Intro/Outro (00:02):

Welcome to Supply Chain. Now the number one voice of supply chain. Join us as we share critical news, key insights, and real supply chain leadership from across the globe. One conversation at a time.

Scott Luton (00:14):

Hey, good morning, good afternoon, good evening, wherever you may be. Scott Luton and Marty Parker here with you on supply Chain. Now welcome to today’s live stream. Hey Marty, how you doing today?

Marty Parker (00:23):

I’m doing great, Scott. Beautiful weather outside. Falcons are going to win the game tonight. There’s Georgia just won. I couldn’t be happier.

Scott Luton (00:31):

Oh my goodness. Well, hey, I love your outlook on life and I’d say you’re right about two out of three things. I’ve got it here man. I’ve got it. Alright, bold prediction, Falcons, take tonight’s game. But folks, it is a gorgeous day in Georgia, gorgeous day in metro Atlanta and we’ve got a big, big episode of the Buzz where every Monday at 12 in Eastern time we discuss a variety of news developments across global supply chain and business news that matters is what we like to call it. And folks, the buzz is powered by our friends@autoscheduler.ai who’s on a mission to make your warehouse operations smarter, more efficient and adaptable. You can learn more at Auto scheduler ai. So Marty, we’ve got an outstanding big show tee up here today. We’re going to be talking about effective leadership both on those good days and those bad days.

(01:19):

We’re going to be touching on big energy concerns that are critical to powering supply chains everywhere. We’re going to get a preview of the holiday spending season as well as sharing and talking about an interesting interview of Ford, CEO, Jim Farley, all that much, much more. And Marty gets even better because in about 10, 12 minutes or so we’re welcoming a special repeat guest, great friend of the show, gee Katon with Texas, who’s going to be sharing a variety of items with us, including how to optimize your approach to automation. Marty, it should be an outstanding show here today, huh?

Marty Parker (01:51):

Yeah, looking forward to it. Look forward to learning a lot, honestly.

Scott Luton (01:54):

Same. I get a certification every Monday, folks between my cohosts, my Esteem cohost and our great guests, and of course our audience out. There’s a great show here today. So two things before we get going. Give us your take into comments, whether you are tuned in via LinkedIn, YouTube X, Facebook, Twitch, no matter, let us know what you think and if you enjoy the show today, we’d love for you to share it with a friend and or your network. They’ll be glad you did. Just like Tricia, happy buzz day. All if you comment, let us know where you are watching and are tuned in from. Okay, so Marty, really quick, I got three things we’re going to knock out. Poor gee joins us, but what’s the score going to be tonight with the Atlanta Falcons game and I forgot who they’re playing.

Marty Parker (02:31):

Buffalo.

Scott Luton (02:32):

Buffalo, oh my gosh, that’s

Marty Parker (02:33):

A tough Falcons are winning 24, 21 last minute field goal.

Scott Luton (02:38):

Okay, I’m writing that down, I’m writing that down and if that is anywhere, I shouldn’t say that.

Marty Parker (02:44):

That’ll make it like

Scott Luton (02:44):

65 to nothing. I owe you a Diet Coke if it’s anywhere close to your prediction. Okay. Alright folks, let’s knock out three things on the front end of the buzz here today. Powered by Auto Scheduler. And I want to start with a great addition, Marty, of our almost weekly newsletter. With that said, which published over the weekend. Now Marty, we featured your Been There, done that leadership perspective in this edition and in your guest blog I’ll call it that we’ve led with in this edition. With that said, you spoke about a few elements that are critical to how leaders overcome setbacks in bad days. Marty, share a couple of key thoughts that you wrote about.

Marty Parker (03:24):

So I think the biggest thing, Scott, is that we’ve got to be clear and concise as leaders in our communication. We have to tell our people they’re doing a good job, but we also have to give them feedback when they’re not doing such a great job. And I’ve found leaders afraid to do that and they’ll come to me, Hey, I want to fire this person. And I’ll say, how long has it been that you’ve been having ongoing conversations? Oh, we talked about it about three years ago and it drives me absolutely up a wall. And I’m like, no, you won’t be firing somebody. You’re going to be having a performance consequence management conversation. So we need both. We need to be giving encouraging feedback. I love handwritten thank you notes because they’ve got kind of a personal touch to them, but we also as quickly as we can have to be clear and concise with folks about their performance and how they’re doing.

Scott Luton (04:12):

Well said Marty. Well said, there’s a whole bunch more folks you have to check out this edition of. With that said, you can learn more. And two quick thoughts. I love how we quoted you here, right where you shared when people understand the full picture, they can help solve it. When they’re kept in the dark though, they just feel managed and no one wants to really feel managed, right Marty?

Marty Parker (04:32):

Yeah, and they’ll fill in the blanks, Scott, they’ll sit by the coffee pot and make all kinds of wrong about things and you want to be really clear with that. They understand what’s really going on.

Scott Luton (04:43):

That’s right, well said. And lean into those tough conversations, which Marty was mentioning earlier. So folks check out with that said, make sure you subscribe. It comes out just about every single weekend and it’s usually packed full of not only actionable perspective just like Marty walked us through, but live events, data points, interviews, you name it. So check that out. Okay, so Marty, speaking of things so folks can’t miss with that said, but they also can’t miss manifest folks. Manifest 2026 is on your radar yet. We had a terrific time at this event earlier this year, back in, I guess it was late January I think it was. Regardless, in a few months, we’re going to be back with all the movers and shakers in industry in February in Vegas. Manifest Vegas brings together the most comprehensive ecosystem of innovation and transformation and supply chain logistics, delivering unmatched opportunities to learn, connect, and innovate. And if you’re doing those three things, you’re probably on the right path, learning, connecting, and innovating. So join us February 9th through the 11th 2026 in Las Vegas to experience unparalleled access to the technologies, trends and connections shaping the way the world moves. It’ll be here for it. Drop the link so you can learn more and hopefully register right there in the comments. Marty, when is the last time that you went to Vegas?

Marty Parker (06:02):

Back when I was in the corporate world and a fun tip, I was a member of Gold’s Gym and I went and worked out a couple of the different gyms near there. I tell you, the best looking people on earth because they have to be in great shape. And so I didn’t want to work out, I just wanted to sit there and for a look at everybody. And so I’m not a gambler, I don’t do a lot of the other stuff, but boy did I have fun at the gym.

