Reference no: EM132333479

1. Business planning is an essential aspect of an organization for the sole purpose of turning a profit. Businesses without strategic plans are doomed for failure because they lack the necessary road map to guide the activities of the company. Nonetheless, business plans vary in dimension and requirements. Logistics planning does not super cede other types of business plans. However, logistical planning is the chief proponent of actualizing the accomplishment of set goals and objectives of the business as stipulated by laid out strategic plans.

Henceforth, numerous variables require consideration while undertaking strategic logistic planning. The various components include inventory management, facility location, transportation, production planning, purchasing, packaging, demand forecasting, warehousing, information processing, and customer services. All the variables, as mentioned above, should be addressed while formulating strategic logistical plans because they weigh in on the delivery of services and products to customers.

Thus, the variables are vital in ensuring the right strategies are integrated into organizations plans. Strategic planning incorporates different approach such as warehouse, transport, drop-ship, and parcel shipping strategies depending on the size and functionality of an organization (Turnbull, 2006). While formulating business plans, different approaches are implemented to eradicate bottlenecks in the supply chain system, enhance transparency, and increase efficiency.

Consequently, even though logistics planning is not more important than other types of business planning. Strategic logistical planning is essential at realizing the progress of different business plans and is a core consideration during the formulation of business plans.

Reference

Turnbull, L. (2006, April). Mind your P's. Canadian Transportation Logistics, 109(4), 50. Retrieved on June 30, 2019

2. I understand your point. I understand what various authors say about this topic as well. I will acknowledge the importance of a strategic plan to guide companies from one goal to the next, but in today's environment I feel like logistics is almost a simultaneous process with strategic planning. A company that can't produce what it says it can through logistical processes is dead in the water. A great Vision and Strategic plan that can't be executed is also a nonstarter. Here is a line line from your post for you to consider, so we can continue our chat.

"The various components include inventory management, facility location, transportation, production planning, purchasing, packaging, demand forecasting, warehousing, information processing, and customer services. All the variables, as mentioned above, should be addressed while formulating strategic logistical plans because they weigh in on the delivery of services and products to customers."

Read this part again... "All the variables, as mentioned above, should be addressed while formulating strategic logistical plans because they weigh in on the delivery of services and products to customers."

In the qoute above you actually acknowledge that these variables have to be considered during strategic planning. The lines are blurry nowadays. There is no month lag from Amazon! The world has changed in my eyes. Great connectivity, communications, and competition in the markets have elevated logistics planning to a higher plain. Customers want what they want right now, or in the morning and they want it delivered to them. Any company unable to build a strategy that gets to the speed of business in current times will go out of business.

Amazon, Facebook, Alibaba, Google. and other firms have changed the business game forever. Mom and pop stores require a website in most cases now. If they don't build one and partner with logistics specialist like Amazon, people don't make it to their store fronts as much.

I am sitting here thinking about how often I Google a restaurant or store and my phone directs me to the place I want to go.

How powerful is it to litterally choose which store that a customer goes too? In some ways, we are products to these giant compants. Out digital footprints seem to be controllable, marketable, and profitable on the front end of the process. It's cool and it's madness! It's refreshing too, its logistics in real time, and it's 2019.

Does any of this makes sense? I will go back and provide some references. If nothing else, logistics is not as an after thought. We agree on that in my opinion. There has to be a strategy which comes first but the moment the decision is made to sell cupcakes on the corner occurs.. BOOM! Financial and logistical requirements control the test of the day. Logistics literally has to be part of the strategic plans somewhere between step 1 and whatever step 3 is going to be in the future.

3. Is logistics planning more important than any other type of business planning? Explain.

First, enter your original response to this question. To keep it original, do not read your classmates' first responses. Then, respond to at least one of your classmates' discussion post. Further the discussion and make it interesting.

I believe that logistics planning is as important as strategic planning and other forms of planning fall secondary to these two types of plans. Strategic planning sets the tone based on the vision of a company's leaders. I can't deny that, but there is a huge argument that strategic plans and outlooks are worthless unless the company can move assets (people, raw materials, etc. to the right place at the right time.) There is no version of a successful company that exists without some form of logistical planning. Moving things is the lifeblood of generating revenue because finished goods and services must reach consumers to keep the company alive and moving forward. I will draw a really basic analogy.

Our brains are incredible, to say the least. We can dream up incredible solutions to problems and build the future but there is a catch. No matter how smart you get your brain an body constantly processes air, food, water, and air to keep you alive. These functions are literally an automatic function of our brain's processes even when we are asleep. No logistics moving vital supplies to nodes through the network equals death. If our internal organs fail to successfully complete basic life-functions, we die. It's that simple. Any number of organ failures will result in death. The lungs must move oxygen to our lungs. Water much reach our stomachs for processing. I will stop there and touch on the other side of the equation.

Some may say there is no planning involved withing out body's but that isn't so. The netword is just mature and still needs adjustments. We sweat automatically, we shiver when we get cold, and we drink when we are thirty. The logistics systems is just mature and doesn't require as much tweaking but it must continue. The same is true with companies. Seasonal activities need logistics plans. Maybe there are already in place due to repetition of the years but the adjustment must be made or the company can't compete.

What happens if a company can't manage its supply chain? According to Cohen and Agrawal(2006), A firm obtains revenue by selling service products designed to provide customers with uninterrupted use of its products. It can capture this revenue by selling performance-based service contracts or by charging for time (for technicians, labor, and for use of a repair depot) and material (for replacement parts). That first part is so important. No logistics planning and successful execution will put any company into "extinction mode." The transporters in the Army have a motto, "Nothing happens until something moves." In my mind, if nothing moves because there isn't a plan, your company gets a one-way ticket to bankruptcy.

So again, I believe strategic planning is very important, but it's a waste of time without a plan to execute that vision. Logistics Planning make it all happen. All the marketing in the world can't help if your company can't deliver the right product to the right person at the right time.

4. A mission statement is a pronouncement of what an organization does (Mission statement, n.d.), and General Mills' purpose is their declaration of what they do. On that same web page, they list several pursuits. Together, these pursuits are their vision. Each of the pursuits are an action that how they serve their purpose, or mission statement.

As the topic for this module states, stakeholders are more than just shareholders. One of General Mills' major stakeholders is the farmers who supply the company. The company recognizes this and highlights this in one of their values, which states, "Improving the lives of farmers who grow ingredients for our products while protecting the natural resources upon which our business and communities depend" (Creating value, 2016).