Mike Griswold is the Vice President of Research at Gartner, specializing in retail with a particular focus on forecasting and replenishment. He is responsible for Gartner’s annual Top 25 Supply Chain ranking and joins Supply Chain Now on a monthly basis to discuss the latest in retail supply chains from an analyst’s perspective.

Gartner held their 2021 Americas Supply Chain Symposium/XPO in late October. The overarching theme was ‘People, Profit, and Planet.’ As the speakers shared, these core ideas are not just critical to companies and customers, they each provide opportunities for supply chains to make a measurable value contribution in the short term as well as into the future.

In this episode, which was created as part of a Supply Chain Now livestream, Mike shares his key takeaways from the 2021 Americas Supply Chain Symposium/XPO with co-hosts Greg White and Scott Luton:

• The idea of ‘people, profit and planet’ as shared by Gartner Analysts Dana Stiffler and Simon Bailey in the event keynote
• Why organizations need to recognize the varied priorities of their customers/consumers and factor those into their planning and decision making
• How companies can prepare themselves to achieve the transparency and make the commitments required to support their people and be accountable with regard to their environmental impact

Intro/Outro (00:00:06):

Welcome to supply chain. Now the voice of global supply chain supply chain now focuses on the best in the business for our worldwide audience, the people, the technologies, the best practices, and today’s critical issues. The challenges and opportunities stay tuned to hear from those making global business happen right here on supply chain now.

Scott Luton (00:00:34):

Hey, good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening. Welcome to our supply chain. Now livestream today, Greg white and Scott Luton here with you broadcasting live from the world championship city of Atlanta. GA Greg.

Greg White (00:00:49):

There you go. I like that. Yeah. To say it, doesn’t it.

Scott Luton (00:00:53):

We could speak for the next two weeks around this season and more importantly, what this championship means for this franchise and this city. Uh, it’s just, it’s a beautiful thing and that

Greg White (00:01:06):

It is. And I think, you know, first of all, you’re a long time, long suffering and long term, a Braves fan. So congratulations to you and clay and everyone who has been basically a lifetime fan of the Braves. But I got to tell you, the players really got it, right. I think we all know, well, many, many people know Atlanta’s, whatever you want to call it hurdle. Even when they get to championship games, it’s been a minute since we won one in any sport. And, um, I think a lot of people not only were really encouraged as sports fans, but as members of the Atlanta community. And I think it’s incredible how uplifting it is and the players get that they get how important it is to people’s identity as Atlantans. So very well said,

Scott Luton (00:01:59):

Well said, Greg, I’m on I’m I’m glad you just share that because that really hits the hits right on the nose. So big, we’re celebrating for the next several days, weeks, years, you name it, uh, the Atlanta Braves winning the world series. And, uh, but for today’s conversation, I promise it’s not gonna be all about baseball and the Braves. We have got one of our favorite and most popular, uh, additions of our live stream supply chain today and tomorrow with the one and only Mike Griswold from Gartner. So today, Greg, we’re gonna be talking about key takeaways from the recent Gartner, uh, supply chain symposium expo 2021 for the Americas. So another opportunity to optimize that supply chain IQ, right?

Greg White (00:02:40):

It seems like we were just talking about expo for last year. Doesn’t it? I mean, it, it’s kind of flown by the last 12 months. And I hear a lot of that too. People particularly talking about October, but I think 2021 is flown by kind of the way we wish that previous year that shall not ever be mentioned. We wish it had flown by

Scott Luton (00:02:59):

That’s right way. Uh, so join us as Mike Griswold would join us here in about 10 minutes. So looking forward, always looking forward, his perspective, uh, when his appearances, usually we get the most feedback or at least as much feedback about a lot of the things we do here. So get ready for that. But as we mentioned, we’re gonna say hello to a few folks in just a minute, but as we mentioned, yes, we’re celebrating our Atlanta Braves winning the world series. And by the way, folks, we can never we’re supply chain nerds.

Greg White (00:03:27):

So everything is viewed through the supply chain prism. And so even last night as Jorge Solaire hit that home run, I shared that that home run ball, which went out of the park, went further than many container ships did yesterday. And the beautiful thing there, Greg, this is on Facebook. The beautiful thing is, look, how many people got that joke because now they know what supply chains do and what containers are. That is really cool. Yeah. Yeah, it is. And actually my next door neighbor, uh, pointed out that there is a fly over, over Kennesaw, the national in OAA national, um, whatever it is, right as identified that Jorge Soler Solaris homerun is about to fly over Kennesaw, Georgia, just outside of Atlanta. That would be landing soon.

Scott Luton (00:04:18):

I love that. I wish I’d gotten a text from you earlier, cause I would’ve worked that one in as well, but folks kidding aside, this is really, you know, thank you for letting us have a little fun, but it really is cool to see how just how aware consumers are now that you know, the last 18 months have happened. So, okay, really quick. We want to invite you to a couple of events. We’ve got November 9th next week, supply chain of 20, 22 and beyond all that resiliency and agility with Laura and Mahtab join us for that. And Hey, if you watch the world series, you saw Cooper everywhere. So the link, right, the link to that is in the show notes and we have a new new webinar Gregory new webinar, a supply chain is a team sport lead your team to victory with a cloud native TMS.

Greg White (00:05:06):

Well, it’s fantastic cloud native. I think people think of that as a catch phrase, but the true differentiation of a cloud technology is, is immutable and never ending power. Basically it allows you to process so much more of the data rich environment that we have so much more quickly. It’s a game changer for literally a game changer

Scott Luton (00:05:29):

And in a real sense that word’s overused all the time, but it’s true. I agree with you. It really is a practical transformational game changer. Join us with our friends at Manhattan associates, by the way Bob and Greg, they won’t disappoint. They’re not only will informed and experts, but they’re, they’ve got a great sense of humor. So join us for that on November 18th at 12 noon. And then finally, before we say a load, a few folks and really enjoy, uh, let us know if you’ve already thought, if you already commented, make sure you let us know where you’re tuned in from. We love to kind of connect the dots on folks tuning in, especially from a global perspective. Finally, Greg, this show here today is produced in partnership with our friends at Zulu Ark who designed our stunning. Yes, we got that feedback, our stunning new website, supply chain now.com uh, as the arc is a leader in experience, uh, user experience design, the good Ole UX, right, and development of websites, but not just websites, custom supply chain software. Uh, you can learn more about Zahir and his, uh, top-notch team@azuleart.com and you know, Greg, my, one of my favorite things about the new site is the library function. Every site you go to these days has a search function. Some of them are far more powerful than others. That library function you can put in one or two words and it searches our entire inventory of close, if not over a thousand podcasts and to find the show you’re looking for.