Scott Luton (06:26):

Oh, you know what the people watching, regardless where you do it, the people watching in Vegas is the best of the best. I was just there last week and it really doesn’t change. And folks, a lot of people are saying that it’s a ghost town these days for the trade war, which we’re going to touch on in a second and other reasons, but it was, I saw no signs of slowing down. I didn’t spend a whole bunch of time in casinos, but everywhere else, plenty of people. Alright, so Marty, we’re about to bring on gee, Katon and just a second, but before we do, I just mentioned the ongoing trade war. It’s the gift that unfortunately keeps on giving and as you shared in the pre-show, every time you join us, Scott just has to talk about tariffs. Well, I’ve got to ask you this, Marty. We all saw the news, the market certainly saw the news late last week. White House recently announced an additional a hundred percent tariffs on Chinese imports on November 1st. As I mentioned, the markets have been reacting wildly and I bet that’s not the only thing bouncing off the walls. What’s one quick thought that you would share with folks in light of this heavy new move, which of course comes in response to China announcing further restrictions on rare earth exports. Your thoughts, Marty?

Marty Parker (07:31):

Yes. I haven’t been on here with you since June or early. Yeah, I guess June and back then I said it was all about uncertainty. We needed things to stabilize and unfortunately they have, but one thing is set on Friday, something else is set over the weekend, a third thing happens on Monday and supply chains don’t work like that. It takes hundreds of days to respond and react. And so we just, whatever it’s going to be, we need it to settle down so we can make great long-term decisions.

Scott Luton (08:00):

Well said Marty. Well said. And folks, we’re dropping a link to that. I’m sure y’all caught it. We have the smartest audience in all of global supply chain, so they’re already analyzing I’m sure. But if you’re late to the party, you can check out the link that our team shared, which goes more into depth, be our friends at supply chain dive. Now I would just add to what Marty shared folks, hopefully y’all have invested in innovative tech so you can run millions and millions of what if scenarios as it goes back and forth or we’re not sure if they’re going to stick what the counter is, you name it. Hopefully you’ve got plenty of sourcing agility. So you’ve got some bad four by four tires on your sourcing platform and there’s a much longer list, but you’re leaning into our ecosystems and hopefully flexible, innovative supply chain ecosystems because your partners, hopefully you trust the relationships you’ve been building and investing in are going to help us get through even the most uncertain of times.

Marty Parker (08:50):

That’s a great point just to comment. We don’t have to beat the tariffs. Nobody’s going to beat the tariffs. What you have to do is beat your competitors. If you can be better with better automation, better systems, like gee, we will talk about later, you can beat your competitors. They may not be doing the same thing.

Scott Luton (09:07):

So true Marty. And it reminds me of, we were talking about big Bad bears in the pre-show and there’s always been that running joke that if you’re in a group of folks and a bear comes chasing after you, you don’t have to be the fastest one. You just have to not be the slowest one. Right? And kidding aside, there’s opportunities in every challenging and uncertain environment. So lean in to your supply chain ecosystem for sure. Okay, Marty mentioned our special guest here today. Great friend of the show. We’ve known Gee for quite some time. He’s doing big things out in industry and we’re delighted to have him here on the Buzz powered by our friends at Auto Scheduler. So Gee Katon is a senior executive with over 25 years of experience in the technology field specializing in supply chain logistics, retail automation and fulfillment. He holds a master’s degree in international relations and get this a dual citizenship in the EU and the USA, which gives him a global perspective and a diverse network of contacts and partners. Gee’s got his finger on the pulse folks. He serves on the leadership team with Texas, which is a leading provider of world-class solutions for complex supply chain challenges. Let’s welcome my friend Gee ton, vice president of industry and Global Alliances at Texas. Hey. Hey gee, how are you doing today?

Guy Courtin (10:23):

Doing well, Scott. Marty, good to see you guys.

Scott Luton (10:25):

It is wonderful. Marty, I’ll tell you what, he is always one of the most dapper gentlemen out in industry and he’s not letting us down again today. Marty looks like a billion dollars, doesn’t he? Absolutely love it. I just love it. Well, I was going to

Guy Courtin (10:37):

Wear a tie, but I figured that

Scott Luton (10:39):

Might go too far. Next time,

(10:42):

Next time, next time. All kidding aside, it’s great to have you back. We were talking in the pre show. We first met way back at modex in I want to say 2019. Gee, you have not aged a single day ever since. I’m very jealous, but we got a lot of good stuff to get to here today. I want to start with a fun warmup question. So Marty and Gee, today here in the US it’s Columbus Day. It’s also the birthday of the US Navy, how about that? And this is where we’re going to land on here. It’s National Delivery Driver week this week right here in the us of course that celebrates all those incredible professionals that make things happen, deliver meals, packages, and so much more conveniently to our front door each and every day and twice a day, sometimes twice a day. Thanks to somebody here at the looting household. But I digress. Here’s my question for you, gee, what is one of your favorite recent delivery experiences?

Guy Courtin (11:35):

Yeah, no, I think it’s a really interesting, I know there’s a day or a week for everything nowadays, but this one I think of course for all of us in supply chain speaks to us. So the one for me, and I think this is one that we can talk about more in terms of the concept, but I remember a couple of years ago, back when I used to order an iPhone every time it came out, yes, I’m one of those people, but I remember they would deliver it to, at the time I lived in a condo downtown Boston by Fenway Park and we didn’t have a doorman or anything, we just had mailboxes and they would just drop packages off in the vestibule. And of course some of us suffer. We had porch pirates, we’d come and sometimes take your stuff. And I remember I was getting the new iPhone and my delivery person for FedEx, she was great.

