The supply chain, artistically reimagined
Can we recreate the story of the supply chain, drawing a new vision for what it means to deliver value in today’s economy?
This edition is a sketch—a preliminary composition exploring the concept of value as created by distribution and the supply chain, drawing on my inner artist. I am inspired by Rick Rubin’s new book, The Creative Act: A Way of Being, a work designed to help anyone embrace their creative instincts. I seek a fresh start and a blank canvas, casting out reigning influences to build a more human-centered process for exploring value's core qualities and emotions—and hoping for a radical reconception. It’s a modest beginning—a foundation layer and initial strokes that might paint the way toward generating value in the digital age.
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Tell a new tale
Molded by Michael Porter, supply chain value is considered additive, completing products through activities that ship, stock, market, sell, deliver, install, and service manufactured goods. Once named middlemen—a dated, disapproving, and derogatory moniker—today’s distributors still play a well-worn middle game. Competitive advantage is slight, dominance is circumstantial, and margins are constrained by suppliers' and customers' pricing and purchasing power. Lacking significant strategic advantage, the middle battle is fought with tactical weaponry—benchmarks, best practices, continuous improvement, and quality control. Metrics matter and fuel a relentless drive for efficiency: freight cost per unit, inventory turns, fill rates, cash-to-cash cycles, day sales outstanding, repeat purchases, asset utilization, and so forth. Profits gained at scale are plowed back in, doubling down without ever breaking out.
All of this is true. I’ve written so for decades with little pushback. Consider this: If my words in the paragraph above were a movie’s plot, would you see it? What would critics say? I imagine reviews calling it practical, sad, and gritty with phrases like “a cautionary reality tale offering little promise for a better future.” Is that the best story of the supply chain? Can’t it be more? Can we make distribution different, grander, and worthy of our times?
Sensing a way forward, I explored Rick Rubin’s ideas in my previous edition, beginning with these words:
Distribution’s innovators are speaking a new language, using repurposed and invented words to describe their work as the supply chain’s last mile. Here’s one example, one of the most important: Adding value to products is out; creating value for customers is in. And by this seemingly simple choice of words, distributors are heralding a revolution.
But the will to create is not enough. To lead a revolution, innovating as artists, distributors must first put a name to their intentions and then understand them as the truth that justifies their endeavors and existence. Rubin explains:
Though the artist may have a number of goals and motivations, there is only one intention. This is the grand gesture of the work.
It is not an exercise of thought, a goal to be set, or means of commodification. It is a truth that lives inside you. Through your living it, that truth becomes embedded in the work. If the work doesn’t represent who you are and what you’re living, how can it hold an energetic change?
An intention is more than a conscious purpose, it’s the congruence of that purpose. It requires an alignment of all aspects of one’s self. Of conscious thought and unconscious beliefs, of capabilities and commitment, of actions when working and not. It’s a state of living in harmonic agreement with oneself.
If you don’t understand every word Rubin offers, don’t worry. He’s speaking an unfamiliar language. Buy his book, read it, find this excerpt, and appreciate its context. But for now, I would offer this: Every innovator’s intention must be grounded in the value that is to be generated for customers and their communities, meeting the needs and aspirations of individual buyers in the larger context of how they connect and collaborate with others in life and at work. Doing so ensures an inclusive, human-centered supply chain shaped by the customer’s need for belonging, shared norms and goals, support networks, collective identity, mutual respect, giving back, shared burdens, common good, and more. (I will dig into the intersection of innovation and communities in my next edition.)
From Rubin, I learned that innovating as an artist is a “way of being in the world” centered on how we “perceive, filter, and collect data, then curate an experience for ourselves and others.” Rubin isn’t writing about the supply chain, but with those words, he could be. Extending Rubin’s ideas, I suggest seven actions for resetting your mind:
State your intention. Write down whatever words come to mind as you think about creating value.
See your customers. Don’t just talk about them; go out and physically observe them, striving to understand, acknowledge, and appreciate them for their work and lives.
Filter your perceptions. Look for human characteristics, not the language of segmentation and targeting. Capture what you learn about your customer’s dignity, wellness, worth, wealth, solidarity, and community.
Collect data. In part, I mean stories. Write down your narratives or record your customers on video. But also look for numbers. Identify metrics to measure dignity, wellness, worth, wealth, solidarity, and community. Look in your systems, your customers’ platforms, and anywhere else.
Craft customer experiences. Avoid the temptation to think about using the products or services you provide. Instead, describe something that customers do. Maybe think of it as a scene in a play or an improv. Pick an occasion that has meaning, needs improvement, happens every day, or something else.
Write a plot summary. Imagine a movie telling the story of creating value as a distributor or other supply chain member, then write a plot summary. If you thought my paragraph on a Porteresque supply chain was wrong, irritating, stupid, or uninspiring, do better. Write your plot and take it to someone who loves movies. Iterate. Always iterate.
Find your muse. As an artist, every innovator needs a person, concept, experience, or environment for inspiration, but also to work with emotional depth, focus, motivation, connection, and growth. In this edition, Rubin is my muse. His book helped, but I also listened to the music he produced as I wrote, using this article as a guide.
Inspire radical collaborations
If this edition provides any motivation, consider pulling a team together to work on value, innovation, and the supply chain. But don’t think of your event as brainstorming or a work session. Be an artist. For inspiration, I uploaded a draft of this edition to ChatGPT, and as a copilot, I asked for a paragraph describing my seven actions as an artistic project. Here’s what came, a model for your work:
In a spontaneous convergence of creative spirits, artists gather for an improvisational set, each bringing their unique flair and perspective. In this dynamic arena, the air buzzes with anticipation as they prepare to embark on an uncharted artistic journey. Without a script or predetermined direction, each artist listens intently, responding to and building upon the others' expressions in real-time. This fluid exchange, a dance of creativity, allows for unexpected moments of brilliance to surface. Their collaboration becomes a living, breathing entity, evolving with each spontaneous contribution. In this space, the artists are not just performers but co-creators, weaving together a tapestry of improvisation that is as unpredictable as it is exhilarating.
As always, I welcome your feedback and experiences. Leave your comments below, or reach out to me at mark.dancer@n4bi.com. If you like, send me your work as a plot summary, script, video, or an image created on Dall-E or the AI copilot you are using to enable your work.