Logistics Support Services - Coursework Example

Logistics Support Services in Impaired or Hazardous Environments al Affiliation Individual project phase 5 Objectives Identifying government agencies at the local, state, and federal level that are able to provide services in support of transportation/ logistic operations. Evaluating and Selecting private relief and human service aid organizations that are able to support transportation/logistics operations in a disaster area. Selecting and justifying the instruments, terms and conditions required to enter into agreements with either the government agencies or private relief and human service aid organizations. Logistics Support Services in Impaired or Hazardous Environments Part 1 Introduction The resources managed in logistics can either be in the form of tangible items that include movement of materials, equipment or animals from their point of origin to the consumption point in order to meet specified requirements for customers or corporations. The logistics management can also involve abstract information like, energy, particles and time. Logistics of tangible items follows integration of the flow of information, handling of material goods, products production and their packaging, transportation of the produced goods to customers or to warehouses. They at times require security. Logistics is, therefore, the process aimed at controlling efficient flow of goods and services from the point of origin to their final destination especially to the customer through a well-planned process. For example, the integrated logistics management system is an information system that is web-based, well designed to upgrade the supply system in the state department where the entry of data is allowed one at a time. It also ensures security and openness in the sharing of information. It ensures efficient management of the flow of materials and equipment. Items dealt with in logistics Supply The logistics supply can either deal with tangible items such as movement of materials, or equipment from their point of origin to the consumption point. It can also deal with abstract like; information, energy, particles, and time in the aim of making sure that the organization achieves its target to satisfy the customers or the corporations they target. Logistics of tangible items follows integration of the flow of information, handling of material goods, products production, and their packaging, transportation of the produced goods to customers or to warehousing and at the security. Logistics is, therefore, the process aimed at controlling efficient flow of goods and services from the point of origin to their final destination especially to the customer through a well-planned process. For example, the integrated logistics management system is an information system that is web-based and well-designed to upgrade the supply system in the state department where the entry of data is allowed one at a time. It also ensures security and openness in the sharing of information. It ensures efficient management of the flow of materials and equipment. Logistics Performance index: Overall (1=low, 5=high) The reflection of an organization or a country’s logistics is based on the customs clearance process efficiency, infrastructure used in relation to transport, the quality of trade, the logistics services quality, the ease of the arrangement of the competitively arranged shipments, and the consignments ability to trace and track. They all give the bases of for the perception of a country’s logistics. The logistic performance of 1 indicates a low performance while the logistics supply index of 5 indicates a high score that is an indication of a better performance. There is a big distinction between the humanitarian logistics and relief supply chain with disaster relief (though have complexities) and development aid. Disaster relief has several phases including preparedness, immediate response, and reconstruction phases. The focal areas of supply chain management in construction include on-sites activities, the supply chain design, transfer of activities from point of construction and the integrated management of the site (Garnett et al, 2003). The designs of the relief supply chain need to be flexible enough that it can evolve from an emergency response to an ongoing construction. Overall process for Key Disaster Identification Management The figure below shows the general process of identification and management of a disaster at a group and Divisional level. Figure 1: General Process of identification and management of identification and management of disaster at a group and divisional level (Regester et al., 2008). Strategic planning for hazardous logistics It is advisable to form a committee in the organization mandated with the responsibility of dealing with a disaster in case it occurs. Conflict is, however, not eliminated by the fact that there is acceptance of the need for emergency planning. The process of emergency planning should take into account integrating plans for the hazard agents into the EOP of multi-hazard. Types of natural hazards should be well and clearly be identified by emergency planners. The mentioned planners should use HVA’s of the community to efficiently identify the natural hazards which include the occurrence of floods, tornadoes, earthquakes and also hurricanes (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2003). The planners should also identify the technological accidents that include, the release of toxic chemicals and accidents in nuclear power plants. After the identification of these hazards, the disaster planners should take into consideration the similarity of demands between the different agents of hazard materials production in an organization’s disaster response. In the case of similarities in characteristics between two different hazardous wastes, the emergency response they would require is likely to be similar. Different personnel opportunities, different equipment and procedures are used in reducing the effect of the hazardous products. The number of annexes that would be functional is reduced, therefore, simplifying the EOP (Regester et al., 2008). Important to an organization’s plan is to incorporate budgeting and reporting in which the management should organize a team that is responsible in the evaluation of specific strategies that will control the process of dealing with hazardous logistics, set the objectives that will make it achieve their goals, and come up with the risks that result in the annual budget that have been approved by the board. The monthly actual performance should be reported together with the budget bearing in mind the years forecast that is periodically prepared. The business and divisional units should monitor the performance business plan and the strategies put in place to plan with the issues that arise. It also assists in moving towards and achieving the goals of an organization. Major Hazards Disaster Hazards can have great consequence on the environment within which they occur. It leads to economic impact in a country as well as health consequences to the humans within the business organization. People expect that the hazards in their surrounding