To an observer, a single shipment appears as one event. To a customer, an order is placed; a customer waits; a delivery shows up either right or wrong. But in logistics, that same shipment is a set of smaller steps. The mapping of those smaller steps lets you see where data, goods and duties move from one node to the other. For the beginner, that’s a powerful way of making the abstract logistics world concrete.
Start with the order. The supplier request or purchase order is the place to begin because it tells you what is being requested, how much is being requested, where it’s going and when it should arrive. However, don’t go too fast to the delivery date. Start with the quantity, product name or description, destination address and delivery note. If you miss these key pieces of data, the whole flow will be difficult to follow because everything downstream depends on the initial data capture.
From the point the order is booked, the goods will then enter a warehouse process. At this point the goods could have been receiving, storing, picking, packing and then shipping to be received. Receiving acknowledges that the shipment was received by the warehouse. Storing shows that the shipment has been placed somewhere in the warehouse for safekeeping. Picking is the step of pulling the correct products from the warehouse shelves. Packing is the step where the warehouse staff are putting the picked items into the appropriate package. Finally, dispatch is when the goods leave the warehouse or fulfillment center and are on their way to the customer. Map out these steps in order because a pickup delay differs from a shipment delay after dispatch.
Here’s an easy exercise for the novice: Draw one long line. Put each process step on it starting with supplier request and then put the final delivery process on the other end of the line. Fill in the rest with purchase order, receiving, storing, picking, packing, shipment, carrier pickup, shipping status and delivery confirmation. Now label which paper work is associated with which steps. A packing list goes in the packing section. A delivery note goes with receiving or shipping at the delivery point.
One problem is that beginners sometimes confuse the physical movement of goods with the information that reflects the movement. The shipment is in the warehouse, while the delivery note has been printed. Carrier has the load, but tracking shows no information yet. Your map will help to separate what has happened to the goods from the record. You can now use that record when you encounter a mismatch in order to make specific questions.
Now that the basic flow is in place, look for handoffs. A handoff is when responsibility for the item is handed over from one stakeholder, department, location, or system to the next. Supplier to warehouse, warehouse to carrier, carrier to receiver and receiver to the inventory system all count as handoffs. This is where a lot of the little errors come in. For example, wrong quantity, missing address, unclear tracking update or a note that doesn’t say where the hold-up is coming from.
The order-to-delivery map can remain simple; its job is to allow you to explain in straightforward English the journey a shipment has taken on one order. If you can point to the purchase order, illustrate the picking area at the warehouse, describe when dispatch happens and the point where a carrier is involved, the flow will be more apparent. Now that you know what you’re looking for, the next time you look at a sample shipment, can you pinpoint the exact step where an information change, a movement of goods or a handoff is taking place?