Ask Me Anything (AMA) Supply Chain with Sami Naffakh

I'd like to welcome all of you to this new session organized by the Global Supply Chain Council. My name is Max Henry and I'm going to be your host today. So today we have again our Ask Me Anything AMA session being organized, and for some of you who don't know the format, this is again the opportunity for you to meet a supply chain leader someone who has tremendous experience in the field, who comes from the industry, and who's ready to take your questions. So again, we hope that this can be an interactive session. If you have a question for Sami, you can go ahead and ask for it. We're going to have the Q&A, which is now enabled. So if you see at the bottom of your screen, you have a question mark button, and if you click on it, this will open a Q&A tab where you can ask your question. We will prioritize those questions from you. So again, you know, feel free to ask those questions at any time, and I will take those questions as they come. We're not going to wait until the last part of that discussion. We will take them as soon as they get posted. This discussion is going to be just 50-55 minutes. So again, if you're worried about your next meeting starting in an hour, no worries. You will be able to join on time, and you will have a few minutes in between. So before we, you know, we have prepared a couple of questions just to kickstart the discussion, but maybe I'll get Sami to introduce himself first. Sami, if you, you know, could start with a very early age, you know, maybe not when you were a kid, but maybe share with us where you come from and what did you study, maybe how did you get into the industry, and maybe highlight some of the most interesting parts or maybe the most challenging time of your career as well in just a few minutes. Welcome, Sami, go ahead.

Thank you, Max, and thank you very much for having me here. And good morning, good afternoon, everyone. Where to start? Look, I was born in Syria, which is a country that people hear a lot from these days, but raised mostly in France. And then I went to an engineering school, graduated with master in industrial engineering, partly in France, partly in the US. And then I started my career in supply chain, and I've been always working supply chain and always in FMCGs. So I started with Unilever more than 30 years ago, phenomenal school. I worked first in my home country, so in France, and then started my international career when I was about 30 years old, first in the UK, as a factory director, and then I moved around in a number of places. So I've been working in Africa, I've been working in the US, I've been working in Asia, and of course a lot in Europe. So first, as I said, at Unilever, then I joined Reckitt Benckiser, first in Spain, then in the UK. Then from Benckiser, I went to Danone, which is a firm, dairy firm, joining their nutrition business. First in the Netherlands and then in Singapore. Then I went to Estée Lauder, a cosmetic luxury company based in first in France and then in Switzerland. Then to Arla Foods, which is another dairy in Denmark, and back to Reckitt for the last four or five years. And I've left Reckitt about six months ago, and I'm now doing a career of portfolio activities. So I'm a board member of a startup business. And I'm doing advisory work for a number of other businesses, always in supply chain. So that's me in a few words.

So you spent most of your time at Reckitt, right? This was your longest experience with a company?

In 2 stretches, yes. Unilever and Reckitt, I think both combined is about 10 years each, yes. But Unilever was one stretch, Reckitt was 2 stretches.

Okay, and what was the difference between those 2 companies? If you're looking back, and again, you know, on supply chain, are those companies leading their supply chain operation the same way or in a very different manner?

In a very, very different manner. So especially if I go back to Reckitt, when I joined Reckitt after leaving Unilever, those 2 companies were almost opposite. So Unilever is— Unilever was a fantastic school, I have to say. There is a book and a guideline and the expertise for everything, and things are run by the book. So if you're in a very stable environment and predictive, it's phenomenal. Reckitt was almost opposite. There is no guideline, no book, very little processes, or there was, it's changed since, but at that time, But in terms of responsiveness, they were amazing. Their ability to quickly change course because the market has changed or because there was a new opportunity or new direction was nowhere near what Unilever was. Because of course, for Unilever to change course, you had to go through multiple iterations of processes, decision-making, etc., etc. So, you know, the strength of one was the weakness of the other and vice versa. It was quite interesting to move from one to the other.

So I think you were with Reckitt during the pandemic. What happened then and what kind of lessons did you learn from that difficult time at this company?

