Despite the hue and cry that went up when we learned that the US Olympic team uniforms were ‘manufactured overseas,’ the reality is that MILLIONS of US workers rely upon and contribute to, the global value chains (GVCs) that design, produce, market, ship and deliver leading brands such as Polo (Ralph Lauren).  Our kudos to Moongate & Associates, for its study published this month (and commissioned by the TPP) which clarifies with impressive supporting data, that the perception that there are two categories into which apparel falls:  imported or ‘made in the USA,’ is simplistic and outdated in today’s global economy.

In fact, according to this study, on average 70.3% of the retail price of studied apparel is value added by high paying US jobs.

Most of the lowest skilled jobs are done overseas, leaving the more highly skilled professional employment concentrated in the United States.  These jobs are spread throughout the stages of U.S. value–‐added beginning with fashion designers (average salary $73,640), and fabric and apparel patternmakers ($48,110), and continuing with transportation, storage, and distribution managers ($82,923), compliance officers ($66,620), software developers ($95,283), and sales managers ($111, 283). Moreover, there are high–‐quality blue–‐collar jobs throughout the chain; for example, cargo and freight agents ($45,100), production, planning, and expediting clerks ($41,060), industrial machinery mechanics ($45,740) 9, railroad employees ($76,574) 10, and longshore workers ($124,138)11.

http://www.tppapparelcoalition.org/uploads/021313_Moongate_Assoc_Global_Value_Chain_Report.pdf

Maybe this data could be included in the next news report on this topic?

-Michele Carroll 2/25/2013

Ian A. Gentis
Reclipse Group
Monday, May 14th 2012

While the science of global warming is being debated, there is no doubt about a new metric coming to your supply chain: the carbon footprint. The measurement of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions has become another plank in companies’ Corporate Responsibility platforms, and there is a good chance that you will be asked to provide your carbon footprint data in your next RFP response.

Here’s good news: Companies large and small that have decided to focus on reducing greenhouse gases as responsible policy, are finding out that they can save money.

The basic approach is to conduct a study of the carbon footprint of your supply chain as part of your product life cycle analysis (LCA).

Here’s some bad news: There is a lot of “junk science” and snake oil being offered up and some companies making honest efforts to understand their carbon footprint have had poor results.

Over the course of the next several blogs, we’ll explore the progress being made, offer resources and suggestions, and help you navigate through the hype to reach your goals.

So what is this all about?  A definition of carbon footprint

Our friends at Carbon Trust (www.carbontrust.com) in the United Kingdom (UK) helpfully offer this definition:

A carbon footprint measures the total greenhouse gas emissions caused directly and indirectly by a person, organization, event or product.

A carbon footprint is measured in tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (tCO2e). The carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) allows the different greenhouse gases to be compared on a like-for-like basis relative to one unit of CO2. CO2e is calculated by multiplying the emissions of each of the six greenhouse gases by its 100 year global warming potential (GWP).

A carbon footprint considers all six of the Kyoto Protocol greenhouse gases: Carbon dioxide (CO2), Methane (CH4), Nitrous oxide (N2O), Hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), Perfluorocarbons (PFCs) and Sulphur hexafluoride (SF6).

There are two types of carbon footprinting

The main types of carbon footprint for organizations are:

1. Organizational carbon footprint

Emissions from all the activities across the organization, including buildings’ energy use, industrial processes and company vehicles.

2. Product carbon footprint

Emissions over the whole life of a product or service, from the extraction of raw materials and manufacturing right through to its use and final reuse, recycling or disposal.

To get to a carbon footprint of the supply chain we will draw on both types of footprints.

What outputs can I expect from a carbon footprint? Some examples of carbon footprints

Let’s take a look at a recent carbon footprint study at Sprint Nextel (To review and download the full study, registration is required, but is free).

Sprint Nextel spends $13.5B annually on the 162 suppliers in its supply chain. Economic consultants Trucost (www.trucost.com) conducted a supply chain carbon footprint. A summary of their findings:

The carbon footprint of the Sprint Nextel supply chain is very concentrated in a few suppliers.