(12:15):

And she actually called me and said, Hey, I want to drop this off. I’ll make sure you’re home. And actually I was actually not at the condo at the time. I was actually literally down the street. I just remember it was something really, I think it was, was a good customer service. She knew what the package was, it was an unmarked brown box, but we all knew the shape, the size, the timing. It was probably going to be something electronic probably from Apple. And she knew that hey, just leaving that package in the vestibule with no one there was at risk. And she did a great job. And she called me and I remember being like, wow, this is really great customer service. And she said, listen, I’ll come back when you’re home, make sure you get it. I’ll give it to you. Make sure it gets in your hands only. And that’s what happened. And I think that to me is an example of the importance of these last mile delivery people because they’re the ones who are truly giving you the last customer experience you’re going to have, right? They might be the only people you touch from the air quote brand you’re buying from. And I think that’s something that’s really valuable. It’s something that as we get more and more of these third party delivery systems, it’s interesting. How can we replicate that with these people? But that was my experience.

Scott Luton (13:16):

I loved it. I love it ghee and it’s so true on so many different accounts. Marty, same question to you. What’s one of your favorite recent delivery experiences? I’m a little embarrassed

Marty Parker (13:25):

Because GHS was so related to supply chain and mine isn’t, but my students have made me a playlist on Spotify called Marty’s Driving Home Rack gave me awake during my 90 minute commute. And so one of my drivers came up playing a Drake song and I knew the Drake song way too sexy because of this playlist. And so we were dancing together. Oh, I love it. He high fived me and I don’t even want to say the carrier because he might get in trouble or something. I’ve gotten in trouble with that playlist, by the way. But anyway, it was great. Just like he said, we made a connection and had a great experience because of such a great driver and such great music.

Scott Luton (14:12):

I love that. If only we had the doorbell camera because I would love to see that moment with Marty and that delivered driver and Amanda and Trisha get the kick out of it behind the scenes too. We got so much to celebrate and be thankful for. We really do. And along these lines, gee and Marty, I saw a great read that I was writing about on LinkedIn the other day. I see if I can pop it up here. So I think this is from the New York Times, I think it might have been the Wall Street Journal. Anyway, there was a phenomenon taking place across New York City where there happened to be a lot of Mama Des that were delivery drivers, especially with food delivery. And it created a buzz and almost a mythic superhero status of the legendary mama do. And really the cool thing here is after folks realized that it was not one super delivery, it was an army, but it really helped drive recognition and appreciation for what these incredible people do every single hour and the risk they pose.

(15:05):

I mean, streets, traffic, unhappy consumers at times and they just keep doing what they do. And we have so much to be grateful for. And I’m glad this is the first time that this week has hit my radar, but it can never, we should be doing this a thousand years ago. So I’m very, very appreciative and great to have both of y’all share your examples and favorite delivery moments. Okay, so gee and Marty, we’ve got a lot to get into here today on the Buzz powered by our friends at Auto Scheduler. We’re going to start with more concerns. More concerns, there’s plenty up. Let’s see here. We’re going to start with energy concerns that leaders have across the supply chain ecosystem. Now as reported here by supply chain dive, the good folks over at Prologis surveyed over 1800 global executives this past August, right on a wide variety of topics.

(15:51):

I’m going to cherry pick a few here. Prologis says that supply chains are going through the biggest reset in a generation fueled by three critical factors, energy, reliability, AI and location of all those industry executives surveyed. Nine out of 10 said they experienced energy related disruptions in the last year, and 83% say that power reliability will drive the next major supply chain crisis. About 75% said power requirements at their facilities will increase by 10 to 50% over the next five years and know the likely culprit for that, right? It’s wonderful to see the great incredible things that AI is doing out in industry, but man, it takes real power to make it happen. So AI energy requirements a big factor. Gee, your comments on these survey results, energy, you name it. Yeah,

Guy Courtin (16:41):

Not surprising, Scott, you hit the nail on the head. I think when it comes to power across the board, let alone in supply chain, but in everyday business, right? AI is a big culprit. There’s some interesting articles that come out recently, not even that recently, but from Alphabet, Facebook, et cetera, who have basically taken all their ESG initiatives and thrown ’em out the window. Why? Because of their AI initiatives. And AI is eating the world from the perspective of power and electricity. So what I always tell people when I talk about AI too is to think about that sort of unintended consequences of when you go into chat GPT or code or whatever, and you ask it, oh, rewrite this memo for me, and you’re like, oh, it’s so great and such a great tool. And it is. But think about what are the consequences that we’re driving by using or relying on AI at some level when really we should be doing some of this with the super computer between our ears.

(17:29):

And I think that’s only going to become more and more of an issue across supply chain and our businesses. So on that article to you mentioned Scott, like the first two are connected power and ai. And I think as we become more and more digital as well, that’s requiring electricity as we start looking to harness and harvest more data from our supply chains that is really asking for a digitization which is electrical, which means it’s power, et cetera. And I think that’s the part that as we move forward with this, we really do have to consider what is this impact going to have on our environment, on our power grid, on our usage. And let’s face it, our power grid was not built to run supercomputers 24 7 to figure out through Gronk how to write a better memo.

Scott Luton (18:12):

So much there to comment on. Marty, before I invite you to share your perspective, I just want to lay out that’s a great final point folks. We already had infrastructure challenges including the power grid before the AI golden age. That’s such a great call out. Marty, your thoughts on these findings and just your thoughts in general?

Marty Parker (18:28):

Yeah, and I’d add robotics, iot, and all the other stuff that are putting pressure, I don’t know, I’m optimistic for a strange reason. There’s a lot of that same technology that’s helping us figure out how to do better nuclear power, potentially fusion power, all the green power things that are getting better and better. So I saw an article that terrible 1972 movie that terrified us all about nuclear power, but that movie not come out. And we had continued on our path with nuclear. We probably wouldn’t be talking about climate change challenges. So as long as we’re thinking about the technology for generating energy in the same way and applying those tools to that better, we might catch up and figure it out. There might be a period where it’s a little scary, but I don’t know optimistic about our ability to do that. I

Scott Luton (19:19):

Like that. I am also practically optimistic, but it sounds like all three of us are also grounded in the current reality. But Marty, you make a great comment because the same technology that’s powering innovation everywhere else that’s using more energy is the same innovative technology that the energy industry will be using to find new efficiencies and hopefully infrastructure gains. And I want to mention this. So Jeff Bezos, his crystal ball has been pretty good. He projects that in the next 15 to 20 years that there will be solar powered megawatt data centers in low earth orbit that will run 24 7 of course powered by the sun. That is an intriguing thought that here in the modern space age that we’re in space economy, if we could figure out the anti-collision technology, which we’re going to need in space before people put a trillion dollar data center up there, we can figure that out.

