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Marty here with you with Warehouse and Operations as a Career and I hope your having a Safe and Productive week out there! I went up north to Philadelphia Pennsylvania for a conference week before last. It was very informative and it’s always good getting to see one’s peers and attending all the classes and sessions. This was quite a large gathering, I believe It was upwards of 2000 attendees and I started thinking about all the Logistics work that went on behind the scenes to pull everything together for such a meeting. I’ve probably attended 30 or 40 conventions over my career and actually had a hand in 8 to 10 of those with some degree of responsibility. SO, with all that on my mind I thought we’d talk about what Logistics is and what it means as well as a few of the positions and opportunities that segment of our industry can bring to us! Let’s start with a definition: http://www.dictionary.com/browse/logistics?s=t states it as “the planning, implementation, and coordination of the details of a business or other operation.” And every dictionary I checked also listed it as “the branch of military science and operations dealing with the procurement, supply, and maintenance of equipment, with the movement, evacuation, and hospitalization of personnel, with the provision of facilities and services, and with related matters.” In many ways I like this definition better, Logistics involves so much, so many tasks and I like how the Military is so inclusive and includes purchasing, supply, moving those products around and all the planning and services involved in making something happen. In our Operations world I like to think of it as everything from making the item to getting it to the end user or consumer.
Wikipedia.org tells us: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logistics
Logistics is generally the detailed organization and implementation of a complex operation. In a general business sense, logistics is the management of the flow of things between the point of origin and the point of consumption in order to meet requirements of customers or corporations. The resources managed in logistics can include physical items such as food, materials, animals, equipment, and liquids; as well as intangible items, such as time and information. The logistics of physical items usually involves the integration of information flow, materials handling, production, packaging, inventory, transportation, warehousing, and often even security.
Logistics management is the part of the supply chain management that plans, implements, and controls the efficient, effective forward, and reverse flow and storage of goods, services, and related information between the point of origin and the point of consumption in order to meet customer’s requirements. A professional working in the field of logistics management is called a logistician. Sounds funny but that’s how you pronounce it. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/logistician defines this position or title as “a specialist in logistics.” That didn’t tell us much so I checked with the https://www.bls.gov/ooh/business-and-financial/logisticians.htm U.S. Department of Labor and their Bureau of Labor Statics which states the position as “Logisticians analyze and coordinate an organization’s supply chain—the system that moves a product from supplier to consumer. They manage the entire life cycle of a product, which includes how a product is acquired, allocated, and delivered.”
I’ve known several ladies and gentlemen that’s transferred from the warehouse and transportation departments into a segment of the Logistics fields. Routing within transportation, you know, mapping out or planning the routes for our delivery trucks is a great first step into the field and on the inbound side scheduling the pickup and delivery of product for merchandising is another position that can be a good entry point for the field! I’m sure your company’s Logistic department works closely with your procurement department for the purchasing of goods, weighing out the loads and cube’s of the trailers, arranging freight costs and delivery appointments along with the necessary financial components of the loads. There’s a lot of opportunities for us Warehousemen and Transportation Associates in the field of Logistics!
I checked out https://www.internationalstudent.com/study-transportation-and-logistics/careers-in-transportation-logistics/ , and don’t worry about writing down all these URL’s I’m giving you today, I’ll include them in todays show notes on our website, but I found a great article there that lists “Eight Careers in Transportation and Logistics”.
Graduating with a degree in transportation and logistics will leave you with no shortage of career paths. And as I stated earlier our experiences and skills learned can earn us the knowledge to succeed also. Not only are logistics utilized by a wide variety of institutions (everything from global corporations to city governments), the warehousing, transportation and logistics industry is made up of many different parts that perform very different functions. These are just eight of the possible careers you could pursue with a degree in transportation and logistics:
Analyst
Logistics Engineer
Consultant
Customer Service
Purchasing Manager
International Logistics Manager
Inventory Manager
Supply-Chain Manager
I won’t go through and define all of these positions but I would like to talk about a couple of them real quick!
