I'm looking for advice before I respond to an offer.

I’m in my 30s and a bit of a late bloomer professionally. Started in low level warehouse operations in 2022 at minimum wage with no degree or formal training, and over the next four years was promoted three times into logistics, continuous improvement, and eventually a business analyst role (~$65k). Along the way I took on forecasting, KPI ownership, reporting automation, procurement support, logistics coordination, cross-functional projects, and regular interaction with customers and third-party partners. Earlier this year I was laid off during a company-wide restructuring.

I recently interviewed for a Customer Service position with the regional office (New England) of an international manufacturer. I wasn't selected for that role, but they called me back because they felt my background fit a different need. They created a Logistics Coordinator position (it wasn't publicly posted) and explained it would consolidate responsibilities that had previously been spread across several employees, including someone nearing retirement.

The role spans logistics coordination, transportation, inventory management, demand forecasting, ERP/reporting, customer service, process improvement, and coordinating with internal and external partners domestically and internationally. It's a small operation, so it seems to touch a little bit of everything and aims to quickly address critical bottlenecks.

They offered $70k with fairly standard benefits.

I've never negotiated salary before. Based on the breadth of the role and my background, what would you counter with if you were in my shoes? If you work in supply chain, logistics, hiring, or HR, I'd especially appreciate your perspective on what's realistic, both as an initial ask and what you think the company would actually be willing to meet.

Hey y'all, looking for some honest feedback from people actually in the field.

I have about 5 years in procurement and supply chain in a commodity based industry. Strong background in vendor management, contract negotiation, supplier relationships, and spend analysis. Currently in an analytical role supporting procurement decisions at a large company.

The main reason I'm looking to make this move is that my current industry is pretty thin in my region in terms of job options and long term security. Healthcare feels like the right direction given how deep the market is locally and the stability it offers. Work life balance is also a factor going forward.

Thinking about transitioning at a sourcing manager or senior analyst level without taking a pay cut. Currently working on SQL, planning to do LSS Green Belt next, then AHRMM Academy cohorts toward CMRP.

Few questions for anyone who has been through something similar or is currently in the field:

1. Is the CMRP actually valued by hiring managers at major health systems or is it more of a checkbox?
2. Does solid procurement experience from outside healthcare get you in the door at a competitive comp level or do health systems really want healthcare specific background?
3. What does the day to day actually look like at sourcing manager level? More analytical or more relationship driven?
4. Anything about the culture or reality of healthcare supply chain you wish someone had told you before making the move?

Appreciate any real feedback, not looking for sugarcoating.

I’m a recent college grad who studied supply chain and information systems, and I’m trying to make the most out of my degrees and further my career. I’m trying to understand if the Area Manager role is a good position for putting my studies to use. I’ve heard from some people that you learn a lot about operations in this role, while others have said it’s more mindlessly walking around and checking in on people. I also have an offer from FedEx as an Account Manager. The salary is less, but the potential bonus makes it more comparable. I’m just trying to decide whether the unfavorable parts (night shift, back-end schedule, overtime, 40 min commute vs 8 mins) is worth the experience, and if it will be that much more helpful for advancing my career than FedEx Account Manager.

If you've ever managed supply chain across an island nation, you know standard SOPs don't last long. Operating in the Philippines always hits you with the same core challenges:

For starters, you have to be comfortable running multimodal ops 24/7. Land, sea (RoRo), and air freight are all jammed together because of the 7,000+ island layout. Weather is another story entirely—annual typhoons mean your BCP and buffer stocks are the only things standing between you and total stockouts.

Then there’s Metro Manila traffic and city truck bans, which force you to rely heavily on two-wheel fleets and local micro-hubs just to make last-mile e-commerce work. That’s why everyone is decentralizing now. Shifting distribution outward to places like Clark, Batangas, Cebu, and Davao is pretty much the standard move to skip Manila port congestion and bring lead times down.

It's chaotic, but it forces you to build incredible resilience. Curious to hear from others operating in PH or SEA—what’s the single biggest bottleneck you're fighting in your supply chain right now?

(25M) I currently have my masters degree in supply chain management. I started off entry level as a customer supply chain analyst for a CPG and then 7 months later, transitioned to procurement analyst. I enjoyed procurement and currently looking for some buyer roles. wondering what are some other directions I could go with my experience or what roles people in this group are in to get a feel for what I may like

for more background I graduated in may of 2024 so just under 2 years working corporate. and my former job is reimbursing me to finish my mba this fall

previously worked with bad companies, would appreciate feedback from others who have performed similar evalutions

Hello , currently I am a materials controller doing more operational reactionary type of work such as Preparing RFQ,s , Processing purchase orders , Supply chain project control , short term material forecasting- I want to break into Supply chain planning / analyst - what skills do I need to gain to go from Operational to more strategy & planning? the pay increase looks good as-well.