(20:07):

I could really see major, major potential that might offload some of the growing demand, which I believe one group, I can’t remember the name, which group is International Energy Commission I think. Anyway, they’re projecting just in the next three or four years that global electricity demands rise 4%, which basically is how much electricity Japan uses in a full year. So we’re basically getting all of that demand onto the current global infrastructure. Wow. Alright. Gee and Marty, I like how both of y’all think very practically and optimistically. I’m going to take a hard left turn here. Y’all ready? Hang on to your socks and your hats because we’re talking softer stuff here. We’re talking about the holiday season and it’s tough to believe we’re in mid-October. That’s crazy to me. So how much money will Americans be spending online for the holiday season? Well, as reported by CNBC more than last year, but the overall growth rate is going to decrease quite a bit.

(21:02):

Data by Adobe Analytics says that US consumers are expected to spend 253.4, don’t forget that 0.4 billion this year online for the holiday season. Now that’s a jump of 5.3% over last year’s numbers, which you think is good, right? But it’s considerably below the 8.7 jump from the previous year over year, right? And it’s far below the 10 year average of 13% growth each year. Now in the water is wet category, consumers are said from the data are said to be looking for deals. Is that ever not the case? Gee, what do you see? What does your crystal ball see? And will the Katon household be spending more than last year online?

Guy Courtin (21:45):

I think we always do. I think to your point, Scott, the Kota household sometimes gets one or two deliveries a day from our friends at Amazon or whatever else we go to. So maybe we’re the wrong household to survey on this one. But I think the numbers are interesting. Marty mentioned it in the beginning talking about the tariffs or the tariffs. The three of us here I think are already confused by ’em. And we live in supply chain, so we already have an understanding of how this impacts business that most, I’ll pick my mother, my mother will not understand as much, and I think the majority of those out there are going to read headlines around tariffs and that’s going to pull back discretionary spending. We’re already seeing that and we’re seeing the prices or the cost of things like eggs and groceries have not come down as much as we were promised they would.

(22:24):

So I think you combine all those together and now all of a sudden you’re going to see sort of a pullback and discretionary. I think that consumers are looking for deals, like you said, that’s like saying water is wet, I think unfortunately or fortunately or what have you, speaking as a consumer, it’s great. But speaking from the retail perspective, they’ve kind of harmed themselves with having just massive discounts and sales on a regular basis. I’ve spoken about this at length and over the time is in the past we always had, okay, you’re going to have your holiday season, then you have your post-holiday sort of sales to flush out inventory and then you might have a couple more sales throughout the year. Now it feels like every week someone, some retailer is having some massive sale. And of course it has been driven by Singles Day in China by Amazon Prime Day.

(23:03):

I remember way back when Old Navy had dollar flip-flop day, which drove massive sales into Old Navy. So this mindset for us as consumers has been entrenched on unfortunately that genie out of the bottle. So retailers have sort of done themselves a disservice and now we’re seeing in the numbers. So you add that to the fact that I think discretionary spendings we pulled back, there’s a lot of, as Marty mentioned, a lot of confusion and unknowns. What about these tariffs? What does that mean? Are they on today? Are they off tomorrow? Are they at a hundred percent? Are they at 20%? Are they being pulled back? Oh, well for these retailers are, okay. So I think the confusion is going to create a situation where the average consumer is going to say, you know what? And I think to some degree we see this with B2B as well. We’ve got money, we’re going to hold it on the sidelines for a while before we figure out what’s going on. And I think we’re going to see that in this holiday season. And unfortunately I don’t see the end of it, right? It’s going to bleed over into 2026 and then we’re going to see it around things like Valentine’s Day, Easter, right? Et cetera. So I think this is unfortunately the trend for the near term,

Scott Luton (24:00):

We need a good practical dose of pessimism as well. But I would largely agree with you, gee and Marty, he mentioned some of your earlier thoughts various times in his response. What about you? What are you seeing? Marty? Talk about pessimistic.

Marty Parker (24:14):

My daughters have asked for LASIK surgery and a robotic automated cat litter cleaner thing. And what we usually do is, hey, we just stretch that out over a bunch of Christmases, which of course never happens. All I want is a humble laboo. That was all I want. I did the laboo thing on U G’s channel. Turns out it was a labu. I want a Labu, I want a re laboo and somebody needs to find one for me. I’m going to send this to my kids so they know what to get that. And of course they think I’ve lost my mind.

Scott Luton (24:50):

It’s interesting going back to one of the points that gee made smearing on steroids rather than having all the big deals and a major volume in a month or six weeks or whatever smearing effect, which has just spread those discounts, those sales year round. That’s a great call out. And Marty, I’m going to get your gift wishlist. Alright, next up, another left-hand turn. We’re going to be talking automotive now folks. SEMA four, I’m not sure if it’s on your radar, but it’s still a relatively new digital media platform and it’s become one of my favorites in the last year or two. And this is a great piece that illustrates why I think they do a lot of great reporting, accurate reporting and interesting and timely reporting. So this is a great interview with Ford CEO, Jim Farley, as shared by good folks over at SEMA four, one of Farley’s main messages.

(25:40):

But he’s on a mission to spread that we have really disrupted our essential economy here in the US now. He defines that economy as everything we build, move and fix Farley points to workforce shortages, tons of nevus bureaucracy and worsening productivity. Now I should point out Farley and Ford also want to sell a whole bunch more trucks, vans, and commercial vehicles that the essential economy requires, right? But that disclaimer aside, Jim Farley says his Ford dealerships get this. They have a 6,000 person shortage of technicians and their service departments. That doesn’t surprise me a bit though because as it be the trades or manufacturing or warehousing, we’ve got a lot to do in order to do a better job of communicating the opportunities there. And as we also all know, the workforce challenges is what’s driving a lot of the automation. So gee, your thoughts on Jim Farley’s message, and there’s a lot more to this interview folks, go check it out. The essential economy and some of those challenges there, gee,

Guy Courtin (26:34):

Yeah, I’m not surprised. 6,000 technician shortage. I think that’s a massive number, but we see that across the board. I mean, I think in logistics, I think the last I saw around shortage for truckers is on the hundreds of thousands in terms of the shortage and we can argue a lot of different things. Why is that? Is it because there’s not off labor? Is it because some of the regulations make it harder for more and more truckers? So I think that’s absolutely essential. And at the end of the day, the economy is still driven by people, still driven by labor, labor being there at all levels from the very top, all the way down to all through the organization and manufacturing, distribution, et cetera. So I think from that perspective, this is really telling. And I think part of it too, some of the actions that are happening today with around labor, I think puts more strain on that with regards to where we find good workers, we find people we can train, and I will say touching upon automation, I think sometimes the C-suite looks at automation and robotics is sort of a panacea that, oh, well, we’re not going to be able to hire people.