Look, this is where this— because this responsiveness and this ability to find solutions in the midst of whatever situation is really in the DNA of Reckitt. So that played very well during the pandemic. Very quickly, without having to go through long discussions and processes, etc., contingency plans were built. The operations continuity was secured with all the protocols to make sure that people were working in as safe an environment as possible. And look, eventually Reckitt gained significant market shares during that during that time because they were able to keep their operations going and keep the supply going probably better than competition, including, you know, including big names like Procter& Gamble, etc. So that's the positive. On the less positive, and that's really a lesson that I learned from that crisis, is there is a balance to be gotten between reacting and not overreacting. Because if you start putting in place some plans, and that, by the way, that would apply to my view very much with the tariffs discussion today. If you start putting plans as a reaction to your immediate situation, but those plans are going to take years to unfold. So typically you're not going to build capacity because of one category that's gone on fire. With the situation, or you're going to start building new plans based on a new tariff situation. By the time those plans are up and running, it is likely that your initial situation has changed, right? So one mistake that we did and that I did at Rekit was starting building capacity on categories which growth was not sustainable. It was entirely driven by the COVID spike. And that came to an end fairly quickly, right? Of course, if you're in the midst of the fire, you don't see it this way, but that's what happens. So I think there is a balance to be had and there is a judgment call to be made between, you know, where do I put the trigger between reacting because I don't want to be penalized by this new environment, but how sustainable and how likely that new environment is there to stick. which was the learning.

Okay, well, I think we'll come back to this again a little bit later in the discussion. I see just one question which maybe we can take this one now in the Q&A. At Rekit, let me put this on screen if it hopefully works. Yeah, how did you keep operational excellence despite all global disruptions, specifically at Rekit? Yeah.

Yeah, and it's a very good question. And the fact is that, you know, disruptions keep coming, right? And you— we're now in the words, and I know that we were going to talk about volatility, but we're in a world where you keep having new news and new disruptions that one wasn't expecting, right? If you look in the 5— in the last 5 years, it's never stopped. Nonetheless, you need to keep that operational excellence drive. So the way I looked at that was to be very clear with the general direction, right? So you want to set manufacturing excellence and here are the milestones and the key drivers that you want to work on. And the same on logistics and the same on procurement and the same on digital. So you need to have structured programs with clear drivers, milestones, and deliverables. Whilst at the same time, you need to be very agile. So whilst the direction doesn't change, you need to accept that the detailed plans might change because you will have some operation imperatives which are going to take some resources which were initially allocated. So the keyword here is agility, but agility without losing the, you know, where you want to go. It's a bit like for the people who are sailing, right? You need to maneuver your sailboat all the time, but you still have to have an eye on where you're going because you don't want to lose sight of where you're going. It's the same. So it's not gonna, you know, it's the path to excellence is much less linear and much less stable than what it was, and you're gonna have a lot of curves and diversions. Nonetheless, you need to get the direction still clear to your teams.

Okay, all right. If you have any more questions, feel free to ask now, and then we'll take those questions as we keep talking. I'm sure there's going to be questions about this, so let me ask this question before someone starts to bring it up. AI, GenAI, this is a hot topic for a lot of supply chain leaders today. You're probably going for it as well, and you've seen some implementation happening at Wrike before you left. But what's your take on those technologies, and how do you think it's going to be impacting supply chain, you know, logistics or procurement processes in general moving forward here?

Yeah, and it's a very good and tricky question, and I keep struggling a bit with the answer, as we discussed before, Max. So first, I have no doubt that AI and GenAI is revolutionary. And, you know, if I'm looking at the way now people use ChatGPT or other similar tools in their day-to-day life, whether professional or personal, you can see that's really changing. It's a game changer. I think there is some entire fields where this is going to be— this is going to drive some radical changes. So anything which is Any activity which is involving researching data or researching facts for decision-making is going to be impacted, whether it is in supply, in legal, in financial, etc. Anything which is about content creation, presentation decks, images, movies is also going to be impacted. So the field of application is pretty wide and pretty radical. Nonetheless, if you look at what this is versus how the companies are organized today in terms of their organization, in terms of their processes, in terms of their ways of working, and in terms of their system landscape, there is a huge step. And I'm not yet quite certain how this step is going to be managed. I think for the digital native startup, it's a completely different ballgame. For them, it's evident. And I know there's a number of startups which are already entirely organized around AI, which is going to give them a huge competitive advantage. If I'm thinking about the big companies and big FMCG, for the ones I know, is going to be a bit more difficult. Let me give you specific examples. I've been in a number of FMCGs that have taken more than 10 years to roll out SAP, right? And they're still on the previous version and they're not considering moving to HANA. And, you know, Reckitt, not to name them, still has a number of areas which is still running on GD Edwards. So let's say This has taken 12 to 15 years. You cannot cope with that kind of change management when talking about AI. And this is where I'm not sure. But by the way, Reckitt is not a specific example. There's a lot of companies which are on the same stuff, on the same kind of time span, because this is taking time, because it's, you know, these are difficult decisions, organizational changes, process changes, and you have a business to run at the same time. So it's not an easy bit.

