“Oxfords, not Brogues” If you’re into supply chain and liked the movie this quote is from, then we’re on the same street! Ok, now that we’re straight on ‘classic’ shoes, let’s talk about the next principle in the “10 Principles of Good Design” as applied to supply chain and supply chain management ( Design for the Supply Chain ). Principle #7: Good design “Is long-lasting” “Is long-lasting – It avoids being fashionable and therefore never appears antiquated. Unlike fashionable design, it lasts many years – even in today’s throwaway society.” – ‘ Dieter Rams: ten principles for good design ’ I was talking with my wife recently and she mentioned the 80/20 rule (Pareto principle) for some systems engineering project she’s working on. I gave an example from inventory management about ABC classification. This way of classifying inventory to provide guidance on which items to place the highest focus on has been around since the 1950’s. There are a multitude of approaches or techniques for managing inventory (e.g. just-in-time, kanban, postponement, backordering, consignment/vendor-managed-inventory, etc.). Different techniques are appropriate for different businesses and even different segments of inventory within a business. However, there’s always a need to do some level of classification to determine which technique makes the most sense. I keep debating with myself whether to say some techniques have gone “out of fashion” or we’ve just gotten a lot better at determining which ones to use as we’ve learned to manage extended supply chains. Likewise, I’m not sure that it’s fair to say that outsourcing to low-cost countries was a fad now that there’s a case for moving manufacturing again ( U.S. Manufacturing No More Expensive Than Outsourcing To China By 2015: Study ). What I can say though, is that putting window dressing on a technique, much […]