Greg White (00:06:58):

Yeah. And anything on it, kind of a topic, right? If you just want to know, if you just want to hear about containers, right? I mean, you can just throw keywords in there and see what comes up and kind of scroll through the shows that you want to, you know, you want to look at and learn about certain topics. Yeah. It’s fantastic and great for the inattentive, right?

Scott Luton (00:07:20):

Sorry. I cut you for the inattentive. Um, we check out, you will not be disappointed. And plus the hero is a great guy. Uh, he joined us for a live stream not too long ago and talked about his, uh, culinary exploits, which is one of the things we’re going to talk about momentarily with the one only Greg Mike Griswold. All right. So Greg, we’ve got to say hello to a few folks. Let me switch some things around here. So a little bit easier to share some of these comments. So Tara brown is with us and she is tuned in Greg from New York city.

Greg White (00:07:50):

I don’t know what the weather’s like up there. You know, I just realized having gone to Kansas city this weekend, that it’s getting to winter in the rest of the world, right? I mean, we were sort of protected from it until about the end of December here, but

Scott Luton (00:08:06):

Well, Tara, let us know how cold it is up there. Great to see here today, a adult woo from Nigeria. Hello. Welcome to us via LinkedIn. Look forward to hearing your perspective today and folks just to give you a little sneak peek again, we’re gonna be talking about key takeaways from the recent Gartner supply chain symposium and expo focus on the Americas, but we’re also gonna be talking about, uh, what business leaders are doing. What are they planning the usual and maybe some surprising stuff for 2022. So get your POV ready. Gene pledger is back with us from Northern Alabama, but he’s in Chicago today. So he says, go Braves about that, Greg.

Greg White (00:08:43):

Yeah. Well, and stay tuned Jean, because we’re going to be talking about where you are shortly. Scott doesn’t even know why yet.

Scott Luton (00:08:50):

So Jean and Amanda and big things, uh, Allie Jayda and Amanda, the scenes helping production happen today, if y’all would find using that library function, we talked about that search function find genes, appearance on supply chain is boring and drop that the comments Jean tunes in all the time. And he gave a great interview with Chris Barnes, not too long ago, it is very boring, uh, arrest us from Kenya. Uh, and if I mispronounced that, let us know how to say it. Right. And it’s so important to get names, right. Uh, great to have you here today, be a LinkedIn looking forward to your perspective, Greg, we have Adida Mola, Adida Mola, perhaps.

Greg White (00:09:29):

Yeah,

Scott Luton (00:09:29):

We try, we try it. You know, my kids’ names still throw me for a loop from time to time. Uh, so let us know if we get it wrong, but Hey, she is a master’s in supply chain student or no master student in logistics and supply chain management at a university of whole in the UK. How about that, Greg?

Greg White (00:09:48):

That’s fantastic. You know that, you know, I think we sometimes forget about schools outside the states we do, of course, but there are some fantastic organizations in schools outside of the U S making waves and supply chain education

Scott Luton (00:10:04):

Agreed so

Greg White (00:10:06):

Many more than when you and I started.

Scott Luton (00:10:09):

We’ll have more. And that’s the beautiful thing too. So thanks so much for tuning in and looking forward to hearing your perspective. We’ve got Eric with us from he’s local, from Duluth Georgia. Great to see it is a gorgeous day here today. Thanks for joining us, Eric. Sophia’s back two days in a row. She says hoping to keep up the streak. Greg Sophia is one of our faves, right?

Greg White (00:10:29):

Yeah, no doubt. We just need to make sure it’s actually Sophia, not her sister. Right? Cause I think like

Scott Luton (00:10:37):

That’s right. Double trouble. Yeah. But great to see Sophie looking forward to your perspective here today. Always a pleasure. I’m not sure who this LinkedIn user is. Let us know if you can, you know, sometimes folks, if you, if you comment on LinkedIn and it doesn’t share your name or your profile, it’s just a security setting that, uh, you have the option of going in and fixing on your profile. So, um, this user says hello from Minneapolis St. Paul, congratulations on the Braves, win that out of the park home run. Wow. I’m I’m with you

Greg White (00:11:07):

Literally out of the park. I’m sure there’s somebody out there with a broken windshield today. You know,

Scott Luton (00:11:15):

That is an S Colleen is, uh, as the folks and the production team. Let me know. So Colleen, thanks so much for joining us here today. I’m going to shoot through a couple of these really quick. And so we can get to our, uh, interview today, Josh. Hello from Seattle. Great to have you here, looking forward to your perspective. Tara says it’s really chilly in New York city, as you might expect. And Sophia says, it’s both of us. We’ve got

Greg White (00:11:38):

Sophia has introduced her sister Andrea into, into supply chain and she is kind of a fan

Scott Luton (00:11:45):

That’s right? What fan an ambassador for the industry. And gosh, I love read her analysis when she attends an event or speaks at an event or what have you. I love her, her recap. So Sophia you’re doing great work for industry and all of us here. So on that note, Greg, speaking of an ambassador for, for global supply chain, my Griswold is, has got that in, in truckloads. So we ready to bring him on. Yeah, let’s do it. Okay. So with no further ado, I want to welcome in our featured distinguished guests here today. Want to welcome in Mike Griswold? Vice-president analyst with Gartner, Hey Mike, how you doing?

Mike Griswold (00:12:24):

Hey everybody. I doing great. You know, I was, I always love the talk you guys have beforehand. And I, and I know I’ll mess this up, but we did a show a couple of months ago on movie. There’s a line in bull Durham about a home run that leaves the park. And I think Kevin Costner said the only park it would have stayed in is Yellowstone. So I know that’s not quite exactly, but the spirit is that yes, yes. God, that ball is still traveling.

Scott Luton (00:12:57):

Yeah,

Mike Griswold (00:13:00):

That’s right.

