Marketing, the weakest link in the Value Chain?

Last week at a Conference about Customer-driven Supply Chains we were exposed to the idea that Demand Chains are lacking systems to respond to human creativity and therefore suffer from same symptoms as we experience in chaos theory. Chaos in different forms..

The underlying idea is that some rigor and efficiency would make sales and marketing stronger and more efficient and bring it on a par with the well-engineered processes and ERP-systems that rule in logistics, production planning and procurement.

Interestingly the clash between left brain and right brain, efficiency and effectivity or structure versus chaos and how to marry these skills are becoming the key to business success in the 21st century.

Value creation requires creative brains to design the solutions customers want but rigour and engineering to make these solutions sustainable.

Supply Chain people got to become more creative. Then they will be able to share benefits of a more engineered approach and beautiful design with their marketing folks.

That is what made Apple great. Innovative solutions. but beautiful engineered designs...