barry lawrence highlight technologies linkedin

#Barry lawrence highlight technologies linkedin drivers#

New customer communication technologies like e-commerce are enabling new ways for firms to deliver the customer experience. Customer experience, simply put, is the effect on customer perception of and satisfaction with all interactions with your firm. E-commerce is essentially the ability to take your sales order processing online. To do so, however, means you have to deliver the experience without the assistance of a sales person. You must provide richer information, ease of ordering, ease of searching, and other creative ways to establish a positive ordering experience. This process, however, either eliminates or frees up the sales force to further elevate the relationship in other ways. In our new book, to be released by the National Association of Wholesaler Distributors (NAW) Institute in 2018, we used the knowledge we developed in our large research consortium to build the “Optimizing Distributor Human Capital Development” model. The book covers the best practices in developing talent but, as we were conducting the research, digitization finally took off. We found ourselves contemplating how Human Capital Development would have to react to the movement. We pondered the many projects from the area that were going on in the Talent Incubator (our undergraduate research teams) and the rich dialogs were getting with business leaders. We found that we could see the future sales and market models emerging across different distributor verticals, sizes, and service models. In our many interactions with best practice firms, we get the opportunity to interact with thought leaders on a daily basis. The topic they most want to address is the digitization of distributors. At first, such discussions are confused and lack clarity. Soon, however, leaders begin suggesting alternatives and action plans. We start research projects on the topics with leading firms and dig deeper. Before long, solutions gain a certain consistency and outliers become better understood. The digital distributor is no exception. We’ve been studying the concept for decades in one form or another. The recent digital onslaught has led to firms taking action, however, and we are now beginning to see the future with some clarity. One thing is absolutely clear. Digitization does not spell the end of human capital development. It opens up a new and more challenging chapter.

#Barry lawrence highlight technologies linkedin drivers#

Distributors have seen their talent needs evolve for many years but, in the new millennium, some change drivers seem to be intensifying. E-commerce, social media, and other information driven business processes are reinventing how the American economy works. Distributors are information driven firms since sales, marketing, management, services, customer and supplier management, and finance are 100% information processes. Warehousing, transportation, and inventory management are driven by poor information processes like forecasting failures (a 100% information exercise). Essentially, distributors are key supply chain information managers. Therefore, information process technology trends have a bigger impact on distributors than on some other firms.