Scott Luton (00:13:02):

Uh, right on the money might appreciate you sharing and it tell you, uh, such a delight to watch that game. Especially after game five, when we didn’t clinch it home, we all as best as Atlanta Braves nation, we all kind of had some thoughts about what was coming next. But man, that was just awesome. So before we get to the heavy lifting, speaking of, and folks, I promise you, we’re not gonna talk too much more about the inner Braves here today. Not too much, not too much, but we had a fascinating and yes, fascinating. You think with food is fascinating, especially if it’s real pre-show conversation around sandwiches and chicken wings. So we’re going to say the chicken wings discussion. Maybe, maybe we’ll wrap that around the super bowl edition in January, but Mike today is national sandwich day. And so Greg and I chatted a lot about this on Monday on the bus, we got a ton of great perspective from folks and sky boxes. And we will know your favorite sandwiches, folks that are tuned in. But Mike question is for you, what is your favorite sandwich? And where’d you get it?

Mike Griswold (00:14:00):

Yeah. Well, first of all, sky, I don’t know how you find all these day things, right? Every time I come on, it’s a new day of whatever. So there must be a glossary or something somewhere where you’re keeping track all this. So kudos for you for keeping track of all this. So I’ll be very interested given the diverse nature of our audience, if anyone else has an affinity for this sandwich. So growing up in Western New York, we have this sandwich called a beef on WIC, which is basically thinly shave roast beef, usually serve warm a little bit of a light Oz you sauce, but what makes it is the role? It is a Kimmel WIC role, which is basically a big role with salt on top. And I, the only place I can get it is when I go back home and see my parents. There’s a little, the town still has a driving. If you will believe in, it’s actually one of the more famous drive-ins in all of New York state, because it’s only one of the few that’s left. Well, there’s a place called the charcoal corral. It sits on a little lake and you know, it started as an ice cream place. Now it’s a big restaurant and that’s where I go get my beef on WIC. When I go see my parents beef,

Greg White (00:15:12):

Is it, I mean, is it, it must obviously a local thing, but why Is it a variation?

Mike Griswold (00:15:22):

Yeah, it’s, it’s a Western New York thing, Greg, but it really comes down to the, to the role because the role has kind of a not assessing me. See, but it’s got like a darker seed and salt and it’s that combination of the roll and the roast beef that is just, I can’t, I can’t find it any place else. And it’s, and I’m sure people, you know, when you find your food from, from where it grew up and you have that same thing someplace else, it’s never the same. Right. It just, it just never is. So yeah.

Scott Luton (00:15:56):

I love that. And really quick. And Greg, I’m going to, I’ve got a question for you, but beef on WIC is actually spelled w E C K. Right? Exactly. And secondly, I’m looking on Wikipedia here. It said that a local pub owner is said to have used the role to create the best beef on WIC with the thought that the salty top of the roll would encourage his patrons to purchase more drinks. There you go.

Mike Griswold (00:16:20):

It works. Trust me. It

Scott Luton (00:16:22):

Works. Love it. Okay. So, uh that’s so I’m going to check out beef on WIC, but Greg, so we asked about your favorite sandwich Monday, and that was the egg salad, egg sandwich, but different question for you. What is the best sandwich you’ve had at a ballpark? And then you do a lot of traveling, of course, with the Kansas city chiefs and others. What’s your

Greg White (00:16:42):

Favorite Italian beef sandwich at Wrigley field. So not, not dissimilar to a beef on WIC. It’s got a little bit of all juice sauce. It’s thinly sliced beef it’s on a hoagie roll is that, you know, to put it in New York terms, but, uh, it’s a fantastic sandwich. It’s really famous and often done around, um, around Chicago. If you can’t get to a Cub Cubs game and get it the best, not just sandwich, but experience for an Italian beef sandwich in Chicago is Mr. Beef where, when he was coming up as a stand-up comedian. Oh my God. I totally forgot his name. The chin, uh,

Mike Griswold (00:17:28):

Jay Leno,

Greg White (00:17:29):

Leno. Yeah. Slept in the back of the place with a cop. And it’s one of those places where it’s kind of like the varsity Scott except much more profane. You better be ready to order, or you will literally be cursed out. And I’ve seen people thrown out for not being ready, cursed at and thrown out for not being ready order, but I’m telling you the sandwich is worth the abuse.

Scott Luton (00:17:53):

I’m going there. Next. We’re going there next. Uh, Mr. Beat. Well, Hey speaking one last little tidbit about sandwiches and we’re going to move forward is, uh, as we learn, we published a whole podcast on sandwiches, the sandwich industry on this week in business history this past Monday. And one of the things I learned there is the there’s a sub us Navy sub base in Groton, Connecticut. Right. And they placed an order back during world war II for a lot of hero sandwiches from a local sandwich shop. Well that coin, that restaurant started calling those sandwiches for the sub-base subs. And that’s where that term originated at night.

Greg White (00:18:29):

Yeah.

Scott Luton (00:18:30):

So you never know, you never, you make a bunch of assumptions around where this term came from or what goes on a beef on Weck or what Mr. Beef’s all about. It is really fascinating

Greg White (00:18:40):

Now I totally get it right. Yeah.

Mike Griswold (00:18:43):

Or grinder all them grinders, which I don’t to know how we got to that name.

Scott Luton (00:18:50):

Well, we’ll find out about that. Michael Avra. Good afternoon, Scott. Sorry. I was running behind. Had a great time celebrating the Braves when I’m with you,

Greg White (00:18:58):

But put a lot of people behind today.

Scott Luton (00:19:02):

Speaking of food, Jean is doing Harry Carrie’s restaurant tonight. Bone-in ribeye will think of you all. He says, thanks so much, Jane. All right. So that enough fun. We got to get to the heavy lifting. What folks signed up, uh, to hear us talk about and learn from Mike. And that is the 2021 Gartner supply chain symposium expo focused on the Americas market. And just like last time we focused on the AMEA version of the event, your last appearance with us. Now we want to hear kind of your key takeaways from the latest that focus more on the Americas market. So where do we start there, Mike?

