the supply chain, to the warehouse, to fleet management. These companies are not only developing solutions that take advantage of this nextgeneration social experiment. They also promise to maintain business stability through security and management capabilities. In addition, companies such as Siperian, which specializes in master data management (MDM); Cordys, which specializes in business process management; and SPSS Inc., a predictive analytics company, have developed ways to govern the kind of freeflowing data that is often generated by Webbased communities. “This is fascinating because there is a whole generation of people coming into the workplace who just expect that Facebook will be there and that they won’t have to go through the hierarchies, but expect that they can just talk to and collaborate with whomever the need to,” says Jon Pyke, Cordys chief strategy officer. “The problem for business is figuring out how to harness this unstructured communication and data, and put it into a form that can be used to their advantage.” INFORMALITY IS THE REALITY In a recent Managing Automation poll on collaboration, 77% of respondents said they are looking at new methods of collaboration in order to become more efficient. However, only 30% said the effort is a formal business strat- The new generation of workers — the Gen Yers — routinely use Facebook (top), LinkedIn (middle), and MySpace to communicate with friends, family, and co-workers. 27 February 2009
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