Duh, We're Not Alone Out There!
- Published: August 01, 2007, By Yolanda Simonsis, Associate Publisher/Editor
Editorial
Have you ever stowed away something in such a safe place you forgot you even had it? I came across a marketing brochure for Massachusetts Inst. of Technology’s (MIT) Sloan School of Management that happened to elude my attention after I packed it “safely” away in my editorial inspiration file. Fortunately, I check this file monthly for obvious reasons. I would have felt badly about not bringing this particular program to my readers’ attention.
So why did I save it? The brochure didn’t have one of those catchy or cute titles marketers (and even editors) shoot for when they want to grab attention. Imagine this: It actually said what it was about! “Developing a Leading Edge Operations Strategy” may not have the same enticing magnetism of BMW’s “The ultimate driving machine,” but MIT’s title nevertheless piqued my curiosity.
I opened the brochure.
Day in and day out, I receive, distribute, and publish information that’s highly specific to the converting industry—been doing it as an editor for almost 30 years. Because I’m so immersed (to the point of being a tad myopic) in one industry, albeit a horizontal one, I was surprised by the comprehensive list of intensive two-day classes from which an attendee could choose in a program meant for a “general” manufacturing-based audience.
I was even puzzled.
Here’s the checklist of challenges the program called “Leading Edge Operations Strategy” addresses from an analytic view:
- Vertical integration and the factors that affect strategic decisions;
- Outsourcing, supplier power, and trends in supplier management;
- Global facility network strategies and the future of supply chain management;
- Strategic implications of process technologies;
- Capacity and risk management, including capacity factors, supply, and demand management and role of services;
- How to survive in a world of outsourcing, and how to decide whether and where to go.
No doubt, this “news” may not surprise those of you who develop and execute operations strategies, including CEOs, strategic planners, and VPs of business strategy, operations, supply chain management, services and product development, etc., (and for whom this MIT program is tailored).
But for those of you who have been solely absorbed in the business of converting, consider that to survive today’s peculiar set of manufacturing challenges, it may take more than sitting in a “closed” classroom of carbon copies of yourselves or your businesses to reveal a new blueprint to take you to a higher plane of success.
The good news is the MIT program is offered once more this year, December 3-4, and again March 17-18, 2008, in Cambridge, MA. For information call 781/239-1111 or e-mail This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
Perhaps sometimes sharing with those outside our circle of familiarity may offer solutions to challenges that actually are universal to manufacturing in general.
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