Mike Griswold (00:19:37):

Yeah, first I want to, I want to thank anyone who, who came to the event. We had about 3,900 people registered, which is fantastic for a virtual event. I did a session with REI and Starbucks on SNOP and SNOP they had almost 250 people, um, virtually. So I want to thank anyone and everyone who might be joining us today that took the time to go to our event. Really appreciate that to your question, Scott and Greg, I think what I want to focus on today is really the big takeaway from the Gardner keynote. So we had two of my colleagues, Dana Stiffler and Simon Bailey talk about this idea of people, profit and planet. That was the overarching theme of our event. And I want to start maybe with the people profit and planet piece first, and then maybe see where we go from there.

Mike Griswold (00:20:33):

But I also want to talk a little bit about the profit piece in a little bit more detail, because I think it’s important. It’s an important context for us maybe for, for our time together. So, and I think the reason I want to focus on that is I think from this will be a generalization, but I think here in the states, we have a little bit more work to do than maybe some other parts of the world in terms of acknowledging and recognizing and putting plans into place around how our supply chain can support those three areas. So if I start with the profit piece, right, that’s pretty straightforward. Organizations are in business to make money and I get that. But one of the things we talked about is, is the impact that striving just for profit can have not only in our supply chain, but our other constituents.

Mike Griswold (00:21:27):

And one of the things we talked about is this idea of sustainable profitability and this idea that we can chase, chase short-term profit at the expense of lots of natural resources. And I would suggest that includes our people resources as well. So we talked about how do you think about this? Maybe a little bit more long-term and I’ll go through that a little bit more detail. When I talk about the three types of profit that, that we’re talking about it and researching and writing about the second is people. And we’ve had, I think a lot of really good conversations, just us together in this forum about the impact on people over the last, uh, 12 to 18 to maybe even 24 months, we did a survey, uh, and 55% of the respondents, which is a very scary and sad number, 55% of the respondents said they had personally experienced some type of bad health occurrence over the course of the pandemic, that percent 55%.

Mike Griswold (00:22:28):

Wow. That could be everything from, from physical to mental, to, you know, friends and family. But that’s a lot of people that are, that have been impacted. And as an organization, as a supply chain, how do we recognize that in deal with what is arguably our most important resource, which is people couple that with, you know, the work we still need to do from a DNI perspective and that people component is really important. Uh, and then lastly, the planet and, you know, I think if, if you listened to the keynote, there there’s things that I’m sure people didn’t just, that people did not agree with relative to kind of how we got to the situation that we’re in today. And, you know, depending on, on what scientist you want to talk to or read there’s different perspectives around kind of what our future looks like.

Mike Griswold (00:23:22):

I think there’s very little debate though, that there are things we need to start doing now relative to things like greenhouse gas emissions, things like plastics. Um, I’m sure everyone has seen the stat. I think it’s by 2025, there’ll be more plastic than fish in the ocean. I mean, those types of things that while the supply chain may not directly control, we certainly have an influence. And when I think about those three areas, people profit and planet, and I think about the role that the supply chain plays in all three of those, it was just, I think, a great topic for us to kick off our, our, uh, event. And I think it’s a great topic for us to talk about amongst ourselves, but also get, get perspectives from, from the people that took the time out to join us today. So those are the three big things, Scott and Greg that I’ll at least start with

Scott Luton (00:24:15):

Powerful framework. Uh, Greg want to come to you when you hear people profit and planet. Uh, it’s gonna be tough to, to give that a go in, you know, 30 minutes timeframe here today, but what comes to mind and what might just share it?

Greg White (00:24:29):

I think about, you know, the old economic term enlightened self-interest right. I mean, I think ultimately I believe that for a company specifically, everything comes back, you know, follow the money, right? Everything comes back to making the company profitable and sustainable as a company. And I think companies are more and more recognizing this notion of conscious capitalism, right? Which our friend Enrique Alvarez, he went to, uh, an entire conference about conscious capitalism, but about this enlightened self-interest of, if you want to make your company sustainable, make your tiny company sustainable, right? I mean, if you want the company to be longterm and you want it to engage appropriately with its constituencies, like employees like employees and now consumers who are ever so much more aware of the sustainability and the good at good and bad, bad actors in commerce, then make your company more sustainable. Right. Use used the right kinds of unfair labor fair trade practices, stay away from conflict minerals. And of course, global sustainability, right. Sustainability in terms of the environment. So it makes me think of that. It’s a concept that I think is, you know, what Mike is describing is just a next layer down from this notion of conscious capitalism or, or enlightened self-interest. And it’s a guide line to how to accomplish that. And I think that’s really important for conference

Scott Luton (00:26:04):

Well said, Greg, okay. So Mike, where are we starting with the people profit and planet?

Mike Griswold (00:26:10):

Why don’t we start with a profit piece? Because I think if I pick up on what Greg just talked about, I think it’s when organizations think about kind of, why are they here? Right. Profit tends to be, you know, one of the things that that comes up and what we’ve started to look at and started to talk to people about are really three types of profit, this idea of durable, profit, holistic, profit, and resilient profit. And really what that does is it takes people, planet and profit to that next. And it makes you ask yourself, okay, to what length are we willing to go to make a profit? And I think what we’re finding is organizations are taking somewhat of a step back and saying it no longer can be profit at all costs. It needs to be profit from the standpoint of, you know, what are we taking from and giving back to our ecosystem, right?

Mike Griswold (00:27:13):

Let’s think of this as an ecosystem because Greg mentioned very appropriately, you know, our ecosystem. We used to think of it as just shareholders, right? And wall street. If we were a publicly traded company, now we have to think about our associates as constituents. And we have to think about the customer slash consumer. However, we define him in her, right? If I’m a manufacturer, my customer might be a retailer, but I also have to recognize that the end consumer, right, the three of us and everyone else together today, we, we make decisions on the physical products. We buy through our own decision tree. Right, right. For some people, the environmental impact is the number one decision they make. If I go to the other end of the spectrum, other people make decisions based on price, right? So we, as organizations need to recognize that. And I think the big takeaway from our conference is how do we as supply chain professionals, professionals enable that balance, that balance between, Hey, we, we’ve got a business to run and we have financial obligations, but how do we do that in a responsible way, both from the resources we consume, the resources we put back, but what I’m finding more and more of a discussion topic is the people side of this.

