How to Design Effective Commercial Processes with Collective Intelligence?

Dear Friends,

Welcome to this month's newsletter dedicated to sharing best practices observed among leading manufacturers in managing their commercial excellence. This month, I want to explore a successful experience in defining end-to-end processes, made possible by harnessing the collective intelligence of individuals worldwide within a major industrial group.

I will further explore these dynamics at the EPP conference in Barcelona on April 11th here

The Challenge of End-to-End Processes:????

End-to-end processes are the backbone of successful companies like Amazon, and their influence is rapidly shaping the manufacturing landscape. Consider this: AWS adds as much computing capacity daily as Amazon had to run its entire operation as an $8.5 billion enterprise in 2005 (Source: Harvard Business School). Manufacturing companies automating end-to-end processes in the cloud are the primary factor driving AWS success.

However, defining end-to-end processes is genuinely complex.

Amazon's Success Story: Lessons for Manufacturers

Amazon optimizes its end-to-end processes through innovative technology, data-driven decision-making, and a relentless focus on customer satisfaction. Their efficiency spans from an enhanced shopping experience and personalized recommendations to improved logistics and fulfillment, reducing costs throughout the supply chain. So what is the big lesson? Manufacturers must embrace the logic of "AND" for success ?

Common Pitfalls:

Without solid end-to-end processes, manufacturers face numerous challenges, including increased costs of interaction for customers due to cumbersome processes, siloed operations leading to friction and delays, and missed opportunities to reflect manufacturing and supply chain quality efforts in pricing.

Starting Right: How to Begin Successfully? ????

Collective intelligence allows for sorting useful processes, organizing them into efficient systems, and setting performance thresholds. And this is a great beginning to the difficult job of defining processes from start to finish!

Recently, a major automotive supplier began developing a complete pricing process to set higher standards of quality. They gathered 30 experts from around the world for a 2-day workshop.

This task is really complex because it involves many different types of businesses (such as automotive, mining, and agriculture), various sales channels (like OEMs, distributors, and online retailers), thousands of products, and seasonal fluctuations

Here are the key steps they took to reach a convincing solution by the end of the workshop.

Key Steps to Success:

1.???? Define a macro process: Provide a clear framework for collective intelligence to work effectively.

2.???? Establish a long list of possible standards with experts: Collaborate with experts to identify potential value-adding components upfront.

3.???? Prioritize and refine: Energize the group to finalize the necessary standards.

4.???? Systemize the solution: Synthesize the group's ideas to ensure seamless functionality.

5.???? Embrace the logic of "AND": Encourage the group to find compelling answers to the need to combine seemingly contradictory variables.

6.???? Set performance wedges: Manufacturers that do this establish a performance wedge and manage pricing and sales performance to exceed it from now on and never regress.

7.???? Continuous training: The aim is to enable the entire workforce to perform at the right level of excellence, rather than tying it to the individual excellence of some.

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Feel free to contact me for an informal chat if you have any questions about your end-to-end commercial processes as an industrial leader at Resilient Growth Consultants ??

Best Regards,

Olivier