(27:29):

Let’s just go out and buy a bunch of robots not realizing that the robots might not necessarily be able to do the job or B, might not be able to do the job without labor. Robot’s still a tool that has to work alongside labor at some level to accomplish the goal. So I think those are things we need to think about and I’ll take a positive spin on it. I think what this shows is that there is still a lot of jobs available out there. There’s a lot of opportunity. I think the question is from a supply chain perspective, from an employment perspective is how do we promote these opportunities to people? Then B, how do we train the people for the jobs? And then C, how do we ensure those people have sort of a career path within the chosen field? They have to go from point A to B2C. And I think those are things that sometimes we fall short on, and I think that’s an opportunity for us as here at North America to start doing a better job with. And I will also say automation is not the panacea, it’s just another tool to help, but it’s not going to replace some of this labor.

Scott Luton (28:21):

That’s right.

Guy Courtin (28:22):

Gee,

Scott Luton (28:22):

Excellent perspective as always the right tool at the right time for the right problem. It has a strong business case. Great point. Marty, your thoughts here on this interview with Ford’s, CEO, Jim Farley via Phom?

Marty Parker (28:36):

Yeah, so I see the problems he’s talking about and one solution, I was recently at King Sws supplier Summit and we were at their new gorillas factory in Columbus, Ohio with the government officials that sort of helped pave the way and coordinate all the resources. And so solving labor shortages, companies aren’t going to do that and government isn’t going to do that by itself. So I think there’s a coordination issue there. I teach my students that, hey, I’m a capitalist, but capitalism never build a bridge and never build a road and never build a port. And so we are going to need more students that are going into things like trade schools, which I know the Trump administration has been emphasizing, but it’s going to need to be coordinated effort with industry and government. And right now it just seems like we hate each other. And so it was really nice to go to King’s Hawaiian and meet these officials that love a private company and the private company love them and they want to sort of work together on these things.

Scott Luton (29:38):

Marty, good stuff there. And by the way, king’s Hawaiian, gee, have you ever had on those king Hawaiian rolls? Oh my gosh, gee, we’re going to have to. And Marty, how come we didn’t get any samples?

Guy Courtin (29:49):

I was about to say, I’ll give you my address. If ship me a box of King’s Hawaiian, I’ll gladly take it.

Marty Parker (29:55):

I have some of their super secret little bikes they’re coming out with. Do you know the ones I’m talking about, the little pretzel bites?

Guy Courtin (30:02):

No, but it sounds delicious.

Marty Parker (30:03):

Yeah, they’re King’s Hawaiian sweet, but they’ve got little leprechauns that glue salt on the outside of ’em. They’re phenomenal. They’re hard to find. Well, they’re coming out with a new one that is a jalapeno version and a cinnamon roll. They’re the balm and they can’t keep ’em in stock. They’re out of capacity.

Scott Luton (30:20):

Wow. Okay,

Marty Parker (30:21):

Well I hope we, I’ll try to find you some, Scott. Please do. Indeed. It’d be hard to get to Boston. But when next time I see you, Scott, I’ll try to get you some.

Scott Luton (30:28):

And you know what? Who knows, we may bring their fearless supply chain leader on a future show, we shall see. But Marty, it sounds like a great experience up there at King’s Hawaiian and I love any event where the supply chain ecosystem can get together and deepen those relationships, exchange perspective and ideas. You name it. Very valuable events. Let’s see here. I’ve got a quick resource I want to share, but before I do, one of our favorites is here with us. T Square do holds down the fort for us on YouTube is going back to the delivery driver conversation we’re having. And he says, an informed and burned customer is a dangerous customer. Reviews with facts are doing a number on a bunch of businesses, especially with how packages are being delivered. And he says hello, FedEx, U-P-S-U-S-P-S. He Squared. Hope finds you well up there in Baltimore and keep the good stuff coming.

(31:16):

Okay, resources folks, as we move right along, we love sharing trusted resources, big news from our friends at Auto schedule, Keith Moore and the team rolled out, get this a free warehouse agent and it’s available to any and all if you want help forecasting labor against demand or analyzing load boards and thinking through labor shifts or drafting comms for carriers or crunching numbers, analyzing data, all that stuff. Maybe picking the Falcon score tonight as Marty says, it’s going to be 24 21 with an Atlanta win. Whatever the case, use the warehouse decision agent for free. Do all of that in minutes. Maybe it’s even seconds rather than days. You can learn more at via that QR code there or the link we’re dropping in the comments. Okay, gee, this next segment, I’m looking forward to picking your brain and getting Marty’s thoughts on your perspective here. We’re going to dial it in on messages, ideas, innovation and perspective. You’ve been sharing with industry leadership all year long. And I want to start with this, lots of complexity. Oh my gosh, tons of complexity, new complexity and exciting complexity. It comes with growth and then of course a lot of not so much fun complexity. It comes with some of many of the challenges out there across global supply chain and sometimes it’s a complexity we create on our own. So why and how does all this complexity kill clarity, which of course is so critical to growth and improvement. Your thoughts, Keith?

Guy Courtin (32:36):

It’s a really interesting question, and I’m sure Marty can speak this. I think we could write a PhD dissertation on this, if not more so for the sake of time. The complexity comes in large part. I think when you think about complexity, it comes from, unfortunately from the people within it. And we make things more complex because we feel like we have to. And I think sometimes we make things more complex because well, we have to create all kinds of systems, checks and balances because part of it is a fear of what if something wrong happens and we have no one to sort of look at and say what happened? I do think, and I think we only amplify this when it comes to our supply chains, why? Because now you’re having multiple systems and networks that are tying to other networks and systems. So it only just becomes a bigger and bigger issue.