Mike Griswold (00:28:38):

And we’ve had lots of conversations, even pre COVID around things like skillset gaps and all that. Right. I saw a story the other day about more and more people, you know, basically coming out of the, out of COVID retiring early, right? Not so much a I forgot the word that they use, but it wasn’t basically, you know, people quitting. It was, they were retiring early, right. So we’ve got this, we’re going to face kind of an educational dream out of organizations and expertise drained out of organizations. As people figure out that, you know, there’s more to life than, than doing XYZ. And it, and I’m going to take advantage of that from a personal perspective, but then what does that mean to the organization and how do we plan for that from a people side? So,

Scott Luton (00:29:28):

Um, interject two quick thoughts, number one, I love the sense of purpose that is that’s, uh, growing and establishing itself in leadership, global leadership. That’s a wonderful development over the last couple of decades. You know, it’s always been there in some degree, but some of the generations that are hitting the executive suite, the, uh, in the last couple of decades, it’s really brought in truckloads. And then secondly, to your last point, and Greg, I’d love to get you to come in here. We are facing undoubtedly, especially in global supply chain, uh, the burnout burden, you know, we’ve put our workforce, our global workforce is through the ringer to get through these, these uniquely challenging times. So we all, shouldn’t be surprised, you know, between compensation treatment, other factors, health factors, like Mike just mentioned 55%, holy cow, as leaders, we’re going to have to, um, find a way, uh, to, to defeat the burnout and, and some of the factors that make that up, Greg.

Greg White (00:30:27):

Yeah. I think there are some jobs that just won’t come back to humans doing them. I mean, we take, we keep using this, this phrase, the dark, the dirty than the dangerous, but also the repetitive and mundane. I think a lot of those jobs will never be, we’ll never employ humans again. And I think that, and this is purely opinion as if anyone wouldn’t know that. I think that we have reached this crossroads where it’s no longer technology is going to take my job where these incoming generations of workers are like, why isn’t technology doing that job. Right. And we no longer have to apologize for technology doing certain jobs because the people who are doing them, when we think of the mat, uh, the great resignation, I think the statistics are point far more to our generation then to the younger generations resigning. It is the baby boomers, the gen X-ers and the like who hold all the knowledge that Mike is talking about because they were brought up in industry when you new stuff, because you learned it on the job.

Greg White (00:31:37):

Not because companies had great training programs, right. And we risk losing a lot of knowledge there, but I do think, and I, I think it’s important for us to consciously capture that knowledge and deploy that to technology and impart that knowledge to technology, to allow them to do the jobs that are dark, dirty, dangerous, or mundane, and repetitive, and allow technology to do that and allow humans to do human things, right. That, uh, analysis that rapid analysis of inadequate or inaccurate data to make, maybe not life-changing but impactful decisions in instantaneously. So I think we’ll see a lot of that trend. We’ll do a lot less apologizing for technology coming into the workplace then than we have even just a year or two ago.

Scott Luton (00:32:28):

Greg. All right. So Mike, uh, let’s keep driving here. We’ve kind of touched on profit. We’ve touched on people here most recently, where are we going next? I think let’s, let’s maybe with

Mike Griswold (00:32:39):

People just for a moment, because one of the things that, that we’ve been working on internally at Gardner is how are we going to go back to work and how are we going to, you know, help associates decide what’s the right work environment for them. Right. So we we’ve been looking at that a lot internally, and I think that’s helped us start to think about how might we advise people going forward for, for themselves? How, how should we, how should they think about going back to work? We saw a stat in another one of our surveys, and I may have mentioned it last time, something like 45 to 47% of people when asked if I have to go back to the office, what will you do? They said they would quit. So yes. So the challenge I think is we think about this people profit and planet is how do you balance the way we think we had generated profit, which is everybody’s butt in a seat, in an office, right?

Mike Griswold (00:33:42):

To now we’ve got organizations that generated significant profit with people’s butts in their own seats, right. In their own homes, apartments, wherever it might be. So how do you, how do you kind of build on that momentum where you were very successful as an organization in a remote environment? How do you kind of capitalize on that? Moving forward as things quote, unquote, get back to normal. So what we’re doing right is, is we’ve identified, you know, multiple ways based on people’s roles, about what the expectation is about coming into an office. And we were, we’re very clear on that. My advice to organizations is, is to reflect on the success that you had and the environment that you had that drove that success. And how do you deploy that moving forward? I think even in retail, when I talk to retailers who, who, you know, never would have envisioned a world where any of them worked remotely, even in retail, I’m finding lots and lots of retailers who are going to, you know, worst case, a hybrid approach where you’re only in the office one or two days a week, right.

Mike Griswold (00:35:00):

You know, most of the retailers, I’m talking to have no plans to make everyone come back to their office five days a week. I think that’s really important that organizations find that balance because of the environment and the success they’ve had, because you, you run the risk to Greg’s earlier point around knowledge drain, you run the risk. If you make everyone come back and I’ve seen some of the, you know, the big investment companies and some of those folks, you know, on wall street say, yes, everyone will be back in the office and that’s fine. But I think like with some other, this kind of draconian mandate is going to cause people more problems than if they look at this a little bit more holistically,

Scott Luton (00:35:46):

Excellent point

Greg White (00:35:47):

Regarding senior cause problems to allegedly progressive technology companies, Google and Facebook demanded that their people come back to the office and they had a mutiny on there. Right.

Scott Luton (00:35:59):

So that’s a great word. There

Greg White (00:36:01):

Is a great word. I was thinking about that.

Scott Luton (00:36:03):

I want to, I’m gonna share a couple of comments and then Greg I’ll place for you to respond to what you just heard Mike say there. And some of these comments, so via says, we are currently experiencing that great resignation phase globally, more than 40% of employees are considering quitting their jobs. Right? Colleen says, I think this is Colleen or correct me if I’m wrong. Um, Amanda absolutely agree. Technology is a tool to more efficiently do the job. And it enables employees to work smarter, not harder globally. We are in catch-up mode in terms of bringing supply chains into the future by leveraging tech we’ll set Colleen. Um, and then finally, Michael, who’s got a couple of good comments here, but Michael says supply chain was always a group that worked long in off hours. And now organizations are asking even more from us, which does burn people out. I have witnessed it firsthand over the past 12 to 18 months. Well said,

Greg White (00:36:55):

Michael, for sure.