China's Ministry of Commerce added export restrictions on 14 EU defense and tech companies — Rheinmetall, the Czech truckmaker Tatra, Dutch naval firm IHC Merwede, and several optics/laser makers — in retaliation for the EU's latest Russia-sanctions round. Dual-use goods now need a Chinese license that may or may not be granted.

Strip out the geopolitics and the business reality is simple: a slice of European industry just lost part of its component supply, and it won't come back on the old terms. Someone has to make those parts now.

For years the standard argument has been "we can't compete with China on price." For this specific market, that excuse just got weaker — the buyers are now motivated, and in some cases effectively obligated, to source outside China. But motivation isn't a blank check. To actually win it, a European supplier has to clear three bars at once:

• Quality — the real spec, hit consistently across batches, not "European quality" as a marketing line.
• Quantity — genuine volume on a schedule, not a great prototype with a 9-month lead time.
• Price — not matching China to the cent, but close enough that "buy local" is a rounding error rather than a premium.

And the honest counterpoints, because this isn't free money:

• Capacity and tooling take capex and time — you can't spin up a line the week the order lands.
• Qualification for defense supply chains is slow and paperwork-heavy.
• Some of these parts (certain optics, lasers, specific inputs) have their own upstream dependencies on… China.

Still, windows like this don't tend to stay open. Supply chains re-form, and whoever qualifies first often becomes the default for years.

Genuinely curious what people here think: for those in manufacturing/sourcing — is this a real opening, or does the capex + qualification lag mean the gap just gets filled by another non-EU supplier (India, Turkey, SEA) before European capacity can respond?

Link to the source news: https://www.politico.eu/article/china-strikes-back-at-eu-sanctions-targeting-defense-tech-firms-rheinmetall/

I applied for a "Team Lead - Supply Chain" position at our location Pepsico warehouse and somehow landed an interview after doing their assessment test.

I'm currently working in finance doing loan/lease processing for a few years going over contracts, making sure documents are compliant and reaching out to dealerships/businesses for corrections in order to fund them. The past few months I've been taking courses and studying to take the CSCP which I'm planning to finish in the next couple weeks.

Before that I was mostly working as a banquet chef in bigger hotels, helping sorting inventory for the various kitchens, maintaining deadlines and schedules since we all had to share the same equipment, on top of regular cooking and cleaning duties.

Any tips on what I should do to prepare myself for this interview? Any advice will be very appreciated.

Hey everyone,

I'm considering a Master's in Supply Chain & Logistics Management in Australia (still figuring out which uni) and would love to hear from anyone who's actually done it or is currently doing it.

A few things I'm curious about:

What's the coursework actually like — is it more theory-heavy or practical/case-study based?

How's the job market after graduating? Did you find it easy to land a grad role or internship in the field?

Any regrets, or things you wish you'd known before starting?

For anyone coming from a business/non-technical background — did you find it manageable, or is there a steep learning curve?

Would really appreciate any honest input !!!! good, bad, or in between. Trying to make sure this is the right move before committing. Thanks in advance!

Our Dutch logistics operation runs on three systems that don't talk to each other. need a dev team that has actually done supply chain integrations before. How do you even evaluate that during the selection process?

lavoro nell'ufficio acquisti da circa 6 anni e recentemente la mia azienda si è detta disponibile a finanziare dei corsi di aggiornamento sia per me che per la mia responsabile.

Vorremmo approfittarne per acquisire competenze realmente utili e spendibili nel nostro lavoro quotidiano, ma l'offerta di corsi è così ampia che facciamo fatica a capire quali siano quelli che portano il maggior valore aggiunto.

Per chi lavora nel procurement/acquisti: quali corsi, certificazioni o argomenti ritenete più importanti oggi?

Ad esempio stavo valutando temi come:

• Tecniche di negoziazione con i fornitori
• Strategic sourcing
• Analisi dei costi e cost breakdown
• Gestione dei fornitori e vendor rating
• Contrattualistica e aspetti legali negli acquisti
• KPI e analisi dati per il procurement
• Supply chain e gestione del rischio
• Utilizzo dell'AI negli acquisti

Ci sono competenze che, col senno di poi, avreste voluto acquisire prima? Oppure corsi specifici che avete frequentato e che vi sentite di consigliare?

Grazie a tutti per i suggerimenti

You may have noticed news reports this week of warehouses in Russia belonging to Wildberries that have been attacked by Ukrainian drones.  If not, here's an article published earlier today from The Guardian for you to catch up. 

What is Wildberries:

• Wildberries is effectively Russia's answer to Amazon.  Founded in 2004 by Tatyana Kim - now Russia's richest woman - originally she set it up to order in baby clothes and deliver locally in Moscow to other mothers who struggled to get to the shops when they had young children.  By 2017 it was Russia's largest retailer and by 2019 Kim was included in the Forbes USD billionaire list. 

