Remote Work and Reconfigured Supply Chains: COVID-19 Effect

Each month, Tony Uphoff, visionary CEO of Thomasnet.com, joins
Cloud Wars Live for a recurring segment. “Uphoff on Industry”
will explore the innovations, upheavals, and breakthroughs
reshaping the world of manufacturing and industrial markets. Join
Tony and me as we discuss disruptive new trends in the
digital-industrial world. These include how we design, source and
manufacture products. And also the new ways in which industrial
companies are getting up to speed on marketing, sales and
customer experience.


Episode 12


In this episode: Tony says about 350 of Thomas are now working
remotely – and 75 independent sales reps that they call certified
Thomas Partners. He says he’s been amazed to watch his company
make that transition and he is proud of his people that got him
there. He says these are anxiety producing times, and he’s amazed
at how calm people stayed.


Tony says that Thomas started to produce some surveys. The first
wave Thomas sampled 750 companies, and the second wave they
sampled 1,400. The first wave of the study 60% of respondents
said they were seeing an impact on the virus in the near future.
Second wave, 45% of respondents said they were seeing an impact.
That means that some sources in China are coming back online.


Tony says that auto companies, electronics companies, aerospace
companies, and others have their supply chains disrupted. He says
you may see an acceleration of re-shoring in the U.S.


I tell Tony that when I was in ninth grade I had a coach that
told us, “adversity builds character.” But he said no, “adversity
reveals character.”


Tony says there’s a lot of people that understand that they can
be very productive and live a high quality of life without the
strain of commuting. He says that it’s pretty easy to draw a
vector point and to see a higher percentage of remote workers.
Which means empty offices.


Tony says to stay calm while we fly through some turbulence. He
says we’re watching how customers and prospects are reaching out
to Thomas and looking at the dashboard of their products and
services. Tony says they were chatting via Slack today, and
seeing users request a feature where a supplier would show lead
times for products and services – right on the supplier profile.


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