Scott Luton (00:36:57):

Greg, your thoughts,

Greg White (00:37:00):

Uh, so many thoughts, but I mean, um, I think that this, this is a great transition. It’s an absolute necessity for transition. As Mike has said, as we’ve said many, many times we were 2 million practitioners and professionals short going into the pandemic in supply chain with no prospect of gaining practitioners into the industry. In fact, we were just starting to build momentum of people coming into the industry when the pandemic hit. And I think that there, you know, when you think about, when you think about supply chain supply chain, when we all came into, it was a brute force industry, it was all about the physical. It was all about the lift. It was all about the push, the tug, whatever. And now it’s much, much more a scientific industry. And that science will allow us to identify where brute force is necessary, where technology is necessary, where efficiency and optimization is necessary, right where transparency and sustainability are necessary and really has forced us to upscale the entire practice.

Greg White (00:38:11):

So I think that, I think we’re in a very, very good place also with, with labor rates being where they are and call it whatever you want, labor shortage or whatever, you know, it’s something we’ve been facing for a long time. I think we have finally been presented with the economics that, that conscious capitalism or, or enlightened self-interest that will get people to automate the jobs that frankly probably should have been automated before, except that generations who took those jobs and didn’t want to give those jobs up demanded to retain. And as that though, that, and those generations retire in droves, then you’ll have less of that protest that we talked about and we’ll gain a tremendous amount of efficiency and profitability in that aspect of the business.

Scott Luton (00:38:59):

Well, a really quick, and my, and my can come back to you. You know, my, when I was in high school, uh, working for a car dealership one summer for five bucks an hour, washing cars on a hot South Carolina black top, right. That was tough work. I can’t get my kids to do air conditioned easy. It might be a little bit repetitive work for five bucks an hour these days. And really, of course, I’m tongue in cheek here, but there’s a little kernel of truth there in terms of what folks want to do these days and what they do not want to do these days. And you’re talking about labor rates and some of those, those preferences, Greg, it is it’s, you know, we were available occasionally with business leaders. I don’t think have really embraced that for what it truly is at this point in time, Mike, but anyway, let’s keep, let’s keep driving. Uh, sticking with people are going to plant it yet.

Mike Griswold (00:39:48):

Let’s go to planet maybe as a, as a quick wrap up. If I think about, you know, the, the journey we’ve been on over the last maybe five to even eight years, if I think about where we were, even from a research perspective at gardener, right? We, if we, if we rewind the clock, maybe even eight to 10 years ago, there was this thing called the environment. You know, we, we were publishing companies were we’re setting some loose targets basically, so they could just check a box. And I think there was a time where people were the, the external environment. The ecosystem was basically looking, did you check the box, but no one really cared if you actually did anything. If I fast forward to today, that has completely changed. I think there is much more accountability, both internally from the associates, certainly externally within the ecosystem around what are you doing to, or for the planet.

Mike Griswold (00:40:48):

I think the supply chain certainly has an incredible role to play in there to your point, Greg, around, you know, the automation element of that. You know, we’re seeing when I think about the top 25 briefings that I take as part of that role, that I have so many companies we’re talking about autonomous vehicles, the, the growth in their electric fleet, all those types of, of kind of, you know, greenhouse gas, carbon emission types of things, to be focused on that. You know, I think there is a greater awareness and a greater accountability of the impact that an organization and their supply chain has on the planet and has on the environment. You know, we have as part of our top 25 methodology, we have an ESG environment, environmental, social, and governance component. There’s three elements to that commitment, transparency, and performance, because we feel it’s important that you do all three, right?

Mike Griswold (00:41:47):

You have to be committed. You have to be transparent about what you’re doing, but you also have to actually be doing stuff right. And being able to measure what we’re doing. I think my last point, which I think really for me, at least hits home in Greg, because you, you play in this area a lot more than I do. The financial community is now recognizing CSR ESG. There’s formal ratings from the financial institutions around how well companies do this. And I think to me, that was kind of the last box to check around, is this going to be sticky? And to me, the answer is, yes, it is sticky. And when the financial community gets involved in, it becomes important to them. To me, that’s kind of the last hurdle that says, if you thought environmental awareness was a fad, forget it. It’s not, it now needs to be a conscious thought in an organization. And it has to percolate into the supply chain, Greg,

Greg White (00:42:50):

Some firms, some of the firms that I work with have what’s called an ESG mandate in, in their investment thesis, meaning you must be sustainable ESG environment, social governance. Right. But yeah, I mean that, as I always say, follow the money when the money says you need to do it right, then you have to do it. And I’m glad. And another key word that you put there, Mike is transparency. It is impossible to hide these days. I am so thankful for the transparency, from the interest in consumers, the interest in companies and the ability vis-a-vis data that is provided to be able to expose, or at least identify if you don’t expose what people are doing, you’re identifying at least those people who are hiding what they’re doing. Right. And I think I cannot believe I’m going to say this. Scott Loudin. I think the United States, federal government has done one of the best things in terms of assuring equity and good actor ship among companies.

Greg White (00:43:54):

They are assuming that if you don’t confirm that you’re not doing bad, that you in fact are. And I think more and more of that spirit, right, this whole, the whole, uh, Xinjiang province and using weaker slaves to produce goods. If you cannot stay unequivocally that you’re not doing it, they’re assuming that you are. And I think that is a safe assumption. I mean, we know why companies like de beers are so lacked so much transparency in their process of mining diamonds. We know why certain companies don’t report on ESG. And I think if we want to get real action, we assume that they are in fact bad actors and that will force them to become good actors and provide the transparency that Mike is, is talking about excellent, an inverse, right? It’s an inverse risk reward scenario. If you, if you assume they are good actors, when they don’t report, what’s their incentive to report, right? You’ve essentially forced them to do it by assuming that that, you know, in the market safely, assuming that they are in fact bad actors. That’s an interesting twist on the perspective

Scott Luton (00:45:07):

And lives are at stake. That’s, what’s at stake when it comes to these things, but all true, but I’m talking specifically about, you know, the regional slavery that you’ve alluded to Greg and human trafficking, which is closely associated folks. Uh, if you will learn more about this, uh, we are partnering with hope for justice, which is a global nonprofit, which, uh, is, is talk about it’ll blow your mind. What that the fact that slavery is in is, is, um, continuing to grow globally in 2021. So check out hope for justice. If y’all can drop that link in the comments, if you would, Amanda, to be great. All right, we’ve got to bring this to a close Mike, cause I, I want to three quick hitters, three quick hitters before we let you go. I know you’ve got a hard stop here. First quick hitter is when you think about 2022 and you’re rubbing elbows, all the business leaders that you do. What’s one thing that might surprise you about what they’re factoring into their plans for 2022.

