MHI, the material handling and logistics trade organization formerly known as MHIA, is in the early stages of developing what it calls a Material Handling & Logistics U.S. Roadmap (which if nothing else confirms our belief that we chose correctly when we renamed this magazine a couple years ago, since it seems like just about everybody has bought into our contention that the convergence of the formerly disparate material handling and logistics fields is a dominant trend in supply chain management).
So what is this Roadmap? Well, first of all, it’s not actually a physical roadmap, not in the Rand McNally sense of the word, anyways. Quoting from MHI, the idea is “to assemble a community of thought leaders with a stake in the future of material handling and logistics technologies and practices to create an industry roadmap that will increase productivity, reduce costs, create jobs and improve the global competitiveness of the U.S.”
It sounds a bit like NAM’s recently announced its “Manufacturing Renaissance” initiative, which aims among other things to establish a modern workforce for U.S. manufacturers, make the U.S. more attractive to foreign direct investment and help U.S. companies expand their global reach.
In any event, MHI is actively seeking thought leaders (i.e., practitioners, suppliers, academics, government, non-government and association professionals) to participate in focus group-style events this spring, in various locales, between April and June. These thought leaders will be encouraged to come armed with ideas that directly address the various challenges and opportunities facing the material handling and logistics community, and what ought to be done to enhance the standing of all those involved both here (especially in Washington) and abroad. The roundtables sound kind of like what we did last summer when we gathered together members of the MH&L Editorial Advisory Board, which resulted in this feature article.
MH&L will be participating in at least one of these roundtables, and if you’d like to be involved, or would like more information, contact me here and I’ll fill you in with more of the details.
