There is a change of presidential administrations coming when President Trump takes office. Here are my thoughts on how the supply chain may be affected. Let’s discuss sustainability, supply and demand of transportation capacity, and federal regulation. Let’s avoid name calling and focus what the new Trump administration will mean operationally. Key take away is agile and flexibility will be needed in changing environment.
One of my favorite supply chain words is sustainability. This word not only encompasses environmental concerns but also whether the organization can continue and strive in its environment. Let’s look at the environmental aspect first.
Organizations have embraced environmental concerns, most importantly as a business concern. A lot of environmental concern is about eliminating waste and be more productive and cost effective. Few organizations will choose to be less cost effective. It is also true, that despite any lessening of environmental regulations, a firm’s market may demand environmental responsibility. So even if the political structure is less concerned about environmental responsibility, most firms will find in its business interest to continue their sustainability practices.
However, as the political situation changes, keeping a business sustainable operation may need to change as their markets change for long tern survivability. One needs to be alert to those changes
There are a lot of articles out there saying the truck recession is over, and spot raises have risen at this writing. If the government chooses to depart a large number of immigrates, it will have an effect on the number of drivers out there. It will affect the ability to manufacture with less people. It will affect government financial resources. It will concentrate resources in its priorities to move out illegal immigrants. All of this is to say, the ability to be agile in your supply chain planning is going to critical. None of your software is likely anticipating these changes in its programming code, like software was not prepared for Covid in 2020.
The upkeep of transportation infrastructure is critical. Organizations should prioritize maintaining the funding by government for these programs as its absence will affect cost of operations
There is a feeling that eliminating regulation will be a boon to business operations. Yes, you can find fairly easily overstep in specific regulations. But lets imagine all OSHA regulations are ended and there was no safety regulations were out there, would choosing to end safety in your organization actually improve costs and efficiency? Only in a very short term period, as legal injury costs would likely sky rocket and your production efficiency would go down as workers are unavailable. My personal experience is when truck driver hours of service violations occur, the accident rate increases and costs go up.
Certainly there is a place to consider whether individual truck drivers hours of service rules might be better off changed or any regulation. Let’s support a wiser approach then just cutting the rules off the books. Organizations should support a process to change regulations, rather then take a scissor to them to them.
It is wise for organizations to consider how the supply chain might change in the new political climate. Agile and sustainability should be the key note of the supply chain in this environment.