Mike Griswold (00:46:06):

I think it’s, it’s trying to wrap their arms around scarcity. And I think what we’re finding is it encompasses all the things we talked about. Scarcity in today’s environment has a broad definition. It certainly is product scarcity, but what we’re also quickly finding is a capacity scarcity and a resource scarcity. So as people are thinking about 2022, my advice is to think about the availability. Think about maybe to Craig’s point, the inverse of scarcity, which is the availability of resources. Right? Think about what, what do you have access to? How comfortable are you that you’ll have access to it and use things like SNOP to build contingency plans. Because what I’m finding over the last two years is people that have had the ability to pivot the ability to be, have a little bit more agility than others are the ones that are making out better or have made out better over the last two years than those folks that have had been much more reactive.

Scott Luton (00:47:13):

Yeah. Scarcity, man, that’s gonna, that’s gonna be the word. And in many ways of the months ahead, just like we’ve seen it on in the, in the last 12, 18 months. All right. And now we really wish we could just bolt on another hour here, that alone deserves a full discussion. As we start to wrap with Mike Rosewall with Gartner here, veteran’s day is coming up next week. So to partying all the supply chain discussion here today, veterans day is coming up November 11th. It’s a week from tomorrow, any regular ongoing traditions that you have in the Griswold household

Mike Griswold (00:47:48):

To, uh, and my wife is a Saint because she puts up with one of these. So normally the weekend after veteran’s day is I go through my list of my top five to 10 military movies. And I’ll watch one of them the weekend after veteran’s day, we could have a whole conversation on what my top five military movies are this week, this weekend after labor, after veterans day will be lone survivor. It’s one of my favorite books of all time. It’s a really good movie. The other thing though, I do, I started this a couple of years ago is a basketball season has started. I think most people know that I, that I coach, uh, the practice that we have on veterans day, I ask any of the girls, if they have parents or family members that were service members, and I take a moment to acknowledge all that, uh, with the team. So those are the,

Scott Luton (00:48:40):

I really appreciate that. And if I’m, if I’m my eyes, aren’t failing me that shot just over your right shoulder. Is that, is that you in a, in a team huddle?

Mike Griswold (00:48:48):

That was me and the team huddle last year.

Scott Luton (00:48:51):

Yeah, it was awesome. I love that. Well, and more importantly, I love what you just shared there. I think, um, oh, so much, you know, on our veteran veteran voices, um, podcast, that’s part of our gift for programming here. As we posted our weekly Wednesday heroes, making it happen, collection of good news in the veteran space, there was an image of a Navy seaman coming back and being reunited with his family, including his son who he had not seen, oh, that was, you know, a couple months old. And if that does remind you of that moment where you got families reuniting and you know, that just, that hits you in the gut. So appreciate what you do, Mike, uh, Greg, I gotta ask you what is, uh, what’s what do you look forward to every veteran’s day? So,

Greg White (00:49:36):

So, uh, some years ago I was made aware of the number of veterans suicides that occur. And there was this 22 pushup challenge, 2010 pushups a day for 22 days. Let me tell you that is a lot of work and is something I have done, not just during that timeframe, particularly during that timeframe, but tried to do every day it’s and it’s a workout. It is literally a workout, but so worthwhile. And it implants in your mind the struggles that veterans have after they have given service to the country. And I think that’s an important thing for us to keep in the forefront of our mind.

Mike Griswold (00:50:14):

Great,

Scott Luton (00:50:15):

Agreed. Find a way as, as, as you’ve said here before, uh, find a way, give small, give big, but just give and, um, I love that sentiment and we subscribed to it wholly, uh, completely a couple of comments here. Kelly’s heroes. Uh, this might be Colleen. So I love that show Christopher fits are under appreciated. I think. Yeah. I think we’ve come a long way, uh, in the last 20 years. And I would like to think that, but we’ve got a long way to go to this sentiment here. So Christopher, thanks for calling that out. Bat 21, he says his favorite.

Mike Griswold (00:50:52):

Well, I, I, I like that because it links gene Hackman, who I love Dan, I think Danny Glover, who I like, but it’s also the not to give too much away, but gene Hackman works his way out of captivity with golf course references. So it, it mixes everything that I like golf. It couldn’t get better than

Scott Luton (00:51:14):

Well, you know, speaking of, uh, not gene Hackman, but Danny Glover. Uh, and right before we ask, make sure Mike knows our audience knows how to connect with Mike. Uh, of course his, one of his famous lines of all time, Greg is I’m good. I’m way too old for this blank. Right? And speaking of the world series, it’s been forever since I stayed up and watch all those games, I’d completely forgotten. We were talking. Pre-show just how long and how late these world series games go. So it was all worth it. But man, there were a couple of times where I felt like Danny Glover.

Mike Griswold (00:51:47):

I, I would, I would argue that you’re in the wrong time zone because it was quite comfortable for me.

Greg White (00:51:53):

I think that’s an, that’s a valid point. Mike, we got to watch, you know, because me and some friends went to Kansas city, we got to watch the Sunday game in Kansas city and it was perfectly it wasn’t 10 30 getting your jammies.

Scott Luton (00:52:12):

And

Mike Griswold (00:52:15):

That’s my plug for the mountain time zone.

Scott Luton (00:52:18):

Uh, our next supply chain sponsored the mountain Thompson.

Greg White (00:52:23):

I think we got to start a new veteran’s day tradition and we can give thanks and shout out to our local veteran here. Scott, thank you for your service service while you were in service for all of your friends who are veterans, your support of these, of the veteran voices podcast and vet Lana and other initiatives that you support really appreciate you doing that.

