Jenise Steverding

Special Guest Blog Post written by Deborah Dull   Imagine it’s launch season in your supply chain, and a team of AI agents is hard at work: coordinating shipments with suppliers, allocating inventory, and handling a missed delivery. It’s hard to go a day without hearing about the latest AI headlines: new LLMs, new applications, new use cases. These discussions are part of my every day. Business leaders and IT teams are eager to explore – and they have a lot of questions… and apprehension. In these discussions, we have found one framework that lands consistently: consider AI agents like new hires, not new software.   Step 1: Hire Like You Mean It Just like hiring humans, this step is about defining what you need. The first decision is the purpose of the role: what problems are you trying to solve? Where are your people overwhelmed? Where is your business growing in coming months? From here, the next decision is to build the business case just like you would for a new headcount. For example, consider the ROI of having a digital employee who can process supplier performance data 24/7. Now, decide on the type of agent that will join…

At the 2025 Gartner Supply Chain Planning Summit in Denver, Scott Luton met with John Lash, who leads strategy and vision at e2open, a WiseTech Global Group company. E2open is a global platform powering the entire lifecycle of making, moving, and selling goods, with capabilities spanning planning, logistics, global trade, supply management, and procurement. The platform is designed not just for enterprise visibility but for true end-to-end coordination across extended supply chain ecosystems. Lash emphasized that disruptions rarely originate within a company’s four walls. “Your sub-tiers are where most of the risk lives,” he explained. “That’s where your day-to-day operations—and your long-term strategy—are truly shaped.” It’s a lesson sharply reinforced during the pandemic, which reminded leaders worldwide that no one does supply chain alone.   Old Challenges Intensified by New Realities When Luton asked about the biggest challenges facing planning teams today, Lash pointed immediately to constraints—supply constraints, manufacturing constraints, and now, the added layer of global trade volatility. Trade policies that once shifted every few years now change weekly, daily, or even hourly. Lash offered a striking example: Brazilian coffee duties jumped from 10% to 50% this summer—before returning to 0%. “How do you plan through that?” he asked.…