Yeah.

Change management to implement AI and to harvest all the potential and all the benefits is where I have a big question mark for the big companies.

So we see already layoffs, you know, as a result of AI implementations and GenAI. Do you think that, you know, supply chain positions, well, some of them will be eventually replaced? So everybody's talking about, of course, redundant tasks, things that can be automated. But, you know, anybody using ChatGPT knows very well too that this kind of tool is also excellent at making analysis, aggregating lots of information, making recommendations and suggestions. And this is a job that a supply chain leader or supply chain VP will do. on a daily basis. So what do you think would be the impact on the actual jobs, you know, for supply chain professionals here?

Look, I think there's a number of things. As I said, for anything which is about gathering information and data, I think there's going to be huge changes. And you still need people to validate what you get out of the tool because it's not, you know, it's not 100% bulletproof. But for that, you need a different skill set, right? You need people who need to understand how the algorithm behind the AI works and whether what you get is sensible or not. But yes, there, I think there's going to be a lot of changes. If you If you look at a traditional company organization in supply, a lot of the layers, you know, typically in manufacturing, you take the layers between the people on the shop floor running the lines and the people at the top of the sites leading the sites. A lot of these layers, the only thing they're doing is collecting information, compiling information, and converting information in some kind of ways to decide what to do. That's going to be radically changed. And this is where, if you think change management is pretty heavy lifting, when it comes to taking the decision themselves, I think it's a different ball game. You're still, to my view, right, it's my personal view, you still have to have people running your business and taking decisions. So it's more an aid you're gonna have a tool guiding you or offering you much more insights and much more scenario planning towards your decision. But I wouldn't expect companies to rely fully on the tool to take decisions. I think that would be a very dangerous game to get into, personally.

All right, okay, no problem. Someone is asking, and let me put this on screen. What kind of— what specific challenges did you have while implementing new tools or software in supply chain? You mentioned some companies still using SAP from 10 years ago. You know, looking back at the different roles that you had implementing all those tools and solutions, you know, what would have been the lesson that you learned from this?

Look, the key challenge I've always been confronted with in implementing new tools and solutions is one word, it's called adoption. Implementing the tool technologically and technically, it always has some challenge, but you can overcome them quite quickly. Adoption, so that people use the tool in such a way that you deliver the value you expect from the tool, is always where I found the key challenges. And there's a number of things behind it. There is some power games because people feel that they're going to be losing control or power. There is some skill gaps. There is some classic resistance to change. There is some misconception of what the value is. But this is always where I have some challenge. And one of my key learning is both at planning stage and execution stage, one needs to plan for enough time for adoption. If you deploy a tool with a tick-in-the-box mindset, which is okay, I've gone there, I've spent a few weeks in that place, I've trained everyone, the tool is running, it's running well, I move on. It's only going to fail, right? Because it's not because people have been trained that they accept the tool, that they actually know how to use it, and that they leverage the value of the tool. So it's taking more time and it has an impact on the value case. But frankly, this is the only way to get the value out of the tool that you're implementing, especially when the tool One thing is automate, is to automate what people are already doing. So they're going to be working the same in a more efficient way. That's pretty easy. But when you're implementing a tool which is radically changing the way people work and the way the company works, you need to work hard on adoption. Otherwise, it's going to be a failure, quite guaranteed.

Okay, thanks for the questions. Okay, we have another question coming in. Let me bring this up. This is from Yanisa, who's asking, having led supply chains across various regions, how do you manage cultural differences?

Another very good question. You need to spend the time to understand it, point number one, right? So when you're— it's not just when you go and work in a different place that you need to understand how people, you know, what's the cultural environment and how people behave both in the personal and the professional environment, but also if you run a multicultural organization, you need to understand this. So you need to invest the time to understand how things are being, you know, how people work and how people think and how people communicate and how people collaborate in various cultures so that you're sensible and sensitive to it, which is not a given. And it's, again, it's an investment that I would highly encourage people to take. That's the only way that you can make sure that a multicultural actual organization works, works correctly.

