Here Are the Biggest Challenges of Logistics (And How You Can Handle Them?)

The ongoing Pandemic situation has affected every business’s operations primarily, especially the global supply chain due to several restrictions and new guidelines. Though you can streamline several aspects of the logistics industry with EQMS software, there are still multiple challenges that need to be handle strategically to achieve quality objectives.

The increasing instability has already tested the logistics industry’s process of excellence, like never before. It resulted in a massive upsurge in demand for problem-solving approaches from businesses and customers to manage continuously evolving challenges in the most subtle, compliant, and timely fashion.

Before we move onto the problem-solving approach and possible solutions, let’s have a quick look at all the challenges faced by the logistics industry due to the COVID-19 Pandemic situation;

1. Air and Sea Transport Limitations

Since the countries started implementing lockdowns with their specific guidelines, the freight industry was drastically hit by the Pandemic. Only a small percentage of space is devoted to cargo that is too canceled for a longer duration in the average flights. It eventually led to supply shortages.

Even after some relaxations, it became too difficult for them to keep up with the soaring market demands. On top of that, there were stringent health inspections at every checkpoint that added more time to the delays.

Similarly, sea freights have experienced a significant slowdown since most of the suppliers shut down their operations for quite a long time.

2. Increased Demand for Land Transport Services

Even if you manage to deliver the goods to the destination country, customers cannot get them the next day since land transport also experienced a drastic hit. There were lesser services, more stringent inspections, and permit requirements even for basic groceries and medical supplies. Such a surge in demand for land transport services led to relatively increased prices too.

The limited transport services also led to struggles such as overwork for labor and delayed services. Moreover, companies could no longer continue with traditional means of confirming goods delivery, which led to many other challenges and needs for automation.

When it comes to land transport, the quarantine and social distancing regulations also need to be considered for overall delays, supply shortage, and increased prices.

3. Region-Wise Business Restrictions

The organizations that have overall operations with manufacturing in one region and supplier in others have faced significant setbacks, especially the companies that were getting their raw materials from China. However, the businesses are looking forward to alternative supplier options from other regions until things improve.

Logistics businesses also encountered problems and cut off the business ties with some regions blocked by the government to curb the virus spread. With these sorts of challenges in the industry, many partnerships and profits suffered.  

Therefore, businesses need to identify the right means for continuing their operations properly, even in unexpected times like this widely spread Pandemic.

4. Shortage of Resources and Labor

The limited supply and demand have made many companies cut down on their workforce to maintain the budget’s operational costs. Those who are still safe in their jobs have to work for extended hours to maintain consistent quality standards.

Also, many workers succumbed to the virus while being on their jobs. This frightened many and made them opt to stay at home to avoid life risk. The shortage of labor continued that put a strain on the logistics industry and the delivery of goods.

Workplaces must think about implementing proper measures to create a healthy and hygienic space for their workforce. They must train their employees on best practices to avoid any kind of health risks to themselves and others.

5. Ineffective Contingency Strategies

The Pandemic has taught one thing to every business to stay prepared for any kind of circumstance. However, some companies managed to continue their operations by facilitating work from home. The current situation has been a turning point for many businesses.

On the contrary, some businesses failed miserably because they did not have proper contingency plans to maintain business continuity.

Therefore, every business must invest their time to create contingency plans for different types of emergencies. It will save them from more significant losses and setbacks in the future.

All these challenges don’t imply that you should give up on your business goals. You must remember, “Every Challenge Brings Along an Opportunity to Grow and Improve.” But it requires a problem-solving approach to embrace a change and redefine the business success metrics, based on the ongoing circumstances.

Here are some solutions to overcome the challenges mentioned above;

1. Embrace the Increased Cargo Services

Many airline companies have completely redesigned their passenger planes as cargo planes during such hard times. It is the step taken to serve two primary purposes, including employment opportunities for their workers and maintain a pace of profit margins. Logistics companies can leverage it as an opportunity to deliver the goods much faster than any other means.

2. Collaborate to Mitigate the Supplier Issues

Since there is a shortage of suppliers, the best solution logistics companies have is to collaborate with the suppliers; for example, they can share the storage costs, container costs, or labor costs to ensure timely shipment deliveries. The collaboration can help them retain their operations at a good pace over shared values, even if there are lesser options to work with.

3. Implement the Proactive Approach

Businesses need to take a proactive approach to problem-solving. Being preventative helps them avoid unnecessary expenses and wastage of resources, especially when they want to lower the operational costs. The proactive approach is a genuinely beneficial deal for the businesses in all the aspects.

4. Stay Ahead with Emergency Strategies

It’s high time that businesses start to think about “what if” strategies to stay prepared for worst-case scenarios. In other words, they should be change-ready. Having contingency plans at hand helps them handle difficult situations without much hassle. This, in turn, increases the overall confidence of customers, stakeholders, and themselves.

5. Embrace the Innovative Technology Solutions

The innovative technology solutions have become a must-have for every industry, including logistics, to survive when their employees work from home. For example, a cloud-based document management solution can help logistics companies to create, manage, and share their business-critical information with all the involved parties without any security concerns. Or they can use a web-based training management system to provide their workforce with complete training about new norms and regulations over a centralized platform to ensure maximum productivity and consistent quality.

“We are all faced with a series of great opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations.” And, the Pandemic is indeed among such situations. It has convinced every business has started overcoming by embracing the changes along the journey.

Here’s one quick recommendation to make your business journey smoother – implement Qualityze Enterprise Quality Management Software to create a closed-loop quality system and manage all your processes with excellence, precision, and flexibility. You can leverage its centralized platform to share, manage, and track the business-critical data securely and collaborate with your quality teams globally while meeting compliance with applicable regulatory standards.

The next-generation quality management software are specifically designed to tackle the unique challenges that any business may encounter. They are generally provided with best functionalities to make logistics quality management a simpler job.

The Bottom Line

The logistics businesses need to be more resilient to survive the challenges that unexpected situations might throw at them, just like COVID-19 Pandemic. Instead, they should consider it as another milestone to cover to get closer to their business goals in the long term. However, it requires them to do contingency planning and embrace changes, like adopting technological solutions to increase operational excellence.

Talking of operational excellence, you can use the Qualityze EQMS Suite for all your quality management needs regarding products, processes, and services. It is suitable for all types of enterprises, big or small, to achieve operational and compliance excellence globally. It supports E-signature, watermark, and many other functionalities to ensure confidentiality and originality of the documents shared over digital platforms.

To know more about Qualityze EQMS Suite and how it can be a part of your contingency plan in the difficult situation we are all in, you can get in touch with our customer success team at 1-877-207-8616 or write to us at info@qualityze.com for a personalized demo. We will be right there for you.