(33:16):

I do think from a positive perspective where I look at complexity, sometimes it’s about communication and a lot of times about communication. If we play sort of the old beer game and supply chain, you see the complexity arises because we don’t have good clear communication between different nodes. So to me, I think as we’re becoming more digital, as we become more cyber if you will, and we exchange data in a more clear way. Now that’s still a long ways away. I certainly don’t mean to say it’s already here. My goal or my belief is that that complexity will start to get flushed out of the system a bit because instead of playing the telephone game or instead of assuming something, we’ll have communication or visibility into the network to understand, I asked my supplier for 15 widgets and they only have capacity for 10, but they promised 15, but I can see in the system because I have good clean data that they could only provide me 10.

(34:03):

So instead of me having an issue after the fact, when they don’t deliver, I can go to my secondary supplier and make up that difference. And again, removing that unknown, that fog of war, if you will, which then leads to complexity in my opinion, I think it’s going to help that. Now the personal people side, people trying to add more layers, that’s going to be hard to break. I think that’s just human nature unfortunately. But again, with better communication, better data, better visibility, I think we’re going to start to bring down some of the complexity. Are we going to eliminate it completely? Absolutely not. But it’s really sort of, to me, I think that’s the promising part of all this is that as we become more digital, as we become more transparent with one another within a system, we’ll have less complexity. We might have other issues, but I think the complexity side, because of visibility, we’ll start to go away. Gee,

Scott Luton (34:49):

What’s old is new again, right? Communication, communication, communication. And even in this golden age of supply chain tech is still a great challenge. Marty, your thoughts on what we heard there from Gee?

Marty Parker (35:00):

Yeah, just to follow a little bit of what Gee was talking about, we get in our own way, and so I’ll go into companies and sales and marketing hate each other and sales and marketing don’t like supply chain and operations and accounting doesn’t want to pay expense reports. And I’ve been in a 12 person company once that was siloed. Those are things that we as people create ourselves. So we got to get out of our own way and not allow sort of core leadership practices. I’ll just give an example with Texas, I know a company that was struggling with the use of it, and it was as if the incredible halt had taken all of their materials, thrown them up in the air and then just let ’em land randomly in the warehouse and it was a pick and pack. And I’m like, are you kidding me? I just followed a forklift and driving miles and miles and miles and miles every day for no reason. That is self-imposed complexity. So a lot of times it’s no knock on Jim Farley, but we’re looking outside to sort of blame other things and other people. When most companies I go into, there’s plenty of opportunity to get out of

Scott Luton (36:09):

Runway outstanding Marty. And most folks don’t know that the Hulk was a demand planner early in his career. And secondly, there’s an old phrase, and it’s cliche, everybody knows it out there, but it’s so apropos with all the complexity and all the big challenges outside of our control out in the industry, we got to keep the simple stuff simple. And that’s kind of one of the points both of you all make in different takes on. But it’s so easy, Marty, that 12 person company with big old silos, that is such a great example and we do it to ourselves. Stop doing that. We got to stop doing that.

Guy Courtin (36:38):

Okay, sorry. I was going to say, Scott, one thing, to Marty’s point, I’ve dealt with companies where you literally have the CEO who has to approve every po. It might be a $20 po for a magazine subscription to a $2 million spend. Got it. But $20 seriously. Or in other cases, I know a CEO when they go away on holiday on the summer, which is great, good for them, but they’re like, I have to prove every PO and everything else, but I’m not going to communicate on vacation. It’s like, well, wait a minute, how are you going to have your business run? If yes, you want that control, but then you’re not creating a system to allow things to happen because you’re on holiday. To your point, Marty, a lot of this is self-inflicted and it’s frustrating to see because you realize from the outside guys, guys and gals, seriously, if you just talked, you would figure this out in two seconds.

Scott Luton (37:22):

What are we doing here? That’s the question we all got to be asking, right? In these kinds of situations. So a mantra that I have used for a long time that I stole, I’ll keep it real here. I stole it from my dear friend Ray. I in fact wrote that yellow book right there. Simplify, standardize, automate, simplify, standardize, automate. It’s mantra that I’ve used and I’ve tried to live and lead by for a decade or two, not just I try to practice what I preach. Gee, what’s your take on the critical things that we’ve got to do kind of along the lines of that mantra before we automate your thoughts.

Guy Courtin (37:53):

Gee, I think that mantra is the two terms before automate are spot on. I think automation at times, as I mentioned earlier, is seen as sort of a panacea like, well, let’s just automate everything. Let’s bring robots in. Let’s bring an AI and do everything through the ghost in the machine, so to speak, without realizing that wait a minute, we’ve got to boil it down to what is the fundamental problem we’re trying to solve? How do we simplify this? And yes, there are big problems, but then there are smaller problems that make up that big problem. So how can we isolate those and figure out what are the tools and what are the processes we can take to solve those problems? And I think that’s the sort of the way we need to approach this. I see too often if we look at automation and we look at robotics in the warehouse, I’ve come across way too many situations where I get told, well, we just want robots.

(38:36):

And then I ask the second question, which is, well, why? And then you get that sort of blank look on them and it’s like, well, everybody else is doing it so we should do it too. And it’s like, well, that’s the wrong answer. We need to understand what are you trying to solve within your warehouse? Is it a picking issue? Is it a putaway issue? Is it a cycle count issue? Is it just a point to point movement issue? Where is the bottleneck and what’s happening? And then let’s try to isolate that. Let’s simplify it and let’s try to solve it. And then if automation is the right answer, fantastic. Maybe it’s not, maybe it’s just a process issue. Maybe it’s a personnel issue. Maybe you’re slotting your warehouse I properly. So I think to some degree that mantra is spot on because before you start automating, automating is a tool.

