Acting Like a Truly
Multinational Company
Driving Sustainability
Within Your Team
To manage far-flung
operations—whether
sourcing, manufac-
turing, distribution,
sales or a combina-
tion of some of
these—you need reli-
able and timely infor-
mation, Rubinson
says. To have that,
you must overcome
the barriers posed by
time, language and
cultural approaches to negotiation, networking and inter-per-
sonal relationships. “To be able to control costs, such as for
trade-related services or logistics, you need good information.”
Cultural approaches are highly important, Rubinson notes,
but lessons learned in one part of the world aren’t necessarily
applicable to another. “A specific product or service that’s suc-
cessful in one place doesn’t automatically mean it will be suc-
cessful elsewhere.”
There are two very different approaches to doing business, he
says, and it’s very important to keep them uppermost in mind. The
first, he says, is applicable to business done in North America and
much of northern Europe. Rubinson calls it “transaction-based”
and says it goes to “doing the immediate deal.” Long-standing per-
sonal relationships, so crucial to the second approach, aren’t
nearly as important in so-called transaction-based cultures. “In
much of Asia, Russia, the Middle East and others, these are all rela-
tionship-based countries, and this can be a challenge to North
American-based companies.”
Johnson Diversey does business in just about every country in
the world, Rubinson says, and has had to come to grips with the
different ways that trading partners look at things.
Finally, solid, timely, reliable information is needed if one is to
properly comply with trade regulations on tariff classification, valuation and country of origin.
Steve Rubinson, director of global trade compliance at JohnsonDiversey Inc., which markets
environmentally friendly cleaning products, discusses how to manage the risk of delays related
to adhering to trade regulations, and how cultural differences impact global businesses.
To view this video interview in its entirety,
visit www.SupplyChainBrain.com.
Most companies have a
sustainability initiative
in the works today,
Youn says, but so many
of those programs
focus solely on the end
customer and don’t
take into account the
so-called internal customers, the employees.
That’s likely to be
counterproductive.
It’s useful to remind
oneself of the purpose of the supply chain, Youn says. “It’s to position the internal customers to meet the requirements of the external
customers.” Yet, studies show that as much as 60 percent of employees nationwide are looking to leave their jobs as employee discontent is clearly on the rise. And employees who are not engaged by
top management are certainly not likely to contribute anything positive to company sustainability initiatives.
Senior management must buy into not only the importance of
reducing the company’s carbon footprint but of engaging their
employees in the effort.
“What is the purpose of the initiative?” Young asks. “Has that
been communicated to the employees?” Has a method to define
and enforce accountability of the “green” team been established?
Are frontline employees and middle managers on the same page?
At Cintas, the green programs of each of the company’s business
units were centralized some time ago. A “green partner” web site was
set up to report on the program’s progress and to solicit ideas.
The traditional paradigm in supply chain is to reduce cost and
increase service, Youn says. Sustainability is a third way to look at
the supply chain: efforts to reduce a company’s carbon footprint
lead to new ways of improving the first two elements.
At Cintas, concerns about sustainability directly led to an increase in
the use of intermodal. Moreover, the company’s trucking use has been
modified considerably, Youn says. For instance, the company’s fleet
use has been reduced by about 12 million miles just in the last year.
Sustainability has moved from buzzword to
boardroom mandate, says Michael Youn, logistics manager for Cintas, a provider of uniforms,
apparel and other services. Leadership from the
top is required to effectively engage the team
charged with carrying out the initiative.
To view this video interview in its entirety,
visit www.SupplyChainBrain.com.