• The top 5 suppliers contribute to 58% of the total carbon footprint of the supply chain.
• The top 50 suppliers account for over 94% of the total carbon.
• Manufacturing is the most carbon intensive sector, accounting for 83% of the total carbon emissions and 67% of the expenditure.
• A total of 121 suppliers from Sprint Nextel’s supply chain are located within the top three sectors.

What can I do with this information?  Make plans to reduce your carbon footprint

Turning again to the Trucost Sprint Nextel study:

Measuring and understanding carbon footprints is the first step to towards managing and reducing them. Sprint Nextel can play a role in promoting emission reductions in the supply chains of its suppliers:

Develop low-carbon procurement strategies:

• An understanding of the main sources of emissions within supply chains could inform low-carbon procurement strategies.
• Baselines can be used to set carbon reduction targets for procurement.
• Include a requirement in tenders for suppliers to report carbon emissions data. Greater transparency can help identify opportunities to reduce emissions and demonstrate improvements in carbon performance.
• Carbon prices can be applied to emissions data to inform procurement decisions.
• Identify opportunities to monitor and share cost savings achieved through improvements in energy and carbon efficiency with procurement.

Inform engagement with suppliers:

• Identify the companies and sectors where engagement could be most effective to reduce supply chain emissions.
• Engage with suppliers that contribute most to carbon footprints, and are carbon-intensive compared with sector benchmarks, to encourage improvements in carbon efficiency.
• Ask suppliers to develop action plans to manage GHG emissions and monitor their performance. Encourage them to focus on improving the efficiency of fuel and electricity use so that they benefit from both carbon and cost savings.

For further reading, here is an interesting white paper from our friends at Carbon Trust which is no longer hosted on their website. (Understanding & Optimizing SC Carbon Footprints PDF)

I was at Apple in the 1986-92 era after coming to the US from the UK with Xerox-Diablo Systems in 1981. My time at Apple was during the John Sculley period. As with many current and Ex Apple folks Steve Jobs and teams created a really insanely great Company with a legacy that touched my life in many positive ways. Without Steve Jobs, and his vision/drive to start/enable continuation of “The Journey”, millions of people Globally would not have traveled their own personal and professional journeys in this recent golden era that Steve created. He will be missed and the Journey, as the Reward, will continue.

Nigel Johnson
- CEO Reclipse Group

HP publicly debates getting out of the PC business. Nokia’s market-share has slipped to less than 30% of the market for the first time since 1999. RIM’s “crack-berry” is withering in the sun of iPhone and Android. What’s it all about? And what impact do these OEMs’ market challenges and their operational responses have on their partners – especially the 3rd Party Logistics Service providers and the Electronic Manufacturing Service providers? These partners took over the management of large portions of their OEMs’ supply chains – taking on the assets and associated labor required to operate them. Is there a shift going on with these OEMs that could force major strategic decisions on the part of the 3PLs and the EMS providers? We have some thoughts about this. How about you?

The importance of being “people centric” in all things is a learning that has grown with me as my career evolved from Industrial Engineer to SC/Business Consultant constantly dealing with change. You can have the best idea or plan but are unable to get that shared vision buy in from and with others. Respect for each individual and asking questions about what they think and then testing your understanding of what they said to you is critical. Being on the same page at the same time and having that “shared vision” is critical in the improvement of relationship,organizational and functional stove pipes to enable true collaboration to occur.
I was at Apple in the late 80’s when things were going well and PC margins were at 55% and was fortunate to experience “The Beer Game” workshop lead by Dr. Peter Senge (MIT) of Learning Organization and the 5th Discipline fame. Peter taught us so much about how to best deal with people and understand and utilize “Learn Org” thinking and methods to better understand and manage change. I really grasped onto this continual learning focus and I am a big fan and suggest if you have not “read the book” then do so or better still participate in LO sessions plus buy the book.
I also suggest participating in the Beer Game. Make it happen as the game is one of the best examples of what end-to-end collaboration to achieve business success is all about. Particularly profound when dealing with e2e Supply Chain management change

