If you're not thinking digital, you're already behind.
-Brandi Boatner
Episode Summary
The Buzz is Supply Chain Now’s regular Monday livestream, held at 12 noon ET each week. This show focuses on some of the leading stories from global supply chain and global business, always with special guests – the most important of which is the live audience!
In this week’s special Digital Transformers edition of The Buzz, host Kevin L. Jackson welcomes Brandi Boatner, Manager, Digital & Advocacy Communications at IBM to the show, for a special “Decoding Digital” episode. Together they discuss:
- What is a digital supply chain?
- The importance of thinking digitally in today’s business environment
- What does it mean to be “digital-first?”
- The rise of the industrial metaverse in manufacturing
- Embracing rapid changes in the digital world and digital transformation
- And so much more!
Tune in and learn how “decoding digital” can make an impact on your role, your supply chain, and your organization.
Episode Transcript
Intro/Outro (00:03):
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.
Kevin L. Jackson (00:32):
Hello everyone. Good morning, good afternoon, and good evening, wherever you are in the world. My name’s Kevin L. Jackson here on Supply Chain now and today I’ve decided to take the lead chair away from Scott Luton to host this special event. I am so, so happy to have Ms. Brandi Boatner on this show. Hey, Brandy, how are you doing today?
Brandi Boatner (01:01):
Good, Kevin, how are you?
Kevin L. Jackson (01:04):
Oh God, this is going to be fun. Brandy is an award-winning digital communications, public relations, social media professional, and a prolific public speaker based in the big Apple, New York City. Currently, she’s a member of IBM’s corporate affairs function, supporting global influencer marketing for IBM’s consulting business. She helps drive market education, brand awareness, and to build IBM’s reputation in artificial intelligence for the enterprise and the hybrid cloud. Today, she’s going to help us decode digital. Is that a good thing to do, Brandy?
Brandi Boatner (01:51):
For us? Yes. For others, maybe not so much. Maybe not.
Kevin L. Jackson (01:56):
I tell you, this is one of the biggest issues when it comes to digital transformation. How do you communicate that? Not to your customers, to your partners, to your audience. But before we get deep into that, I want to just remind everyone here, this is the second Monday of the month. This is a digital Transformers buzz where we discuss variety of news and developments across the global supply chain, and we are going to talk about supply chain news today, but more important, we’re going to talk about communications of digital transformation. Doesn’t matter what industry you’re in, you really have to talk about this. So I want you to talk back to us in the comments whether you’re tuned in on LinkedIn or YouTube X, Facebook, Twitch, no matter, because this is an important conversation, how do you talk? But before we get started with the news, I want to make sure you forget the US Bank Freight Payment Index for first quarter 2024 that was released just a few weeks ago, and it provides key insights across the domestic freight market.
(03:11):
So we’ll drop the link so you can register to get this free resource every quarter. There are also two blockbuster webinars coming up this week. The automation ROI, solving the top three operational challenges is coming up on Wednesday, July 17th with Linda Grady and Will Mansard of Bastion Solutions. And we also have strategies for aligning business planning with supply chain design, and that’s on Thursday, July 18th. Mariana Rovic, the manager, operations research and network optimization at GAF and Nari Viswanathan Senior, the director of supply chain strategy at our friends over there at Cooper Scott will never, ever, ever, forgive me if I don’t remind everyone to read the recent edition of With that said, and they talk about one of my favorite topics, good food, good food, great people. I just love the quote from Julia Child in that show. People who love to eat are always the best people. Brandy, do you like food?
Brandi Boatner (04:28):
Absolutely. Born and raised in New Orleans, hometown of great food.
Kevin L. Jackson (04:34):
Oh, no, absolutely. I grew up on the Gulf Coast also. I was down on the Mississippi Gulf Coast. I would go to New Orleans all the time for some great food.
Brandi Boatner (04:44):
Good food.
