Dive Brief:
- Various logistics leaders spoke about the challenge of finding talent, and their strategies, at a trade show in Munich last week, as reported by The Loadstar.
- Companies are pursuing alternative strategies to find new talent: At Amazon, new logistics staff are mainly operational researchers and mathematicians, while Flexport prefers candidates "really smart" candidates with minimal logistics experience, lest they be too locked in to one way of thinking.
- That said, Swiss forwarder Panalpina asserts that logistics experts will always be needed to handle customers and supply chain complexities.
Dive Insight:
Continued concern about talent shortages within manufacturing and the supply chain have expanded to include logistics, with company heads hunting for alternative sources of new talent. With Amazon's metrics-heavy approach, coupled with Flexport's "really smart" holistic strategy, companies continue to apply varied techniques to unearth talent that can enhance the supply chain — even as companies such as Amazon say it's really the "demand chain."
One method of ensuring that enough smart candidates make it into the talent pool is to recruit far more broadly — and fairly — than current methods suggest. For example, a recent survey revealed an astonishingly wide pay gap between genders in procurement. Further, a 2016 survey of Women in the Supply Chain revealed that few companies deliberately endeavor to hire women, let alone promote them once on board. But with a talent crisis pervading logistics and the supply chain, professionals can ill afford to continue overlooking 47% of the workforce.
Furthermore, certifications are increasingly becoming a strategic way to designate and identify supply chain talent. Even those without specific supply chain degrees can build out their careers with these certifications, which offer both the additional professional exposure that recruiters are looking for, and expanded professional networks.