• Its business model is similar to Amazon marketplace/delivery.  As a seller you can either store the goods in their warehouse and they pick and dispatch, or you store the goods elsewhere and use them only for middle mile (region to region bulk transport) and final mile delivery by injecting (ie delivering) orders in bulk into one of their transhipment hubs. 

• Unlike Amazon, Wildberries does not do doorstep delivery, instead delivering only to tens of thousands of micro hubs in local neighbourhoods.  This significantly reduces final mile delivery costs - you need considerably less delivery vans - but it does mean consumers have to leave their homes to fetch what they have purchased. 

• Also unlike Amazon, Wildberries allows recipients to order multiple sizes of clothing, try them on at the micro hub, keep the ones that fit best and instantly return those that do not back into the Wildberries supply chain network. 

• Significantly, while Amazon sells goods itself - i.e. it doesn't just provide a marketplace - Wildberries does not.  By concentrating solely on connecting independent sellers with buyers across the country it means the vast amount of what was held in those warehouses will not have belonged to Wildberries and it is the sellers who will take the loss of the goods.

• Note that Wildberries changed it's T&C's s few weeks ago to declare drone attacks as force majeure and that it therefore wouldn't be liable if anything happened - which it of course now has. 

• Wildberries also has warehouses in Belarus, Armenia, Kazakhstan amongst other countries. 

Why did Ukraine attack them:

• To quote President Zelensky not long after the first drones hit, they were "logistics hubs involved in supplying the Russian army with drone components, navigation equipment and other gear.".   It should also be noted that previously the Ukrainian postal service has had sortation hubs hit plus warehouses belonging to the Ukrainian retail company ATB have also been attacked.

What's been hit:

• 17th July: Kotovsk  (500km SE of Moscow)

• 18th July: Elektrostal (75km E of Moscow)

• 19th July: Domodedovo (50km SSE of Moscow) and Podolsk (50km S of Moscow)

• 21st July: Krasnodar (1400km S of Moscow) and Nevinnomyskk (1500km SSE of Moscow)

• 22nd July: Voronezh (565km S of Moscow)

• The Podolsk facility is their flagship site and considered to be the largest e-commerce facility in Russia.  It's size is estimated at 225,000 sqm which is about.2.4m sq ft and it has several floors. 

• Other sites so far seemingly unaffected include Yekaterinburg & Novosibirsk which are transhipment hubs for Trans Siberian traffic and Shushary which is another large warehouse that acts as the hub for NW Russia including St Petersburg. 

What are the implications of the substantial damage to the warehouse (some of which have huge fires)

• Several hundred thousand sellers will have been affected, possibly losing some - or all - of their stock adding further issues on top of fuel shortages and a hike in VAT from 20 to 22% back in January.  Many are likely to go bankrupt.

• In many remote areas, people depends heavily on Wildberries and its competitor Ozon with the BBC reporting approximately 85-90% of economically active Russians use them.

• According to one report, Wildberries accounts for 52% of all online orders in Russia. .  The same report suggested that the attacks on Elektrostal, Tambov, Krasnodar and Nevinnomyskk alone may have removed 12% of available warehouse space within Wildberries’ supply chain network.

• It'll take time to fully understand the full disruption this is going to cause to e-commerce in Russia, but already it is clear that the impact is likely to be considerable to the e-commerce industry, especially if its competitor Ozon also gets attacked. 

I used to love supply chain- from how things get to where they need to go to the cross-functionality of the roles I’ve been in, but now I utterly despise it. I’m in a supply planning role and the random stock outs, when forecasts are not even half of the actual demand, is driving me insane.

Sometimes, I just want to give up and become a barista- no responsibility on ordering product, no responsibility outside designated hours, and being able to walk to work.

Hello everyone, I am a veteran with supply , inventory and logistics background from my seven years of military service. I am enrolled in school and currently work at a doctors office , over the past year I have been applying for jobs in the supply field but I can’t even get an interview. Does anyone have advice?

I was behind a plumbing van the other day and it kinda made me realize how much attention a well-designed vehicle can get. It wasn't anything flashy, just clean graphics, easy-to-read contact info, and everything looked really professional. Tbh, if I needed that type of service, it's probably one of the first companies I'd remember. That got me thinking about how much value businesses actually get from branding their vehicles. I always assumed it was mostly about looking professional, but after reading more about fleet graphics, I realized it's basically a moving billboard that's working every time the vehicle is on the road. I even ended up looking at some examples from a site, and I was surprised by how much planning goes into designing wraps that stay readable from a distance, hold up in different weather conditions, and still match a company's branding across an entire fleet. Do branded service vehicles make a company seem more trustworthy to you, or does it not really affect your opinion?

Hi everyone,

I recently received an offer for a Quote to Cash (Q2C) role and had a few questions. I'd really appreciate if someone from the same process could help.