are well managed to reduce the risk that might result if the amount is within the uncontrollable level. The nation’s law is also keen on ensuring that the organizations that operate in it have strategies put in place to deal with the hazards that arise in the country due to their operations. Proper management and putting the necessary measures not only benefits the organization but also the surrounding community and the nation. Major accidents can be prevented and the health of the people protected if responsibility is taken in putting the right measures to deal with the hazards. Most hazards result from chemical industries and include the accidents that may arise when moving the chemicals from the production to the point of storage of to the market for sale. These industries might also be experiencing constraints or the ageing of a plant when the sectors are declining. The hazards may lead to situations where the supply increases due to increase in demand within the market and, therefore, more transportation volumes increases leading to more likeliness of disaster to arise in case there are no disaster management plans. It is as a result of rapid development and expansion of some areas. In such a situation, the management should always plan ahead and set aside a bigger budget than the current operating volume to be in a position to deal with the disasters in case of such rapid expansions. If the market expands rapidly unplanned for it becomes difficult for the management to plan for the control of a disaster that might arise most probably due to financial constraints. Other factors that may put an organization at a risk of dealing with the hazards in its logistics performance are the situations where there is ageing of the employees or even unavailability of a skilled workforce within the organization. It is important that the logistics management team ensures that there is sufficient process in concern of the safety competence that is an essential factor that will ensure the organization is in a good position. A good position to deal with the technical and the managerial challenges in its operations so that they can be a suitable position to deal with major hazard business. The logistics supply management should also take into consideration the training of its employees in an organization to accept responsibilities in order to reduce the frequency at which disasters arise and affect the organization. They should also recognize the efforts of the employees and treat them with the utmost respect they deserve as they work. It makes the employees have a feeling of appreciation. They are well motivated and the end result is a good performance and enhancement in care towards achieving the organization’s goals. They also lead to an avoidance in the occurrence of a disaster. In case a disaster arises, the employees will also be ready and much willing to assist in the elimination process of the disaster, hence, reducing the impact it would have on the organization. Cooperating with the employees is one important factor in the success of a firm. When the employees are careful during their working hours, it saves the organization the cost it would incur if the employees were not careful and carelessly held hazardous items in a way they would result to the emergence of a disaster. It’s always important to ensure that the issues of major hazards are well controlled to ensure strong health of the employees and the surrounding communities. It only results, if the leadership in an organization is strong enough to ensure safety for the success of the organization, the whole community, and the nation. Organizations should also opt to seek information from outside in order to be well informed about the likeliness of emergence of particular risks and the possible ways of dealing with them for the minimum possible impact. Organizations should also involve their employees in the processes of risk management. All-hazard strategic plan An organization is intended to enhance the working environment free from natural or human based disasters through developing a common strategy and vision. It is required to develop the ability to prevent, deter, and respond to any form of disaster. The Strategic planning effort is aimed at assisting the whole organization in the leadership to direct programmatic efforts used to accomplish results, therefore, ensuring accountability and proper allocation of the limited resources over a specified period of time. Strategic planning is a suitable measure of the expertise of all the stakeholders from all the possible levels of governance including both public and private sectors as well as non-private organizations. A strategic plan in an organization is designed to serve as a long or a life-time guide that is able to direct the efforts of both short-term and long-term aims of the organization in the aim of developing a single emergency, security, vision, and mission. Vision, Mission, Guiding Principles, and Strategic Goals An organization’s future state of emergency management is described in the organization’s vision statement. On the other hand, the mission statement describes how an organization plans to achieve the set vision. Example of a set vision would be; an organization prepared capabilities coordinated to protect against, respond, prevent and recover from all hazards. The mission statement would be; organizations stakeholder groups, community, and volunteers work efficiently in a well-coordinated manner to protect life, property, the environment, and the economy from any emergency. Cooperating with civil militaries. Supply chain by the military are aimed at keeping missions. They are useful in the provision of humanitarian aid and disaster relief. The plan of the logistics together with their command and control systems are very crucial and important in operations undertaken in areas of disasters. The military are trained in remote areas where they are taught to work in these areas (Stirling, 2011). They provide security and protection and assistance in mass distribution. They are trained to work under harsh conditions and can easily be involved in disaster supply chains due to their knowledge of the disaster areas. For example, they were used in the fire disaster management in 2010 in Australia where the fire was much widespread. The Australian defense forces was used to air the resources responsible in the putting down the fire. The United Nations Humanitarian Civil-Military coordination is part of the office used for the coordination of humanitarian affairs. Trust can be well built in the military to enhance good relations during their involvement in dealing with disasters. Taking care of their needs and paying them reasonably are ways of maintaining their trust. The trust can also be maintained by believing in their efforts to control the disaster (Kovacs & Spens, 2011). Maintaining trust In any long-term organization relationships, maintaining trust is of great importance for the success of the organizations. It has been championed for a long time by literature, different organizations, and stakeholders. Trust presents itself in a situation where a particular party has a belief that it is fundamental that the other