Customer-Anchored Supply Chains | SCLinx in the News

SCLinx in the News

Date Published	Title	Excerpt
07 OCT 15	How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love Customization	The boom was great while it lasted, and the bust, at least in North America, has largely played out. Oil and gas compa- nies and service companies have execut- ed their traditional cyclical playbook, cutting staff and squeezing vendors to protect margins. With no quick recov- ery in sight, attention is now focused on more substantial, systemic cost cutting to improve finding and development costs and service company margins. One area of potential savings is the standardization of equipment used to complete and produce oil and gas wells. While all the equipment is “round with a hole in it,” the degree of customiza- tion evident today is staggering.
22 SEP 15	Customer-Anchored Supply Chains A HART ENERGY PUBLICATION/AUGUST 2015	The downturn is a good time to take a new look at the intricacies of the supply chain and to invest for competitive advantage. Oil and gas company asset managers and procurement teams, oil service company field personnel and supply chain or- ganizations, and all their vendors, are part of a single chain of pro- cesses. These link together, within companies and between companies, and are purposed to create value by extracting hydrocarbons from reser- voirs and delivering products to the end con- sumers. In total, the processes and the companies comprise the hydrocarbon supply chain.
11 SEP 15	Customer-Anchored Supply Chains An Executive’s Guide to Building Competitive Advantage in the Oil Patch.	Contents in Brief Foreword Preface Introduction Section 1 - Introducing the Customer- Anchored Supply Chain Foreword To those on the outside of supply chain management, our task is simple take the order, procure or build the product, and send it out the door to the customer. With more than 50 years of combined experience in and around the oilfield, Gary Flaharty and Noman Waheed know the task is anything but simple.
14 AUG 15	NEWS RELEASE: Customer-Anchored Supply Chains	Houston – August 13, 2015 - A new book, Customer-Anchored Supply Chains, presents innovative supply chain management concepts that can help oilfield companies improve profitability and build sustainable competitive advantage. Thebookisessentialreadingfor executives responsible for the supply chain organization and for senior managers at companies that provide products and services to the oil and gas industry.
29 JUL 15	Customer-Anchored Supply Chains: An Executive's Guide to Building Competitive Advantage in the Oil Patch	Customer-Anchored Supply Chains introduces oilfield service executives to the twin concepts of customer-anchored supply chains and customer-applications as important concepts for setting supply-chain strategy to build sustainable competitive advantage. Written for the executive responsible for leading the supply chain organization, Customer-Anchored Supply Chains presents leading practices for supply chain, proven in many other industries, in straightforward terms, showing the applicability to the oilfield service industry.
6 APR 15	Linx - Supply Chain Simulation	Linx is a supply chain simulation game. Linx is designed to illustrate certain supply chain management principles and is part of a two-day workshop for 16-32 of a client firm’s managers and senior managers. The first day of the workshop includes education on key supply chain management concepts and the Linx simulation game. The principles introduced in the sessions are applied during the Linx simulation game and reinforced in the debrief sessions. At the end of the first day, teams are formed and issued a client-specific challenge (or challenges) requiring application of the concepts learned on the first day to the client firm’s issues. Coaching continues on the second day...
10 MAR 15	What is the Baker Hughes Rig Count Trying to Tell Us?	Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.’ — George Santayana. One of the questions dominating oil service company C-Suites and boardrooms this quarter has been debate about US drilling activity and where it will head next. Will LNG exports drive a recovery in the gas-drilling market? Will $50 oil be sustained? Will we see $20 before we see $200? How deep do we cut and for how long? While our crystal ball is as foggy as anyone’s in the industry, we do believe a glance back in the rearview mirror ...
8 OCT 14	Advancing The Worst Supply Chain in North America	First, kudos to Steve Banker for having the courage to write and publish what many of us in the oilfield services and upstream oil and gas sector have, at best, only whispered quietly to each other. While the industry has had spectacular achievements, applying technology to extract oil and gas from rocks buried thousands of feet in the earth, the supply chains that support the effort seem dysfunctional, immature and inefficient, even to many veterans of the oil patch. We agree with the author that, ...
28 JAN 15	This Time, Don’t Forget Your Stopwatch!	We Know the Drill The drill is familiar. The Baker Hughes oil rig count peaked at 1609 in early October. It teased us by drifting only a percent or two lower heading into the holidays. Now, in late January, we find ourselves with a “four-handle” on the oil price. The oil-directed rig count is in free fall, down 18% from the peak and falling two to four percent a week. In just a few weeks, we have erased more than two years of growth, matching the rig count we had at the end of March 2012. Every seven or eight rigs lost from here turns the clock back another week. Stick around this industry long ...
10 FEB 15	SCLinx and the Customer-Anchored Supply Chain	SCLinx is a management consulting firm specializing in executive supply chain coach- ing for oilfield services companies. Our clients are the executives to whom the supply chain reports, the top supply chain executives in a firm and their teams. We coach the client’s team through the process of identifying customer- application segments, determining customer re- quirements, analyzing the gap between today’s real- ity and the future state and plotting a course to- wards building competitive advantage, and tighten- ing the links in the supply chain. Our engagement begins with a weeklong in-depth analysis to learn about the company...
4 FEB 15	New Pages for an Old Playbook — Driving Competitive Advantage	Last Friday, January 30th, the Baker Hughes rig count continued its decline with an announcement that the oil-directed rig count fell the most in any single week since 1987. News headlines trumpet the continuing layoffs as companies execute the bust cycle playbook. We all recognize that attempting to preserve margins solely by trimming variable cost is a no-win game. Cutting variable costs in proportion to activity decline does nothing to address reduced absorption of fixed overhead or compensate for reduced pricing. ...
24 SEP 14	Dealing With Oilfield Service (OFS) Product Complexity.. Part I	Some will argue that oilfield technology drives complexity challenges that are unique to our industry. We disagree. Every industry has to deal with issues of increasing complexity. Consider two examples: Unsatisfied with simply flipping a switch to turn on lights, we can now turn our lights on and off from anywhere in the world — as long as we have an Internet connection. Our cars can sense objects behind us or in front of us and automatically apply brakes to keep our loved ones safe. These and other innovations increase the complexity of almost every product in every industry. What makes the OFS ...
24 SEP 14	The Two Most Powerful Words in the English Language	On one of his trips to America, Shigeo Shingo reported discovering the two most powerful words in English, at least the two most powerful words in English when it came to business. The first word was powerful enough to describe all the causes of every problem you could encounter on the shop floor. The other word was equally powerful – it describes all potential solutions. The two words were various and appropriate.
7 JUL 14	Do you need an Alignment?	Most of us have learned to differentiate between symptoms and the underlying causes when our car's steering is out of alignment. We feel the shakes and shimmies, the pull to the left or the pull to right. We see the uneven tire wear. We know that investing in new tires will only grant temporary relief. Replacing the tires (treating the symptom) does little long term good. We learn that uneven tire wear will reappear in short order unless the alignment (the underlying cause) is properly addressed. In a car we check and repair the ball joints, racks, bushings, gear boxes, tie rod ends, ...
27 JUL 14	Customer Intimacy … Are You a Good Listener?	The power of customer intimacy and the importance of listening was driven home to me in a series of interactions with potential annual report vendors. After a decade of using the same firm we decided to test the market and take a hard look at the competition. All firms were given access to the same information … our story, goals, ambitions and background information on the company. One by one the companies filed into the executive conference room and made their pitches. As we approached the end of the process the front-runner was clear … it was the incumbent. They left no stone unturned. They filled the conference room and presented ...