Kevin L. Jackson (04:47):
So Brandy, you ready to go? Let’s
Brandi Boatner (04:48):
Do this.
Kevin L. Jackson (04:50):
Let’s do this. So our first story is from all places Shopify. You say, why are we talking about Shopify? Yes, they have a supply chain too, and this article, they’re helping everyone understand the digital supply chain. Unlike the physical supply chain, the digital supply chain provides real time visibility, automation, and collaboration, which allows for proactive decision making. It enables your company to adjust the production source suppliers or reroute shipments to minimize delays. Supply chains will traditionally rely on manual linear processes between the suppliers, manufacturers, distributors and customers. But a digital supply chain integrates some key steps through advanced software platforms. And the benefits of this digital supply chain include added visibility and transparency, increased agility, responsiveness, and better customer service. That benefits however, do come with some important risks, including cybersecurity, vulnerabilities, data privacy, protection concerns, and it can have a high investment and implementation costs. So Brandy, we’ve talked a bit about the technical aspects of a digital supply chain, and one thing I want to point out that this article was actually on the corporate blog site for Shopify. So one question is that from a communications strategy, how does a blog fit into a digitally transformed or a company that’s trying to think digitally in that communications strategy?
Brandi Boatner (06:48):
Yeah, well, that’s a great question, Kevin, and it’s like how do you think digital first and your company blog is one tactic for how you can communicate what you said? Talking about the digital supply chain, that’s one way you can talk about it, generate awareness about it. Hey, this is what we’re doing, learn more here. Another tactic that you could use if you’re thinking digital first because you said something as you were reading that article, you said, here are the things that they’re doing to deliver an excellent customer experience. Well, when you’re thinking digital first, okay, the blog is one tactic. Well, what about your employees? Because think about how they are delivering an excellent customer experience for someone who’s experiencing your brand. So what would it look like if one of your subject matter experts or one of your thought leaders or one of your executives wrote a blog, whether they used a platform like LinkedIn, whether they use the company blog, whatever, maybe they have their own platform. Sometimes in LinkedIn it’ll say, click on my website, or it might say, read more here. That’s another way to deliver the content digitally. To think digital first is okay, I too can deliver an excellent customer experience. So it’s almost like not you’re the supply chain, but you’re thinking about how you’re delivering an excellent experience digitally to someone who might consume, whether it’s the company blog or going to your LinkedIn to get similar information.
Kevin L. Jackson (08:07):
You sound like you’re saying that there’s a different way of thinking with respect to the voice of the company. Is this an important aspect of thinking digitally?
Brandi Boatner (08:19):
Yeah. I wouldn’t say the voice of the company because the voice of your company, you have to make sure you have your brand voice and everyone’s brand voice is going to be different. You have to stay true to your mission and value. So again, what I’m saying is from a digital first mindset, you have to think about how your brand or how the news or how your product or whatever the thing is, is going to be experienced or consumed by your customer, your target audience, or even your employees. All I’m saying is having a digital first mindset. It’s like, oh, well we shared this on the company blog. That’s one way. Are we having an expert or a subject matter expert or a thought leader executive also share in some way
Kevin L. Jackson (08:55):
Reinforcing each other? You mentioned something there, and it kind of ties into the next article. You’re talking about what executives do because in item two, US wire talks about innovative leadership and how that is driving digital transformation, supply chain and logistics, and they highlight the fact that leaders must adopt innovative strategies to harness the power of digital technologies. And one thing they actually focus on is that visionary leaders have to set a clear direction for the organization and build a digital first culture. What does that mean? What does it really mean to be digital first?
