The face of the business

By Peter Bradley, Editor in Chief -- Logistics Management, 6/1/2000

Consider the wonders of technology: Order online. Trace and track online. Use voice mail to check on order or account status. The rapidly evolving world of electronic commerce is marvelous in many ways, accelerating transactions while reducing their costs, expanding market access, and, ideally, compressing leadtimes and cycle times.

But by the same token, every expansion of electronic commerce means less human contact, and the implications of that are among the important unexplored questions of what e-commerce is going to mean to business.

The question is particularly important to logistics professionals and to their transportation providers because as businesses become more connected to their customers electronically over the Internet or over the phone, the danger is that they will become less connected personally. But goods still need to be delivered. And that means that the pickup and delivery side of business will increasingly become the single point of human contact between the seller and the customer. That's certainly true on the business-to-consumer side, where consumers can order goods and products from around the world from their computer consoles. It is probably less true on the business-to-business side; salespeople still make calls and most buyers and shippers want quick access to a supplier's customer-service representative. Yet it is becoming more pervasive there as well, as such things as proof of delivery become available at the click of a mouse.

We've all been subject to the worst of it, as when a phone call leads to a long series of automated instructions to press one for this, press two for that, and forget reaching a human being. Knowing that frustration should be incentive enough to avoid being the cause of it, and yet as we're all driven to use new technology to become more productive, that same technology can insulate us from the people most important to our business success. Even e-mail, which allows quick and easy contact with almost anyone, anywhere, can serve as an insulator when it replaces a phone call or a face-to-face meeting.

There's a rich philosophical literature exploring the effect that technology has on human relations. So I'll leave the philosophical implications of all of this to others. On purely business grounds, though, it suggests that logistics professionals and their providers do themselves and their companies much good when they ensure that the one remaining point of human contact between themselves and their customers is well managed. Look at the drivers you employ or the drivers who work for your carriers. More and more, those men and women are the face of your business.