party can be relied upon by the first upon fulfilling their obligations that should be done with integrity. It is also required to act in the best interest of the first party. However, there have been little that is found put in paper in the discussion of developing and maintaining trust within an organization’s environment. Long term trust can be formed and maintained through the development of the network from the short notice that mostly operate over a short period of time. Nevertheless, there is the existence of some models of trust and trusting behavior in the hastily formed relief networks. The example of trust in such a condition is swift trust. Hastily formed relief networks are usually formed in situations where the co-relocated teams are organized in disaster areas in partnerships that link humanitarians to governments, local communities, businesses, and the military with the aim of forming humanitarian aid supply network. The members of a hastily formed relief network come together with a mission to bring relief to a particular disaster. The groups do not, however, subscribe to common goals and neither do they have a common history that can be beyond the short-term deployment. Swift trust is the form of trust that occurs in temporal organizational structures. For example, those made by groups that start quickly. The history of an organization and how the members relate with one another is a factor that determines trust in an organization. The view, which is determined by the traditional relationships seeks to assume that building of trust is something done overtime. With the changing technology and the increase in modern globalization, the view of swift trust is with time becoming problematic. It is due to reliance of temporal teams by the organizations. Swift trust in accordance to Myerson et al., (2003) provides the required initial confidence of cognition for the interaction of the temporary team if there was the presence of trust. The team in the swift trust is required to be verified by an individual and be assured that it can be in a position to manage the vulnerabilities and the expectations of an organization. The behavior of trust is mediated by the risks of possible gains or losses that come about due to the interaction within the network. If a high level of risk is perceived, it may lead to a situation where deliberate information becomes withheld. Specific outcome will always be associated with specific behaviors in an organization. These includes a better performance of the network. It also becomes the immediate basis for the improvement of an outcome where the justification of the improved outcome in the investing of the trust relationships can develop. A relationship development cost has been found to be reduced by trust. Swift trust is made up of two main components comprising of: Cognitive components that relate to the collective group perceptions based on the expectations that relate to social identity and individual categorizations. It applies to situations where the individual members of an organization can’t rely on the prior-interactions with members of the team and, therefore, they rely on self-categories in order to promote favorable groups. Normative components that involve the early beliefs of trust that develop the normative actions in adding to the ability of a team which is suitable in increasing the ability of the team to overcome various obstacles that might affect the organization. Both of these components do interact with the swift trust by working in conjunction with each other. Part two Logistics performance and the impacts of a disaster in a country The level of logistics supply management in a country is equivalent to the impact a disaster will have to a country’s performance and success. The two have a positive correlation. The impact of a disaster is measured in terms of the average amount that is affected by the disaster that could be the average amount of deaths that results after the occurrence of a certain disaster. It could be measured in terms of the average number of people that have been injured in a certain type of disaster or even by taking the average of the amount of the economic damage that an organization experiences within the trading period affected by the disaster. It is easy to find the positive correlation between the logistics performance index of an organization and the level of economic damage an organization experiences. However, a negative correlation can also be possibly found between the logistics performance index of an organization and the amount of those that are affected in an organization that is within a country that has an average ranking logistics performance index. Any organization or country with low logistics supply index and high probability of the occurrence of a disaster can also be identified further using the above explained means of measurements. The findings can be important to a country and organization because it will make either of them to be in an effective point. An effective point of putting into consideration the logistics they put in place for excellent performance any time they plan and carry out response operations for humanitarian aid. Designing post disaster supply chains Planning for a post disaster model is a theoretical model that should be tried in the trials of finding disasters to emergence of risks. After the experience of a disaster, an organization is required to from a committee that assesses the possibility of the occurrence of similar disasters in future. It ensures that the necessary adjustments are made to reduce the impact of future risks. Employees should be well trained and well informed to be in a better position in dealing with similar types of a disaster. However, the post disaster projects of reconstruction face several challenges towards their implementation. The resources and materials required for the project may be scarce in supply. It poses a challenge that requires enough resources to be set aside so that the whole process will be a success. Prevention is the best way to prepare for a disaster even though resources needed may not be easily accessed. References Garnett, M., & Lynch, P. (2003). The conservatives in crisis: The Tories after 1997. Manchester, UK: Manchester University Press. Kovacs, G., & Spens, K. M. (2011). Relief Supply Chain Management for Disasters: Humanitarian Aid and Emergency Logistics. Hershey: IGI Global. Myerson, J., & Thomas Cooper Library. (2003). Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882): A bicentenary exhibition from the Joel Myerson Collection of Nineteenth-Century American Literature. Columbia, S.C.: Thomas Cooper Library, University of South Carolina. Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. (2003). Environmental risks and insurance: A comparative analysis of the role of insurance in the management of environment-related risks. Paris: Author. Regester, M., Larkin, J., & Regester, M. (2008). Risk issues and crisis management in public relations: A casebook of best practice. London: Kogan Page. Stirling, R. (2011). Special forces: The ultimate guide to survival: how to fight your way out of any military disaster. London, England: John Blake. Read More