Scott Luton (00:52:46):

You bet we do it as a team and, uh, it, it is an honor to do it. So, um, okay. Well Mike, thank you so much for, you know, Mike is always a good sport. Greg, we start talking food, we talk about massive important issues across global supply chain. And then we were apple things like, uh, veteran’s day and some other things. So

Greg White (00:53:05):

He’s one of us, whether you like it or not. My,

Scott Luton (00:53:10):

So on that note, uh, Mike, how can folks connect with you in the Gartner team, LinkedIn,

Mike Griswold (00:53:16):

For sure. And just feel free to send me an email. Mike Dockers is@gardner.com,

Scott Luton (00:53:21):

Wonderful looking forward to what’s next, next month. As we, as we rapidly approach it in the year. Big thanks to our dear friend. The one only my Griswold with Gardner. Thanks so much, Mike. Thanks everyone. Bye-bye He is just, uh, as down on earth, uh, on one side of the coin, but as rock solid finger on the pulse knows what is, um, you know, can always, he always delivers he’s he’s Mr. Consistent consistency, perhaps Greg, huh?

Greg White (00:53:52):

Yeah. I mean, I, I, you know, when I had a tech company, I worked a lot with Gardner analysts. I love working with my, and he is a hell of a golfer, by the way, he’ll take money off of you. I’m like, I would always make him part of my team, but he’s so knowledgeable he’s so in so many ways, so far ahead of the curve on some of the things that we are talking about that are challenges today, because he comes from retail. A lot of the problems that we see in manufacturing today have not yet been solved in manufacturing because manufacturing has so much higher margins than retail. Those things that have been solved can be adapted in many ways to manufacturing. That’s what he’s attempting to do with his SNOP and SNL E initiatives is to take what’s the best of manufacturing and drop it into retail and vice versa, take the best techniques of retail and push it up the chain to manufacturing. So a lot of good things,

Scott Luton (00:54:51):

A lot of goodness. Absolutely. Okay. One other note, I don’t have a link for this. Uh, but Kevin L. Jackson, who was also a veteran us Navy veteran, former Naval aviator amongst other things, he’s he is part of this effort project vet who’s appeared on some of our show previously. They’ve got, yeah, you might remember this. They’ve got the, the veterans bowl, the final, which is an e-sports championship, a way of engaging the veteran community and it’s really grown dramatically, Greg. And so what we’re looking at possibly doing, you don’t even know this yet. I’m going to completely surprise you. So their final takes place at the Lonnie Johnson stem activity center, which I got to find out where that is. Anyway, December 11th is their final we’re we’re, we’re trying to find a way of live streaming. He’s going to be there in person interviewing some of the veterans taking place and, and beyond talking e-sports with them, we’re gonna be talking about some of the issues facing the veteran community. It’s going to be just a really love rumbling tumbling, stumbling conversation. And, uh, we hope to get that set up in the end, but in the meantime, be sure to check out project vet. I think you can still sign off your veteran out there and you’re in the e-sports check them out. P R J K T project that, and I think you can find them@projectfit.com. And if Allie, Amanda or Jayda can look that up really quick and drop it in the comments, that would be wonderful. Okay, Greg,

Greg White (00:56:18):

Let’s just think about this. Scott, how would you like to face a team of veterans playing call of duty? about starting out behind the eight ball, right? You’re already coordinated. Just imagine that a platoon decides to make themselves a call of duty team,

Scott Luton (00:56:38):

You know, as a lowly data analyst that I was, uh, hand signals, uh, and you know, working through streets, they industries and whatnot. That was not part of what I did. So the first thing that comes to my mind, Greg is the two tiger. I see two tiger tanks from saving private Ryan. If you remember that talk about a masterpiece, huh? Yeah. And it looks like we have got the link to project vet in the links. Thanks so much for doing that so quickly. You’ll check that out. They do a lot of great work, but this veteran’s bowl is really cool that to engage our veterans that you know, in this environment right now, you can be really disconnected and, and there’s a lot of loneliness. So we gotta, we gotta overcome that. Okay, Greg, your final for us on off, what was, uh, one key thing you think about everything that Mike Griswold shared here today on his monthly appearance here on supply chain. Now, what was really one key thing that folks need to pay to?

Greg White (00:57:32):

I think they need to pay attention to the fact that gardener while predominantly a technology analytics or analysis organization is talking so much about people and the importance of people in the workforce, in the workplace. And as part of a key, uh, you know, part of your keys to success in the workplace. I mean, they never ignored it. I just want to be clear on that, but that they are recognizing and highlighting how important the workforce and people in the processes of attempt of accomplishing everything that they, that Mike laid out here, how, how much in the forefront they put human beings. That’s a critical thing for us to understand. We are headed for a lot of automation, right? Need dollar jobs to, to flip burgers are not sustainable from a profit standpoint and therefore will be automated. So, but there, but then what that, the challenge that that presents is what do we do with people?

Greg White (00:58:33):

And it, I think it goes to those unique gifts. We talked about earlier, the ability to make those rapid decisions, right? With, with very little or incorrect data that are highly meaningful, that is where we will position people in the future. And that will be better for everyone. It’ll allows human beings to do those things that are satisfying. So many people are dissatisfied with doing the physical, the mundane, the dangerous, right, the mind numbing. And, you know, I think we’re at a stage where we, where we really focus our efforts. We can challenge human minds to do the things that they do and satisfy their human needs. In the meantime, we’ll see

Scott Luton (00:59:12):

Very well said. Okay. So folks, thanks for being a part of our programming here today. Always a pleasure. Hey, join us on November 9th with friends from Kupa. Join us on November 18th with our friends from Manhattan associates, you’ll find the links to those in the show notes on behalf of our entire team here. Again, a big thanks to Amanda Jade and Allie behind the scenes making it happen today. But thanks, Matt, Mike Griswold with Gartner for joining us, thanks to all the folks that showed up in the sky boxes and shared some comments and some questions today on behalf of Greg white and our team. This is Scott Luton signing off for now. Hey, challenging. You do good. Give forward, be the changes needed. And on that note, we’ll see you next time, right back here as supply chain now, thanks for about,

Intro/Outro (00:59:55):

Thanks for being a part of our supply chain. Now, community check out all of our programming@supplychainnow.com and make sure you subscribe to supply chain. Now anywhere you listen to podcasts and follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Instagram. See you next time on supply chain. Now.