Brandi Boatner (09:42):
Yeah. Well, again, not speaking to the culture piece. Everyone has their cloud, how leaders going to build their own culture. So this is not so thinking digital first, the landscape has changed post pandemic, the digital landscape has changed. We’ve got new players. The way information is consumed, the way information is shared, the sources of information that may not have seemed credible or a reliable source or now hugely reliable sources. So the landscape has changed in order for, and this applies to anyone, I can’t necessarily say visionary leader, but anyone as you’re thinking, okay, the landscape, who are the players? How do I meet people where they are with the right information? What platforms do people want to receive that information? These are all things that a digital first mindset, these are the things you need to think about. The technology and the platforms are changing so much, even so much so Kevin, that the platforms themselves are transforming literally before our eyes.
(10:46):
They’re coming up with new names. They’re saying, I don’t want to be known as a social platform anymore. I want to be known as a connector. And I’m like, but aren’t you still on social connecting people socially who do social things, but you say you want to be. So we are seeing this evolution of the platforms themselves changing. So for any leader, for anyone operating in today’s digital landscape, you got to know the players. You have to keep up and it is moving quickly. Woo. It is moving so, so fast. But again, changing your mindset and kind of going back to the whole theme of decoding digital, it is so imperative to be able to do that today, just to stay relevant and like I said, to meet your customers, your audience, where they are, because many things happen in 60 seconds digitally. Many, many, many things. Question is, do you know what’s happening and are you a part of those many things that are happening in 60 seconds on digital?
Kevin L. Jackson (11:39):
So you’re getting scary now, right? Because you’re talking about change, and this is why people don’t want to even think about digital transformation because humans are naturally afraid of change. So a question, personal question from me, because I run into this all the time. How do you keep up with this change? This is like you are bread and butter. Yes,
Brandi Boatner (12:08):
Yes. I get this question a lot too, Kevin. People ask me, they’re like, oh my gosh, you’re in social and digital. You work with influencers. How do you keep up with the various things? So one thing, as you said, it’s not scary in terms of change. It’s uncomfortable, sure, but the only constant in life is change. That is the only constant. We know that things are going to change when you operate in this landscape. I kind of mentioned you have to know who the players are. Part of the fun of my job and what I do is that I know things are going to change, that I know something is going to change. If you would’ve told me three years ago that threads would’ve been a platform, I would’ve been like, no way. That’s not going to happen. Because again, we’re coming right out of the pandemic.
(12:51):
It was a different time, it was a different mindset. Then things happened with another social platform. Here comes threats. Oh, okay, I didn’t see that. This is where we are. If we look at other social platforms that have taken precedence where a lot of a certain particular age group, audience group now goes to said social media platform for news as a credible source, if you would’ve said to me, that platform is going to be where most people get there, I’d be like, wait, what? That’s a news source to get that rhyme something with a clock. That is, you’re
Kevin L. Jackson (13:28):
Not talking about tp
Brandi Boatner (13:29):
Are you? All I’m saying is like, oh my gosh, that’s a credible news source. The beauty of being able to work in this space and look at this as a communications professional, as a digital communications professional, is to see the trends and the patterns and how, like I said, how people consume, how people share. I remember the days of social media, you probably do do, Kevin, you were an early adopter and just excellent with social media, but I remember the days when social was about a lot about the content, amplifying the content, pushing out the content, creating the content, capturing literally you’ve seen the articles, content is king, content is queen, all the things. We’ll, notice there has been this shift, and companies can say this as well from a digital transformation standpoint. Now it’s about sharing not just the content, the experience behind the content.
(14:21):
What was the experience? What going back to customer, is it personalized? Is it relatable to me? Can I see myself in the thing? Does this speak to me? Someone says that just that hit different. Are companies today hitting different with their digital transformation? If you’re not thinking digital first, think about that. That reaction that we have on social and that shift that we’ve gone from sharing the content to amplifying the content to now the experience how I’m experiencing the content. If that’s not transformation, I don’t know what is, then we should just pack it up. We should just pack up this whole thing that’s not transformation.
Kevin L. Jackson (14:53):
Yeah. It sounds like a few years ago when car manufacturers stopped being car manufacturers and start delivering the experience of moving from one location to another.