Quick Reclipse Update – What is so difficult about communicating whats happening in Reclipse when you are deeply focused and working on the client challenges is that we cannot really talk about those activities. Confidentially is a critical key to successfully helping our clients go to new next levels and those plans and changes are what we are working on that become the “Whats Next”. We thrive on working to help move business entities to a new and needed next levels.
Strong current themes are: true collaboration and partnering; outsourcing next’s; innovating; speed; value; communication; ROI’s and breakthroughs.
Rewarding but challenging change management work and very people, subject matter expertise and relationship based consulting/resulting to deliver measurable soft and hard metrics objectives.
A proactive focus and onward into 2011 and building on and around progress made in 2010.

All is growing well in California following the substantial rains during the winter and spring everything in the garden is growing and blooming.

The same applies in our Reclipse World. I like to call it “moving into the light”. It is exciting times with our Reclipse team and key partnerships building with experienced and innovative top talent and real pragmatic Vision to Action programs. We are developing both internally to fertilize our growth and externally as we prepare and present “value proposition” offerings for clients and potential new clients.

Exciting – Next Generation

It is a fact that most things we currently work on are confidential and we pride ourselves in working ahead of current curves to help our clients be the “Best Next”! Personally I really dislike the terms like “Best in Class” and “Benchmarking” as that really means trying to catch up and become normal or true examples of JIT vs. JIC vs. JTL (Just Too Late)

An Example: Apple and the iPod, iTunes, iPhone current realities really were “game changing” thought leadership and innovation to action and world changing success! Now the iPad has instantly become a “fashion statement” that sells like hot cakes and has created a whole new product, market and community category.

At Reclipse we prefer to work on innovating and creating “next generation” happenings for and with our clients.

Exciting – An all Electric Vehicle

One project I can mention is in our Sustainability, Clean and Green, category. This is a Company that has built a “Zero Emissions” electric vehicle that charges rapidly, has a long range between charges and can and does drive on the freeway as it goes fast enough to be able to. We are developing the Vision (s), Mission, Values, Strategies and Tactics for this entity and a business model that can bring most value for all. The working concept vehicle is operating and very exciting and very real!

We have also developed some compelling Business Chain Management offerings as although we are proven experts in all aspects of cradle to cradle (we borrowed that term from someone) Global demand/supply chain management, integrated logistics, operations and asset management practices we also know that its time for a next level of thought leadership thinking and actions to suit the world we are in and the one ahead of us. To many experts SC terminology for example has become a misused catch all and nothing phrase that has created and not integrated Company stovepipes/silos versus produced real “Business” Sales, Cost, and Profit and Innovation success results. Our Business Chain (Change) thinking, methods and actions help build a wave of change towards true “next generation” customer, people and talent centric collaborations and business innovations results successes.

Exciting – Outsourcers, the 3PL’s (4PL’s)

One of these next generation offerings is targeted at the current 3rd Party Logistics Outsource providers who have to keep up with the ever increasing demands and expectations of the Brand designers/ODM’s who outsource to others to get things produced and delivered for them to an ever increasing and demanding Customer and Cost reduction expectation. How do the 3PL’s survive and compete to thrive in this very demanding arena. Our offering, value enhancing propositions and know how to methods and “how to’s” are targeted to pragmatically help companies in this arena.

Exciting Times

So “lots going on” and it truly is an exciting time and opportunity for us all. Let the Sun shine and the gardens grow!