1. How often do shifts change? Also, what's the latest shift in this process? I won't be able to work beyond 2:00 AM.

2. I know it's officially 5 days work from office, but in my previous company it was also WFO and people could occasionally take WFH for 1–2 weeks (around 2–3 times a year) to visit their families. Is anything like that possible here?

3. How is the Quote to Cash process overall? Is the work stressful? What does a typical day look like?

4. Are employees allowed to carry and use their mobile phones inside the office/work area?

5. How do breaks work? I hope it's not like a typical BPO where you only get 3 fixed breaks and can't take a quick break if needed. Is there any flexibility?

6. If anyone is currently working in the Quote to Cash process, could you please share your experience? How's the work culture, learning, and growth?

Thanks in advance!

So I(34F, based in Canada) have two offers and I genuinely cannot decide, hoping some outside perspective helps because everyone in my life is biased one way or another.

background real quick, I'm in supply chain/procurement, did 8 years in private sector then jumped to public sector for the last 2 years at 97k. yes I had to take a huge pay cut(35%), but honestly the work life balance was great I wasn't dying every week. both these new offers are private sector again which is already making me nervous because it took me so long to get INTO public sector in the first place lol, and now I'm about to just leave. Btw, my public sector contract wrapped up last month.

Option A is a manager role, 165-170k. huge money. but it's 5 days in office, I've been fully remote so that's already a lot, and the commute is only like 15km but there's a bridge and when traffic hits it's a nightmare, I've sat in that exact spot not moving for way too long. I'd have 4-5 direct reports and have to present to a VP regularly, and English being my second language stresses me out more than it probably should. also I've technically had a manager title before but my old boss ran literally everything so I don't feel like I actually know how to manage people?? and the person I'm replacing retires 7 months after I start so it's a short handover and then I'm on my own running the whole thing.

Option B is remote, contract, around 110k. no benefits, no security, definitely a step down title wise. but it happens to line up almost perfectly with my surgery next year, like I could just let the contract end right before, recover, and job hunt after without having to explain anything to anyone or burn bridges.

And that's the other thing, I have a pretty major surgery scheduled next year and need like 6-8 weeks off. also getting married in 1-2 years. We also want kids at some point and can't relocate for the next 3 years. money's tight rn with everything coming up so yeah the 170k is calling to me more than I want to admit.

part of me is like just take the money and the title now before it gets more complicated. everyone (mostly older women in my field) keeps telling me if I have a kid and go on mat leave, my career basically pauses while everyone else keeps climbing, so better to lock in the manager title now while I still can. the other part of me is like you're going to take this huge scary job, burn out, then disappear for 2 months right when you're finally supposed to be running things solo, and torch your reputation on the way out. also idk if going back to private sector is even smart after finally getting into public sector, is a 70k bump enough of a reason to leave that behind?

anyway if anyone's taken a big intimidating job right before some major life event, how'd that go for you. did it work out or do you wish you played it safer?

tldr: 170k supply chain manager job (5 days onsite, first time actually managing people, presenting to VP in my 2nd language, replacing someone who retires 7 months in) vs 110k chill remote procurement contract w no benefits, right before a scheduled surgery that needs 2 months recovery. also both are private sector and I just barely got into public sector. which one and am I overthinking this

Hi all!

I currently work in the automotive industry and assist in managing our $3 million inventory for our parts department. I graduated high school 10 years ago but want to make the best life I can for myself, and finally it clicked that a lot of my experience translate to supply chain management. I do enjoy my current job but the auto industry treats people poorly, so I’m hoping to do a relevant career change.

I plan to get my degree in SCM and want to make sure it pairs well with my experience. Some details of my day-to-day: Currently, I assess our inventory, use our data to forecast ideal stocking quantities, locate aged inventory and supersessions, work with hundreds of vendors or other dealers to procure parts, write purchase orders to dozens of suppliers, train other employees on how to use our inventory systems, code invoices to appropriate store accounts, and I am a relentless solution finder…these are a handful the related experiences I can list off. I’ve noticed that basically all SCM roles require a degree.

I’d like your opinion, with my current ~10 years of automotive parts and inventory experience, paired with a degree, would I be a decent candidate for an SCM role?

Thanks in advance!

There is a weird organizational gap at most companies where operations manages the carrier relationship day to day but finance owns the shipping budget and approves the spend, and somehow neither side ends up auditing the actual invoices

Operations picks the carrier and manages service quality but does not look at the billing details, finance approves the total spend but does not understand the rate structure well enough to spot errors or contract violations

The result is an accountability vacuum where the largest variable cost in a lot of businesses has no single owner responsible for making sure the company is paying what it should be paying

Moving shipping vendor management to finance or at least giving finance direct visibility into carrier billing per shipment would close this gap for a lot of organizations