Following the success of an event held at Oracle in May, a new series of free interactive webinars have been released that will explore enabling supply chain growth.

If the success of an event can be measured not just in the number of people who attend, not just in the number of people who stay to network over coffee afterwards, but in the number who stay on to then come to the pub, then this was an extremely successful event.

What made it successful? Perhaps the focused subject and the speakers. Perhaps the location or the very interactive nature. Probably a combination of how CILT Operations Management (OM) members needs were answered.

Supply chain is a key battleground for customer loyalty as companies respond to fast changing demands and business controls whilst dealing with massive disruptions and changing expectations, often without sufficiently robust and flexible support from their business systems.

Business systems such as Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) are usually extensive and complicated. Getting them up and running & keeping them operating well is not easy – figures show that up to 70% of all ERP implementations have failed in the past. Getting benefits from ERP systems and avoiding pitfalls is crucial for supply chain and operations success, and has to be supported by many people from many different areas.  

Presentations and panellists included: 

Chris Cottington, Operational Design Director, Wolseley

Graham Newland, Future Business Design Delivery Lead and Business Architect, Wolseley

Bryan Oak, COO and Head of Strategy & Architecture, Searchlight Consulting

Vikram Singla, Strategy Director – Commercial Industries, Oracle Corporation

Ian Scott, Supply Chain Consultant, The Config Team 

Catherine Milner, Director, C2mc Ltd 

Tom Davies, Sales Director, Supply Chain Management Solutions, Oracle Corporation

Gary Perkins, CRM Cloud Limited

Manish Popli from Hitachi

We benefited greatly by combining their multi-disciplinary expertise together in one forum and one place. 
The interactive aspects were a great success too. The Quick Fire Panels and the World Café had people involved, where we discussed three key questions:

• What were the key drivers (e.g. cost, customer experience, compliance, carbon footprint) for your supply chain transformation?

• How do you prepare the business and the business system for supply chain success and supply chain growth?

• What are key problems / key successes you’ve experienced (during implementation or on-going in the business)?

The event combined expert opinion from all perspectives for delivering success for your business by combining excellent processes, people and technology. It was both informative and interactive and provided true thought leadership to enable companies to develop greater understanding of how their organisations can achieve real value from business systems in the areas of operations management and supply chain.

Thanks again to our presenters for all their input on the day as our thought leaders, to Oracle for hosting us and to Hugh Williams for chairing the event. 

The success of the event has now spawned a series of Operations Management free interactive webinars, the first one is on 22 July at 2pm where we will look at SaaS v. hosted ERP and compare companies’ choices and experiences. Book your place here.