Okay, thank you for your questions. Okay, so I wanted to ask you about, you know, ESG initiative. Quite a buzzy word for the past few years. COVID came in, and I think there were some, you know, some companies have been scaling down a little bit on this, but it's still very, very important. So How do you think sustainability and social responsibility have been, you know, embedded and developed into supply chain operations? And, you know, and what has been the impact of sustainability into the organizations today?

Look, it's a mixed picture, really. I think there's a to my personal view, there has been a number of missteps in ESG. So from a regulating authority standpoint, especially in Europe and to some extent in the US, probably less so in Asia, there was a very dogmatic approach to it, which was not making any sense from an economic reality. You know, the European Green Deal, which is now scaled down, was just you know, impossible to work out practically by businesses without committing suicide. And again, I think in some areas in the US, in some states in the US, there was a problem of overregulations which were completely disconnected again from the reality. And, you know, of course now with Trump, this is kind of going the other extreme. And then from a company standpoint, I think there was a lot of a lot of marketing around ESG, right? A lot of— I'm not a fan of that expression, but a lot of this greenwashing where people thought that ESG was the new way to get a shiny corporate image and a new shine with your customers and your consumers without necessarily a very profound reality behind it. So I think we're now kind of course correcting this. Of course, I think regulating bodies do understand that they need to course correct. I think the analysts and the organizations, nonprofit organizations, are also much more cautious about what is being said by companies. And, you know, I think this is now getting a bit more profound, a bit less show-off and a bit more profound, but there's still a huge amount of work to be done. I think companies, generally speaking, have done a, you know, decent work in their, in everything which is within their control. So what kind of energy are they buying? What kind of operations are there? Sorry, what kind of emissions are they having from their own operations? When it comes to the extended supply chain, which is what about my transportation? What about my suppliers? What about my tier 2, 3, 4 What about my end-to-end ecosystem and how green is that and how sustainable is that? I think there's still a huge amount of work to be done. Same with the consumers, right? One thing is how sustainably you're producing your products, but then, you know, the way your consumers is using your product, is treating your waste is again something different. And as a corporation, you cannot say it's not your problem because it's the consumer. No, it's not the consumer, it's your consumer. using your products, which is also something to be addressed.

Okay, we have a question. Let me bring it on screen again. How do you cultivate leadership within your teams to ensure resilience and adaptability?

Oh, that's a tough question, Brian. Look, how do I cultivate leadership I think, you know, it's difficult to answer a question on leadership in a few seconds, but let me say 2 things. I've always been looking at 2 things in leading teams. The first one is to ensure that you have the right people with you in your ride. And this is not to say people are right or they're wrong or they're good or they're bad. But there are people who are going to be adhering to your project and your vision and your direction. And there are people who will not. The one who will not will always be toxic, right? So the first— and I'm not here advocating chopping heads and firing people, etc. I'm just saying you need to have an assessment on whether you strongly believe that the people in your leadership team are going to have the passion, the willingness, the skills, the competencies to go and ride with you where you want to go, with vision and direction, which by the way means that you're yourself clear on where you want to go. Of course, if you're not, it's difficult. Now, once you have the right people or the people you believe will be the right co-riders with you in your leadership journey, you need to build a team. So that's the second thing I'm I'm investing a lot of time on in terms of leadership. Building trust, building a common vision, building common ways of working, building a common agility. To your point, if you're saying that resilience and agility is key in your leadership journey, then make sure that resilience and agility means the same for everyone in the team. Because a word can have very different meaning to very different people. So you need to address that so that the team is really cohesive and federated across a very clear and common direction and vision. I hope that helps, or I hope that answers the question.

And if you could explain, Sami, at Rekit, the supply chain organization that you had. So did you oversee everything from sourcing all the way to logistics, or because some companies kind of differentiate and sometimes they don't include procurement in supply chain for some reason. But so did you cover the end-to-end supply chain within your organization?