Brandi Boatner (15:06):
Wow. Exactly. And listen, we’ve always been in an experience economy. There’s a book called The Experience Economy. I read when I was in college, it’s a great book, but do you remember the things like Rainforest Cafe? Yeah. That was an experience that you thought you were in the actual rainforest. We’ve always had this, but I feel today it’s just heightened and it’s just accelerated as to what the experience and how social and digital delivers on that.
Kevin L. Jackson (15:29):
Okay. Okay. So this third article, I can’t wait to hear what you got to say because Yeah, yeah. The title of the article actually asked a question. It says, what is a digital supply chain network? It was kind of interesting is that they draw a parallel between social networks and supply chain networks, and they say that digital media platforms made it easier for us to communicate and collaborate with our social networks as they acted as a turbocharger for what we could already do through other means. I guess IRL in real life. That’s what I mean. So executives really have to understand that their company needs to operate within these networks to stay competitive. In other words, to minimize risk, increase efficiency, reduce costs, and capitalize on opportunities. So with this, you got me wondering, what is a social media platform? You said yourself, they’re changing their names, they’re changing their missions. I remember clubhouse the audio only.
Brandi Boatner (16:53):
Where
Kevin L. Jackson (16:53):
Is that? Okay. Okay. These platforms are transforming themselves.
Brandi Boatner (17:03):
That’s right. It’s a great question and a great lead into what we were just, I mean, it’s almost like you’re reading my mind, Kevin. It’s a nice seamless into, so interesting that you bring this up. So with that, the definition of social media network or social media, like we said, it has changed. It has evolved, and the landscape is different today because the channels are fragmented. It’s hard to reach like, okay, what am I doing on TikTok? What am I doing on LinkedIn? What am I doing on Instagram? Then you have misinformation, disinformation woven into the channels too. So then there’s bad behavior, there’s negative agents, there’s all these things happening. What’s so interesting with what you said is at the Cannes Lion International Festival of Creativity, the chief revenue officer at Pinterest came out and he said, Pinterest is not a social media platform. And I was like, wait, what? Did he just say that Pinterest is not the social? He said, it’s not a social media platform. We’re not a social media network. He said, Pinterest is the antidote to traditional social media. Now, Kevin, first I was like, I didn’t know we were sick because that’s what I know.
(18:10):
Exactly. But you need an anecdote. So first I was like, this is news to me.
Kevin L. Jackson (18:15):
You’re saying, I got to go write my resume again,
Brandi Boatner (18:17):
Right? I was like, okay. Then I’m thinking, well, wait a minute. If you’re the antidote to traditional social media, does that mean you’re the modern? I’m not sure if I look at other platforms like Snap, snap came out with a Super Bowl ad this year in February at Super Bowl, and it was like more snap less social. I think that was their tagline. No less social media, more snap.
Kevin L. Jackson (18:40):
Okay, okay. Okay.
Brandi Boatner (18:41):
Aren’t you a social? Yeah. Are you a social media channel? So just the very point of how do we define, they are saying that they’re moving away from being this a platform. Going back to what I said about experiences or the antidote for traditional, well, I see all the pins that people put on Pinterest and shop and e-commerce, and so how are people experiencing the platform if I don’t call myself a social media network, but in my professional opinion, you’re still a social media.
Kevin L. Jackson (19:14):
You are the professional.
Brandi Boatner (19:16):
So it’s really interesting to see, like I said, the digital transformation. We’re talking about these articles, but the digital transformation of these networks themselves and what the platforms think of themselves, Reddit says the same thing. We don’t think of ourselves as a social network. Okay, what are you guys, new chip?
Kevin L. Jackson (19:32):
It doesn’t matter what everybody else says.
Brandi Boatner (19:35):
They think that they’re social network. So it’s just really interesting to see how audiences and again, are experiencing these platforms and then how the platforms themselves are defining what it is that they do.
