Database Reference
In-Depth Information
As emphasized brilliantly by Frank Davis (see Davis and Manrodt 1996), for achiev-
ing responsiveness, the separation of assignment and delivery is critical. It is the
frontline worker that interacts with the individual customer to determine individual
needs. These individual needs are then used in conjunction with the conditional
best-practice guidelines to develop the individual delivery plan. The individual delivery
plan, which itemizes each task, schedule, and the responsible person, becomes the prioritized
assignment list or Kanban. This list is used to assign each task dynamically to the resource
network as also for recording the results.
The offering-based deterministic enterprise uses highly structured systems or channels to
develop a plan that includes not only the product design but also the channels that will be used to
deliver the product to the customer. When enterprises do not have the flexibility to respond to a
wide variety of needs, a different system must be established to meet each type of need. This makes
it very expensive to respond to new markets. In contrast, the customer-responsive enterprise tends
to build and use networks of resources that it can call upon to respond to a wide range of needs. The
customer-responsive enterprise is able to put together a large combination of resources to respond
according to initial-condition-determined best-practice guidelines to a wide range of needs.
The role of the responsive enterprise is to develop an infrastructure that facilitates the integra-
tion of the provider network into the solution process and the assigning and monitoring of each
delivery. When the infrastructure works, the relationship is effective and hassle-free; otherwise, it
is frustrating and unresponsive. Similarly, when the infrastructure works, the delivery is efficient
and coordination cost is low; otherwise, the delivery is late and ineffective, and special recovery
mechanisms such as expediting, inspection, sign-offs, and approvals must be implemented to work
around these shortcomings of the infrastructure. These recovery mechanisms unduly increase
expense, slow delivery, and make the enterprise inflexible and unresponsive.
Thus, to be able to respond, the enterprise must create an organization infrastructure that
includes
◾
Best-practice guideline development to maintain a repertoire of delivery practices
◾
Resource network development that identifies resources and interfaces and builds relation-
ships to ensure that the resources are available when needed
◾
Information infrastructure development that integrates and coordinates individual
deliveries
Surely, the Internet is the classic illustration of a
neural network
on a large scale that
displays a
top-down
oversight combined with a
bottom-up
cooperative delivery of
digital content.
It displays characteristic features of
◾
Network Effects
◾
Small-World Networks (SWNs)
◾
Cooperative Patterns
We touch upon these topics briefly in the following sections