Yes, both at Reckitt and Arla, it was a complete end-to-end supply chain integrated. And by the way, I personally believe that this is the right setup. So it covered everything from function standpoints, so procurement, upstream logistics, manufacturing, downstream logistics, logistics, customer service, and of course quality planning, you name it. And then it was covering all the business units. So Reckitt has 3 business units. One is health, one is hygiene, and one is nutrition, and all the geographies. And the way my team was set up at Reckitt is I had one head of supply chain end to end. So each of them were covering procurement, manufacturing, distribution logistics planning, one for each of the business units, one by business units. And then they would have their own organization. And then I have functional specialists. So I had one head of manufacturing excellence globally. I had one head of logistics excellence globally and one head of procurement globally. So it was kind of matrix split.

Okay. And all those people were in one location or they were located?

No.

Okay.

No, no. So people were scattered across the geographies.

Okay, that's interesting. Okay, if you have again questions for Sami, go ahead, you can ask now. You can just click on the question mark button located at the bottom of the screen, and then we'll be happy to take them. All right, so let's continue. We kind of started already talking about risk and resilience, but so We're still going through it. I mean, there are a lot of challenges. You know, obviously tariff has been, you know, a hot topic for the past few months and companies are going through it, struggling with it. There's still a lot of uncertainty about what's going to happen around those tariffs, where things could change overnight. People are on hold, on standby. They're waiting for Trump's next move and next decision and negotiation. Plus we have geopolitics, plus we have the environment, you know, extreme weather, which also affecting a lot of different things. So how do you think, you know, supply chain leaders can cope with all those, you know, risk and, you know, factors happening on a daily basis and where nothing really stops? There's always something new coming up. And so what's your take on this? Yeah.

I think you need to radically reframe and rethink the way you're setting up your supply network. And what I mean by supply network is both procurement, which is where do you source your materials and services? It's not just materials, it's also services from where do you manufacture your products and where do you distribute from? You know, for, I would say for 30 years since I started working, it was all about consolidation, driving leverage and scale, moving to low-cost countries or lower-cost countries, maximizing capacity utilization. And all that is fine as long as you're in a global open market with limited disruptions. It doesn't work anymore because, you know, we're less and less global. Unfortunately, global trade keeps, keeps going backtrack. And more and more, as you were rightly saying, there is more and more disruption. So you cannot have all your eggs in the same basket and that basket completely full without any headspace. And that's easier said than done, right? Because your economic equation, your financial equation is going to be changing. Of course, if you start producing multiple locations, you don't have the same leverage of scale. If you start producing into locations which are higher cost, that less risk than your low-cost location, it has a cost impact. If you say that you don't want to utilize your assets at more than, quote, 70%, whereas you were used to using them at 90%, 95%, it has an impact on cost. So there is a lot of work to be done by supply chain professionals with their executive committee, financial teams, and boards to convey that message that resilience comes with a cost, unfortunately, right? You cannot have it all. And the whole P&L equation of the company is changing as a result of building in your P&L that resilience cost. But I think we're really changing era, right? We're moving from an era where it was really about efficiency, and consolidation to an era where, you know, resiliency, diversity, and optionality is going to be key.

And you also mentioned, you know, nearshoring and reshoring. I know that you were involved also in, with operation in Asia. And so do you think it's happening? Do you believe that European or even American companies are trying to bring back manufacturing and sourcing in their own region?

So yes, the simple answer is yes, with different dynamics. There is certainly from the US companies, there has been a lot of focus and attention in reducing their exposure to China because they knew there was both a geopolitical and trade war risk, which by the way happened with Trump election. So I could see this. By the way, it's not always nearshoring. There's been a lot of nearshoring towards Mexico, but there's also been some diversification within Asia. So you've seen a lot of moves from China into Vietnam, from China into Malaysia, to some extent into Indonesia. If I'm looking at the European businesses, it's the same but with less intensity. But I think there is a general There's not necessarily a willingness to move out of a specific country, but there's definitely a willingness to diversify your sources. So again, I've seen a lot of focus onto moving either, you know, moving between Eastern Europe, Asia, moving within China from— within Asia from China to other countries, moving from Asia into Eastern Europe. Or Latin America to have, whilst keeping your costs under control, having much more diversification of your sources. And an example of that, by the way, is if you look at palm oil, which has nothing to do with China, that's to give a different example, the immense majority of palm oil was sourced out of Malaysia and Indonesia. Now, you can see companies starting to buy out of Latin America, especially Mexico, to diversify, to be less exposed to Asia because, you know, they— I don't know if you remember, but during COVID Indonesia put a ban on export of palm oil because they wanted to secure it for their own population. Now, that makes you think. If 95% of your sourcing is coming from that country and from one day to the other, all exports are blocked, then your business is killed. So those kind of movements, yes, you see.

