Shippers are constantly looking for a balance between costs and customer satisfaction. This was evident from a survey we conducted last year among shippers in Belgium and the Netherlands. And in conversations with (potential) customers, too, I increasingly hear about a search for balance. On the one hand, shippers want to work with standards, but on the other they need flexibility.
The link between standards and flexibility is fairly obvious. Working with a certain standard often has a positive impact on costs. And flexibility is in the interest of the customer, who is at the centre of the supply chain objectives. In many cases, it is also quite possible to work on the basis of standards. Yet a certain degree of flexibility is always needed. After all, each carrier has different needs as a result of different modalities. And even within a modality, there are differences.
Differing requirements
Take road transport in Europe as an example. It could just happen that an international carrier has completely different requirements in terms of timing and content in Romania than in France, even though it is the same company. Sometimes it even differs per depot which fields should be seen in a transport management system (TMS). The reason: such companies have often grown rapidly through acquisitions and often the different business units continue to use their own systems. After all, IT is not their core business, so the thinking is often, "If it works, it works." So they may want to work based on standards, but are not (yet) ready to do so. I also see this in the market with the big, global carriers versus the carrier from around the corner. The first group is made up of well-known, global companies that use a standard themselves, or even impose it, while the second group of companies may not even communicate via EDI, because they are simply too small. And then there is another group in between, which usually adopts the solution provider's standard. In short, while standardisation is the desire, a lot of flexibility is still needed now to support the current market situation.
The same applies to applications, such as a transport management system: the preference will mainly be for standardisation. Because the more that can be delivered as standard, the lower the costs will be. In practice, I see that a standard package is usually not enough for an organisation. After all, every company is unique and that is precisely what makes it stand out from the competition. It is therefore important that applications like a transport management system are also able to support these unique processes. This means that flexibility is also needed here.
Future vision
Of course, the combination of standard and flexibility is nothing new. And thanks to new, mostly cloud-based technologies, new insights - such as the integration of different modalities - and new customer requirements that follow each other in rapid succession, I think that this combination will continue to develop rapidly. We used to be willing to pay for flexibility, but now it is normal that this is part of a service provider's service.
So I come to the conclusion that, on the one hand, standards are becoming even more important and that, on the other hand, the need for flexibility is increasing. Because, on the one hand, as a company you want to reduce costs, while on the other hand you need to be able to continue to meet continuous changes, such as the consumer becoming more and more demanding. As a basis for this, I see a network to which the various parties in the supply chain can be connected, because I notice in practice that there is a lot of need for connectivity. But do you then choose standardisation or flexibility? In my view, the solution lies in a cloud platform that allows you to work cost-effectively with standard procedures, but which can also be expanded with services whenever you want. For companies, replacing a working network is obviously a big step, yet I see it bringing more advantages than disadvantages. You improve information delivery, which leads to higher customer satisfaction, and you therefore find the balance between costs and customer satisfaction.
Arthur Lasschuyt, Product Manager Transport Management Europe at Descartes
Descartes will be present at ICT and Logistics in the Jaarbeurs from 28 to 30 November, Stand: 03.D041.