(39:12):

It’s a tool. It’s like saying, Hey, I need ai. And it’s like, well, what are you trying to solve? Or I have a great cartoon, I think Scott, that you shared with me where it’s like someone standard with a hammer, it says, I found the solution or a problem, but the problem is all a bunch of screws. So it’s like, well wait a minute, I need a screwdriver, not a hammer. So I think that’s the same problem here. The question again, the issue though, back to what Marty said earlier sometimes, right? It’s like we get wrapped around the axle, and I’ve seen this a million times, I worked at Forrester in late nineties during the.com boom. And I remember companies coming in saying, we want a website and do e-commerce. And I’d be like, well, why? Well, because Amazon’s doing it, but you sell water, you literally are in the water purveyor, you’re shipping bottles of water. E-comm is not for you, but we’re going to do it. And it’s like, okay, it’s your money. But I think that’s the problem. And sometimes we get in our own way as opposed to having those conversations about what’s the problem we’re trying to solve? Are there sub problems? What are the solutions available? Automation may be one of them, but maybe there’s other solutions that aren’t as sexy, but are going to get you the right place faster and more efficiently.

Scott Luton (40:12):

And a lot of times maybe it’s even cheaper and even cheaper and with less of a friction issue or adoption issue or whatever. Marty, I’ll tell you, industry needs to hear gee’s last response to that question and embrace it because we see so much of that shiny object syndrome where business leaders, they see AI doing all this stuff, we just got to have it, invest it and throw it over to fence and aggravate the heck out of your team and also not get any results. But Marty, your thoughts here.

Marty Parker (40:38):

Yeah, I go all the way back, believe it or not, to company strategy. A lot of companies don’t even understand what kind of company they are. I teach a simple model. Are you an innovator, a customer-centric company or a cost leader? The supply chain of spirit air and Delta aren’t the same. The supply chain of Walmart and Lululemon aren’t the same. And so many companies don’t even understand ultimately what they’re trying to accomplish. They haven’t gotten that out. And then I use an ancient tool, Pareto ancient in the lean world. I tell people that’s the most important tool. Work on the things that matter. We work on so many things that don’t matter and by matter, I mean win in the marketplace, make money in the marketplace. And they just forget that. And so ultimately as a COO, I’d be asking, well, how does that robot help me make money? What checks am I not going to be cutting or how much more revenue am I going to make? And if you can’t go back to the strategy now, there may be a customer-centric strategy and a metric around that, but eventually that leads to revenue and higher gross margins and things like that. So my biggest thing is even companies understanding what they do and making sure their people understand that as they’re making these kinds of decisions.

Scott Luton (41:53):

Billion dollar advice. That’s right. And gosh, when you help your teams see the strategies and the bigger picture, I’ll tell you, you’re going to be blown away with some of the ideas they’re going to come back with. But you mentioned Pareto named after Reto, Pareto, the famed Italian economist, mathematician, and many, many other things. I wonder if he knew hundreds of years ago that his name would still be relevant and tied to a fundamental business principle that’s still very valid generations later. I’m kind of curious, is there a Lutin law out there that’s going to be a few decades? I am no mathematician, so maybe not. But anyway. Alright, so let’s do this. Gee and Marty, you are quite a one-two punch here. I feel like I’m getting at least an associate’s degree if not a four year degree from our conversation here today. But I want to shift gears here actually before we take a peer into the supply chain, dogs supply chain. Gee, really quick, what are some of the cool things that you and the team over at Texas have been up to?

Guy Courtin (42:50):

There’s a lot of things we’re working on, but I think some of the really exciting stuff more recently is focusing on within the healthcare side, the right pharmacy. And I think this is really interesting supply chain challenge. I think the pharmacy supply chain is fundamentally shifting from what it was 5, 6, 7, 10 years ago. And I think the problems, not the problems, but the opportunities we’re seeing is to some degree pharmacy is starting to cross over into what retail is, which is we as consumers now expect to be able to get prescriptions when we want delivered to our home, fulfilled the way we want. And that’s putting a lot of pressure on the pharmacy supply chain to understand how to respond to that. So that’s one area that I think there’s a lot of really interesting work going on that we’re in the midst of. And I’m really excited about that because it’s a space where supply chain to some degree took a backseat. Supply chain was always yes, from the manufacturing side important, but to that last mile, I mean you mentioned it Scott, right? This is a last mile delivery week. And I think that’s one area where you’re going to see a lot more innovation, if you will. There’s a lot of challenges because of course shipping a t-shirt to someone’s home is very different than shipping a narcotic. But I think we’re going to solve that problem and that’s something that I’m really excited about as we look forward. I am

Scott Luton (43:56):

Too. That’s a problem. We’ve got to continue to innovate for so many different reasons. Alright, so Marty and gee, Marty, we’re going with you next. And gee, again, thanks for being here. Really appreciate what you and the Texas team are up to helping to make the industry much, much more successful by solving a lot of the complexity out there. But you mentioned healthcare and I got to mention what regime Vallee shared with us a couple months back. She’s the chief supply chain officer and much, much more at Ochsner Health down in New Orleans. And she’s really a trailblazer and a pioneer that was doing some really cool things prior to the pandemic when the world was changing that folks didn’t think healthcare supply chains could do. Fascinating individual and a dear friend. But we were asking her as a pioneering leader, how can can the rest of us unleash our pioneering leadership skills?

(44:43):

And one of the main things she shared with us, and maybe we drop the replay in the chat, if she said to regularly ask two questions, number one every day, what if, fill in the blank, what if every day? And number two, which I found even more intriguing, why not? Why not me? And that I think factors on a couple different levels including what we think we’re capable of. So folks go check out that replay regime is a hall of fame material. Okay, Marty, I’ve got a little picture here, one of my favorite pictures of Marty and just a portion of his big ecosystem. Look at those smiles as bright individuals that are about to go do big things already are doing big things in industry. And I’m not sure which UG of this is Marty. I know there’s a whole lineage there, but I felt compelled to put the Georgia Bulldog with the supply chain dog. So Marty, given all of your work with the now generation and all these supply chain dogs and army of them you’re creating, what’s one key observation as it relates to students this academic year as we’re about a month and a half in?