When I, I was listening to you also before, when you talk about agility, and, and, you know, we have very large FMCG companies now, I mean, the like of Unilever and P&G and Reckitt and, and many others. Do you think those companies in their own business model can still be agile when they are so big and so heavy and so slow in making changes and decisions. And those companies are highly structured, you know, matrix organization and different divisions and different operations. And you also mentioned diversity in their manufacturing and sourcing. So they have, you know, their supply— because, I mean, the supply ecosystem is so complex. And can those companies still be fast-moving in in a world where, you know, everything can happen and the fact that they're so big and so fat, it's tough. So because I cannot stop thinking about all those small brands which are very quick to bring products into markets versus those big giant dinosaurs like P&G or Unilever.

I think it's a very, very valid question and I think it's one of the key one of the key challenges that those companies are having, and by the way, that applies to FMCG, I think that applies to a number of other industrial sectors, whether it is automotive or fashion, etc. As you were saying, right, they're very, they're actually not fast moving anymore, they're pretty slow moving. You can have spikes of agility because of one specific situation, But generally speaking, they've become pretty slow moving. And look, they're all, to be honest, there are a lot of them, not all, but a lot of them are struggling. Nestlé is struggling. Reckitt is not having a great ride. Fracture is okay, but their latest results were not phenomenal. Unilever is struggling for years, if not decades, in reinventing itself. And you're right. Besides this, you see small companies, digital natives, really playing the speed. Look at, you know, if you're looking at how Shein has been disrupting the whole fashion industry, it's a good example, right? If you're fast, if you're young, if you know how to play with the new tools, etc., it gives you an immediate competitive advantage. And back to the question on AI, that to me is a key question and a key risk I see, which is the rate at which you would need to adopt these new technologies and the rate at which you would need to transform and reinvent your entire business, ways of working, organization, etc., versus the reality of how fast those businesses are moving is completely disconnected.

Interesting. Anyway, we can probably talk about this for some time. Okay, there's another question coming up. Let me bring this up. What emerging trends do you foresee shaping the future of supply chain management? We talk about AI, but maybe is there any other trends that you see really impacting supply chain management, probably I'm not sure what they mean, but probably the profession itself or—

Look, I think we've covered a number of them. Again, the entire environment, the playing field of supply chain is completely changed, right? It's massively changed in the last 5 years. All your references and all your ways of thinking that were valid 5 years ago are not valid anymore now. So it's all about you know, resiliency, optionality, responsiveness, etc. Planning, take planning for example, you cannot look at planning the way you're looking at planning 5, 10 years ago just because of the volatility and unpredictability of both your demand and supply, by the way. So you need to rethink entirely and to adapt to a new playfield. The second thing is, of course, you have the technological disruptions and you need to think about not only what can it do for you, because what can it do for you is the easy question, but how you're going to implement it, right? So how can you leverage that value and what it means in terms of transformation in your supply chain, organization, ways of working, underlying processes, etc.? Otherwise, it's going to be a spinning question. ESG is another one that we mentioned. Of course, with the Trump election, it's lost a bit of steam. Nonetheless, if one is objective, the real impact of climate change in terms of disruptions is, you know, you cannot deny it. I think all of us have been confronted with sourcing issues or manufacturing issues because of a severe weather event, because of a lack of water, because of energy disruptions, you name it, right? So it's a reality. So you need to, you need to take this into consideration, both from a how do I make my supply chain greener, not for the sake of being greener, but also for the sake of being more resilient. And how do I prevent those emerging climate-related risks to impact me? And the last one that we haven't, I mean, we touched on it, but we haven't spoken a lot about it, is about talents. You need people, right, to run even with AI and you name it. And of course you might need less people, but you still need people, but you need the right people. You need people with the right mindset, with the right motivation, with the right skills, with the right learning agility. At the same time as, you know, younger generations have a completely different view on the work environment, in the environment they strive to work within, their aspirations, their view on the balance between life and work is completely different than what the previous generations had. So how do you cope with this from a supply standpoint? So how do you get the right people who are very rare And how do you attract them? Because those people are frankly not necessarily interested. As an anecdote, right, my son is 21 years old. He did an internship at Reckitt, and his conclusion was, I'm never going to work in such a company.

Right.