Kevin L. Jackson (19:47):
Okay. Okay. So you teed us up for this final article, and it comes from this little known company called IBM, small Startup.
Brandi Boatner (19:57):
Small Startup. I
Kevin L. Jackson (19:58):
Dunno if you’ve ever heard of it. No, no, no, no. But anyway, it kind of talks about procurement leaders. Okay. And it’s entitled, procurement is a Pressure Cooker, and I can agree with that. They got to deal with product components, transportation, insatiable appetite for information details. Right. But you mentioned in your last comments about misinformation and disinformation and what the article talks about, and it says that generative AI tools can help procurement teams pair for a future characterized by uncertainty. Isn’t that the problem that some of this misinformation is actually causing this uncertainty, and it warns that these chief procurement officers can’t underestimate the potential of generative AI with respect to steering their teams towards higher value activities. They say it’s very important to apply generative AI to predictive spin and sourcing. So in a spin on this, how does generative AI fit into a digital first strategy?
Brandi Boatner (21:18):
Yeah, no, it’s excellent piece of thought leadership, recommend everyone take a read a patient
(21:23):
Using. We talk about it all the time, but if you look at it to your point, from a digital first strategy, from a customer strategy, you use it to augment the things you’re already doing to get closer to the customer or your audience to better understand them, understand what their needs are and how you can help them. How genai help you get from point A to point B or help you solve a business outcome. You use it, like I said, to augment, not replace, not solely depend on, but again, thinking digitally, you have to meet people where they are. So if they’re on a particular platform or they’re on a particular channel, what’s the experience you are delivering there? How are you connecting? How are you making this creative? How are you making this relatable? How are you making this come to life? All the things that you referenced with the digital supply chain, think about what we are delivering in terms of information or how we’re communicating. All of the things that you’ve covered in the articles that we’ve shared in the buzz, if you’re not thinking digital first, you’re already behind. Already behind.
Kevin L. Jackson (22:25):
So decoding digital really means delivering that experience. Oh, this is great. There
Brandi Boatner (22:33):
You go.
Kevin L. Jackson (22:34):
Unfortunately, it’s like time for us to wrap up this episode. I could keep on. This has been so much fun, right? Yeah. Well, one more thing before we leave here. What is your top recommendation for thinking digital? First,
Brandi Boatner (22:49):
Don’t be afraid to think digital first.
Kevin L. Jackson (22:52):
Make
Brandi Boatner (22:53):
Sure you keep up with, because it changes very, very quickly. And digital today, tomorrow, future, Isabel, today, tomorrow future. Don’t be afraid. Keep up with
Kevin L. Jackson (23:05):
Your, I got to write that one down. I got to write that one down. Oh, thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Brandy. This has been great.
Brandi Boatner (23:13):
Thank you. Kevin.
Kevin L. Jackson (23:14):
Before we leave, how can people catch up with you if they want to learn more about how to think digital first?
Brandi Boatner (23:24):
My digital platform of choice is LinkedIn, so you can find me on LinkedIn. I check it every single day, probably more than I should, but that is my digital experience platform of choice.
Kevin L. Jackson (23:34):
Oh, wow. Thank you very much. I know we are connected, so why don’t you connect Brandy. So I really appreciate you joining me today, and please come back again. We’re going to talk. So with that, I would like to repeat the mantra that Scott leaves us with at the end of every show. It’s all about actions, not words. Please take something you’ve heard today to improve your future. So in closing, please do good, give forward and be the change that’s needed. We’ll see you next time on Supply Chain now. Thanks everybody.
Intro/Outro (24:17):
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.
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Brandi Boatner is an award-winning digital communication, public relations, social media professional and prolific public speaker based in New York City. Currently, she is a member of IBM’s newly formed corporate affairs team supporting influencer and advocacy efforts across social platforms (includes enablement and activation) both internally and externally for social media and content experience. Connect with Brandi on LinkedIn.
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