Marty Parker (45:39):

So I often get the question about this generation and I find them extraordinary. They have access to things that Scott, when we were kids, gee, we could only dream about. And they’re curious. They start businesses. They love solving challenging problems and I’ve learned a lot from them. And the big one right now of course is generative ai. We talk about it a lot. I’m trying to teach them really simple things like note taking in meetings. As an example, I tell the students, look, as a COO, if people could have cut my meetings in half, that would’ve changed my life because I was in meetings all day long. So I tell the students, look, use these tools, use these techniques in terms of creating agendas and meeting minutes and those kinds of things. But they are great. They’re learning how to use the latest and greatest, how to apply it to solve great problems. I had one that launched a business and it will take your syllabus, you just take pictures of your syllabus and it’ll create your schedule. You don’t have to think about it at all. And they’re just coming up with stuff like that all the time. And I’m just really happy and excited about what’s coming.

Scott Luton (46:46):

I am too. And folks, if you’re not playing around with all the various AI platforms out there, including auto schedules, offer, man, experiment with it. Get it in the skunkwork. See what breakthroughs you may unlock. Gee, really quick, your response to what you heard there

Guy Courtin (47:01):

From Marty. I’m always interested. I will unfortunately mention Marty a rival school of yours, but I remember going to University of Tennessee a lot and talking to their supply chain undergrads and graduates, and it was eyeopening to your point, if you asked the young gee, or even the college age, gee, what he wanted to do, I don’t think supply chain made the top a hundred. I don’t even know if I could spell supply chain if you gave me all the letters at the time. So I think from that perspective, the fact that supply chain has become an academic discipline, I think is fantastic. I think it’s absolutely necessary. At the end of the day, when I look at the world we live in as digital as it becomes at the end of the day, it’s still about moving physical objects from point A to point B, whether it’s B2B or B2C.

(47:39):

So the more of these younger generations that get involved in supply chain early on, and to your point Marty, sort of embrace it in the technologies and start doing new interesting things, I think that’s great for business, for society, for the world we live in. Because like I said, part of it too, I kind of joke during the pandemic is the first time my mom actually told me she understood what I did because when there was no toilet paper in the grocery store, she was like, oh, okay. That’s what’s supply chain does. So I think the more and more students we get involved and that are entrepreneurial and thinking it’s fantastic. So the future I think is bright. And like I mentioned, other great schools like Georgia, university of Tennessee, and here in Boston, Northeastern and others are really doing a great job pushing this agenda. And I think it’s time is due, right? We should have done this years and years ago.

Scott Luton (48:24):

Gee. So true. And along those same lines, big tip of the hat to great practitioners like Marty that take on roles with these schools and help the light bulbs go off with these incredibly talented, bright young people. So Marty really appreciate what you do and I think, and you can tell that Marty loves what he does. I mean, every time he talks about what he does at UGA, he’s beaming and I love that. Okay, we’re going to have a fast and furious finish folks. Let’s start, gee Katon with Texas. How can folks connect with you? Gee,

Guy Courtin (48:51):

Absolutely. So really easily through LinkedIn. So first name, last name, pretty easy to find. Otherwise, go to our Texas website, Texas, not the state, but the company. So T-E-C-S-Y s.com. And by all means, please do reach out. I’m pretty active on LinkedIn, so always happy to connect with new friends. Outstanding.

Scott Luton (49:08):

We dropped, geez, LinkedIn, URL right there as we try to make it really easy. Marty, I got a two part question for you. First off, T squared says you’re creating a good, good monster at the mentioning of anything Kings, Ohioan. So T squared, we’re going to have to talk a lot more about those delicious products. Marty, what was one of your favorite things and patent A key takeaways from today’s conversation here on the Buzz powered by Auto Scheduler. And secondly, how can folks connect with you?

Marty Parker (49:32):

So key takeaway to me is pretty easy. There are all kinds of headwinds and challenges and difficulties in supply chain these days, but the future is bright. We have amazing tools like auto scheduler, AI and generative ai, and the bright young people that are curious, wanting to learn and make it better. And so get out of your own way, be a great leader, solve the problems you have internally before you start blaming everything on the outside. But at the end of the day, I really think it’s a great time for supply chain and it’s got a really, really bright future and we’re going to figure all of these things out.

Scott Luton (50:06):

Undoubtedly, Marty, I love your almost daily leadership moments that you drop across social, especially LinkedIn. Is that the best place for folks to connect with you?

Marty Parker (50:14):

Yeah, Marty Parker on LinkedIn, Marty Parker, UGA. There’s a bunch of different ways to reach

Scott Luton (50:20):

Me. Outstanding folks are dropping. Marty’s, URL right there in the chat. Make sure you connect and follow both Gee and Marnie. And also, hey, we’re trying to make things easy. That’s one of the themes here today where you can find Texas right there on the URL as well. And one final plug folks, be sure you go check out auto scheduler’s, warehouse decision agent, mess around with it. Give us some feedback, let us know what it might unlock for you. Or if you’ve got any other feedback, we’ll take it. But check that out. Okay, big thanks today, man. What a great episode. I knew it was going to be, it surpassed all my expectations. Gee and Marty, gee, guitar with Texas. Gee, thanks so much for being here, my friend Scott, I appreciate it. Marty, thank you so much. Always enjoy these conversations. I do too. I look forward to seeing you at several industry events out there as your keynote and help educate and inform the industry. Big thanks to my esteem co-host Marty Parker, the one and only Marty, great to have you here today. Thrilled to be here,

Marty Parker (51:17):

Learned so much and great to see you, gee, and thanks for having me, Scott.

Scott Luton (51:21):

You bet. I looking for Micah, Freddie, and even Georgia to make an appearance. But all of them, all those pets were sequestered unfortunately today. So maybe the next episode of the buzz. Big thanks to Amanda and Tricia behind the scenes. They make production happen seamlessly every single day. And most importantly, big thanks to our global audience for being here. I know we couldn’t hit everybody’s comment or question, but really appreciate the smartest audience novel, global supply chain, and what you do each and every day. Folks, hope you enjoyed the show today. The challenge though, you got to take one thing, gee and Marty brought it. And then some take one thing they shared, share it with your team. Put into practice deeds, not words. That’s how we’re going to continue to transform global supply chain and leave no one behind. And with all that said, on behalf of the entire supply chain now, team Scott Luton challenging you, do good, give forward, be the change that’s needed. We’ll see you next time, right back here on Supply Chain now. Thanks everybody.

Intro/Outro (52:10):

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