- Nigel

OK the Holidays and 2009 and decade reflections are done.
The Reclipse compass and talent is pointed in the help business while helping people make the complex simple directions and so far so good.
Reclipse will build on the foundations that we have secured in 2009 and help evangelize and support companies in building and transforming their businesses in the most profound and value oriented manner possible.
The social networking and community marketing focus is a blur of connection and real efficient navigation is needed so the “Fad Focus” moves to a more focused real value/ROI benefit instead of creating blurry “Blink” dots that are short lived and no-one can connect. I am not a twitter fan at this stage of its evolution as you might gather from my comments.
All being well it will be a year to continue the healing from the Economic Flu of the past few years. It will be a year and time of entities figuring out how to truly collaborate/partner to succeed and our umbrella lite methodology of Business Chain Management and Improvement will become a high value add for our clients and partners. We practice the Customer Driven – BC Sell, Recruit, Do methods and this year we will unveil more on these capabilities. Onward – Nigel

“The sexy new discussion in policy circles around the world, thanks to the recession, is whether a significant shift of power from men to women is underway — or whether it should be. Accounting giant Ernst & Young pulled out charts and graphs at a recent power lunch in Washington with female lawmakers to argue a provocative bottom line: Companies with more women in senior management roles make more money.”

This is from an article in the Washington Post (http://tinyurl.com/washpost) talking about a number of studies which have shown a direct connection between company profitability and increased senior management diversity at those companies. This is not going to be a surprise to the many women professionals who have spent their careers trying to break through the “glass ceiling” (the one that we’re told was shattered years ago – when? I must have missed it).

Large numbers of women keep leaving the corporate world to start their own businesses or join smaller entities where they have more control over their work and can lead a more balanced life (don’t say women aren’t risk takers). The current economic and social mess in this country has been caused by the greed and mis-management endemic to the masculine model of competition in business. Co-operation will get you alot further down the road to profitability and success, just look at the results from these studies – “Pepperdine found that the Fortune 500 firms with the best records of putting women at the top were 18 to 69 percent more profitable than the median companies in their industries.”

Susan Rosin
President, Reclipse Group

“It’s the end of the world as we know it,” and we at Reclipse feel fine because we get it, we are proven agents of change. Today, companies are holistic business chains and entities; Economics 101 and Demand and Supply Management fluency are still the key measures of success; and after living through the boom and breakage of the dot com era we know that the world and business, as we operate now in the 21st Century, has changed and times are tough again. We are in an age of Alternative Energies, On-Line Communities, Health and Design of Living changes – that to survive and thrive people and companies must change and adapt to the new economy and the new world ahead of us. Companies need to be proactive and positive not reactive and behind.

To us at Reclipse, the Supply Chain as we know it is gone and has morphed into a true Holistic “Business Chain” as we describe it. We cannot think or act like the old school, we need to help the old school adapt and the new school inherit the best DNA/Genetic code of business know-how possible. Trailblazing companies are well beyond Lean, Six Sigma, ERP, outsourcing just because, etc. We are in an era where business is complex enough, so lets simplify it and take a leaf or two out of the way an Apple thinks and acts to continually improve ease of use and build innovative and profound services and products (iTunes, iPhone and iLife for example). REI has high prices and sells high quality goods to the adventurer and explorer- a mountain bike, gear to climb a mountain or just a great pair of hiking boots. Thousands of SKU’s, great retail and on-line shopping environments, REI makes money and pleases customers and if you are not happy with it just return it.

Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin plus the Zoominfo worlds are with us and helping change the “face” of what we do and how we do it. Developing our “own space and and clients and growing into it. You truly need GPS and a Garmin to help you navigate the business terrain and be the new world class because it is indeed the end of the world as we knew it (and we do feel fine).

So what is the same and what is different. Some thoughts:

• Cost is still important but lowest total cost, best value and quickly, freaky fast as Toms ….the sandwich chain says and does. Not the cheapest but so fast and good.
• On-demand mass personalization delivered to your door or acquired in your store
• Community and holistic communities. I always liked the “portfolio” word and you always look to having a strong portfolio
• Invest in USA! Buy in USA! Homesourcing becomes the trend. Awaysourcing is secondary. What a waste of fuel and time when we can make the complex simple and Homesource!