Rick Sather
As vice president of customer supply chain
for North American Consumer Products at
Kimberly-Clark Corp., Rick Sather is
responsible for customer service, distribution operations, supply chain analysis, and
customer supply chain strategy. He has been
with Kimberly-Clark for 28 years in various
supply chain and operations roles in
Fullerton, Calif., and Neenah, Wis.
While leading the customer supply chain
team, Sather has established a lean/continuous improvement culture that’s focused on driving exceptional outcomes for team members, customers, and shareholders.
He has also been involved in the company’s efforts in
North America to create a demand-driven supply chain.
QHow did you end up in supply chain management?
A I studied manufacturing engineering and took a couple of logistics courses
as part of my studies. I was introduced to
APICS in one of these courses, and while I
was an intern at 3M, one of its managers
was pursuing APICS certification. I decided
to pursue this and was certified before I
graduated.
My first role at Kimberly-Clark was as a floor supervisor
working the third shift in a distribution center. From there,
I’ve never looked back. During my 28 years at KC, I’ve had
14 different roles.
QAt Kimberly-Clark, you were involved in an initia- tive to make its supply chain more demand driven.
What was the biggest challenge in getting that program
started?
A We have been on our demand-driven journey for several years. There have been and there remain
many challenges. The biggest challenge in getting started is
building an understanding of what it means to be demand
driven and the benefits it can provide. This is especially
true given the number of stakeholders that will eventually
be impacted—both internally across functions and externally with customers and suppliers. As with any change,
the best way to gain acceptance and support is to deliver
results. Whether through pilot activities or rolling out a
new process or system, demonstrating results along the
way and sharing stories and examples is the best way to
build understanding and support for a long-term effort
such as this.
QWhat’s your greatest accomplishment in the profes- sion to date and why?
A If I had to pick one accomplishment, it would really be about people. I’ve been personally very fortunate
with the freedom I’ve had over the years to pursue
improvements. We faced many problems when I first started, and we still face many problems today. And now that
I’m in a role where I can influence the culture for a broad
team, I want to establish an environment where all team
members can make a difference for themselves, our customers, and the company.
About eight years ago, I started my own personal “lean”
journey. This helped me promote a culture that would
allow our team members to have the same opportunity that
I was so blessed to have during my career. It is very gratifying to see a team member who has only been with the company a few weeks or months share a problem-solving story
where he or she has made a big impact. My greatest accomplishment would be to embed this culture deeply.
QWhat would you say to other supply chain managers to convince them to adopt a demand-driven supply
chain?
A I would share real-life examples that demonstrate the benefits of adopting a demand-driven supply chain.
We have invested in people, processes, and systems to
enable what we call “shelf back replenishment.” This capability has enabled us to focus on what is happening from
the shelf back up through the supply chain. For example, we
have been able to apply this for promotional events with
some key customers—monitoring actual event pull at the
store level and then deploying more product to the store
groupings where the event is pulling heavily and less to
those where the pull has been slower. This led to a simultaneous increase in sales and decrease in stock-outs, costs,
and inventory levels. From my perspective, these examples
are the best way to make the case for pursuing a demand-driven journey. Who would not want to get these benefits?
QIn general, what’s the biggest challenge facing supply chain professionals today?
A The amount of information available at our fingertips is tremendous. It also presents supply chain professions with a great challenge. Information by itself adds no
value. But being able to take information and turn it into
data that can be effectively analyzed, brought to an insight,
and then acted upon is a big challenge we all face, especially as we pursue becoming more demand driven.
QWhat advice would you give to a young person considering a career in logistics or supply chain
management?
A Supply chain is a great area for anyone who is inter- ested in analysis, problem solving, and working with a
broad range of people. The breadth of career opportunities
is really astounding when you think about the range of
areas the supply chain covers.