Analyst is the most common entry-level logistics position. Analysts are responsible for gathering and analyzing data to look for problems. Our routing experiences will mean a lot in these positions! Good math and computer skills are generally required for these positions; thriving in a team setting is also important, as analysts are expected to recommend solutions to their supervisors. Although it is an entry-level position, an analyst’s tasks become more varied and complex as he or she accumulates experience. The basic understanding of logistics planning that one acquires as an analyst is useful in many more-advanced positions.
Logistics Engineer
A successful analyst might find himself promoted to Logistics Engineer. Engineers evaluate the supply chain and logistics systems for trends or problems using computer systems and mathematics. Our WMS or Warehouse Maintenance Systems and that knowledge of using them as order selectors or even inventory control will be very beneficial to us as Logistics Engineers. While analysts make recommendations, however, engineers are responsible for implementing solutions. They manage their own projects as well as those of analysts.
Customer Service
With all the customer service we’ve learned dealing with customers as a delivery driver I’d call us pro’s at customer service right? Whether acting as a sales team or managing existing clients, customer service acts as an intermediary between clients and the rest of the logistics team. A client’s needs and concerns must be relayed to engineers or managers; likewise, if there is a problem of logistics, the problem and its solution must be communicated to the client. Therefore, a knowledge of logistics offers both clients and customer service representatives a greater grasp of the situation. As with other positions, successful customer service eventually leads to a management position responsible for establishing procedures for the entire customer service team.
Purchasing Manager
I’ve know no less than 20 or 25 warehousemen that’s moved into purchasing or merchandising departments. Not every company that employs logistics professionals will employ a purchasing manager though. Carriers such as UPS, FedEx, and USPS, for instance, distribute goods or products that are ready to be sold, or already have been sold. Manufacturers, however, must acquire resources and materials and have them delivered for production. Purchasing managers find materials suppliers across the world, sign them to contracts, and manage relationships with them. They must also communicate with inventory and warehouse managers to coordinate the delivery of materials.
International Logistics Manager
While international logistics managers aren’t responsible for acquiring materials, they are responsible for maintaining relationships with international partners. International logistics requires a familiarity with ever-changing international customs, laws, and regulations. Such managers often start off working as importer-exporters and are expected to collaborate with manufacturing, marketing, and purchasing to build and manage supply chains. Knowledge of both logistics and international business are essential to the successful international logistics manager. These are awesome positions for those individuals that enjoy traveling, I have a friend living in Taiwan now and he loves his job. We drove forklifts together back in the early 90’s. He went the merchandising route as I followed the management path.
Supply-Chain Manager
If transportation and logistics is the study of distribution systems, you might expect the supply chain manager to be the king of all managers. This is not quite true, but they are very important. Supply-chain managers oversee the entire supply chain (including purchasing, warehousing, inventory, and production) and seek to streamline the system in order to reduce cost and optimize productivity.
A little more from Wikipedia.org on Logistics activities and fields is Inbound Logistics and Outbound Logistics. I won’t go into all 19 of those different departments but you should check them out if you have and interest in the field and it’s a really good read too!
There are two fundamentally different forms of logistics: one optimizes a steady flow of material through a network of transport links and storage nodes, while the other coordinates a sequence of resources to carry out some project (e.g., restructuring a warehouse).
A depot or deposit is a standard type of warehouse thought for storing merchandise (high level of inventory).
Distribution centers are for order processing and order fulfillment (lower level of inventory) and also for receiving returning items from clients.
https://www.camcode.com/asset-tags/what-is-warehouse-logistics/
What is Warehouse Logistics? Challenges, Benefits, and Best Practices
Last Updated: Jun 28, 2018 Posted by Nicole Pontius
It does a really good job of walking us through all the steps from sourcing the raw goods to them reaching us or the end user. Again, I think logistics is a great field for us if we really enjoy learning and a good strong challenge to get us out of bed each day. It can be a really rewarding Career too, financially and opportunity wise.
Well I hope I was able to explain logistics a bit, it sounds complicated but it’s really just the purchasing of product, moving it to storage and on to distribution centers for holding, selecting of orders and the final delivery to be used or consumed. All this is warehousing and all its ordering systems and transportation and its movement and tracking systems. And that’s Logistics!
Thanks for listening in today, and be sure to check out our show notes for those links, there’s some good reading there. Until next week work safe and think safe, and lets look over our planning and career goals, are you on track to reach your goals?