Okay. And this was not about Reckitt. because it's Wreck-It. It's just the environment of SNCG, the ways of working, the kind of dynamic, etc., was simply not suitable to him. And I don't think it's a unique case.

Yeah, it's probably, you know, I mean, young people don't always like large setup, right? They prefer to work in smaller, you know, companies, startups, you know, where—

Correct. And And they want to have speed and they want to have momentum and they want to have energy and they want to see that the tools that they're using themselves on an hourly basis are being leveraged in the professional environment, etc. So how you're going to be able to secure the talent you need for the future is going to be more and more an issue, I think, because there is a disconnect between what those people who you need are expecting and what they're looking for Versus what you can offer.

Yeah, and if all those young people who are interested in supply chain are going into those very agile kind of startup style of companies, what's going to happen to those large MNCs like Unilever or Wrigley?

Absolutely.

They will have no choice than downscale and use AI agents eventually just to replace those to fill those positions that they cannot find talents for, right?

Yeah, no, look, and that last point for me is essential. I think there's a real strategic thinking to be had within supply chain and beyond supply chain, right? If you look at the reality of the younger generations and what those talents are aspiring to. And if you look at the technological revolution, you need to have a very strategic discussion and thinking about what does it mean for me and what does it mean in terms of setup, what does it mean in terms of organization, what does it mean in terms of changing completely the way I run that organization and we work within that organization. And frankly, I don't see this happening a lot in the large organization.

And we have another question which relates to this. Therese is asking, what guidance will you offer to aspiring supply chain professionals aiming to excel in this dynamic field? Yeah, what would be your advice?

Yeah, it's a good question. I I would say 2 things. I think, you know, it's a buzzword which I don't like a lot, but I think this principle of reverse coaching is interesting. I think those younger generations, they have a role to play in coaching the more experienced people in the organization on, you know, this whole theme about new tools and how do we leverage this on a constant basis, etc. So I think there is a they can play a role in helping driving that change that we've just been talking about. And then the second one, and that's the most important, is I would advise any, and I did advise any newcomer, you know, those young, bright, energetic people, I always advise them not to change, right? To keep being authentic to themselves, because the worst thing that can happen is that they get kind of melted in the organization. You want to use them as change agents. So of course they need to get the support, they need to feel embraced, supported, recognized, rewarded. That's your role as a leader. But they also have to be clear that they're going to be faced with a lot of resistance, passive, active, etc. And they need to stay authentic to themselves because, you know, there is no way you can change an organization if you give up and you melt yourself into the existing ways of working.

Yeah, and on this note, do you think, Sami, that the schools who are teaching supply chain management have the right programs? And do they teach supply chain management in a way that it should be taught, given all the changes and all the new technology that's coming in right now?

I'm not sure. I think there's an effort, to be fair. I think there's an effort to adapt the programs to the new reality. But I think there's still a lot of material which is based on more technical things. Whereas, you know, if you're looking at the, you know, what you expect from somebody working in supply, you expect a person to be not knowing but learning, right? The environment changes so quickly and the ways of working changes so quickly that you need people not who have a set, you know, a fixed set of skills, but people who are very agile in learning and keep learning and keep willing to learn all the time. That's one. And then you want leaders, you know, you want people who are going to be drivers of change and who are going to be helping reshaping all these organizations. You don't need somebody who's a specialist of whatever technical field.

Yeah, a lot of interesting changes happening. Okay, thank you very much. Okay, so this is— I think that's it for our session. I want to thank again everyone For all those questions, we had some interesting questions today. Thank you again, Sami, for taking the time, for being with us and giving your insights, given that you had a lot of experience and you probably learned quite a few things from your career. So thanks again for being with us today.

No, thanks all and have a great day.

So that's it today for our AMA session. This was our AMA with Sami Nafaf. Nafak, you have a French name also, Pascal. Sami Pascal Nafak joining us, ex-Racket, and giving you insight. If you miss part of the discussion, you can always watch a replay, and the replay will be made available on our chain.net platform in the next 24 hours. So thanks again for attending, and we look forward to seeing our next event. We have an event on supply chain orchestration happening next Thursday. So if you're interested in the topic, join us again next Thursday for this event. We have a number of panelists coming from different industries and interesting companies as well. So we'll see you next week, and thanks again, Samir. We'll see you next time.

Thank you. Thank you.

Bye-bye.