Ken Ackerman

Ken Ackerman has been active in logistics and warehousing management for his entire career. He is editor and publisher of Warehousing Forum, a monthly subscription newsletter. Since 2007, he has also been a group chair for Vistage International, the world’s leading chief executive organization. Before entering the consulting field, he was chief executive of Distribution Centers, Inc., a public warehousing company that is now part of Exel Logistics USA. In 1980, Ackerman sold the company and joined the management consulting division of Coopers & Lybrand. Later, he formed the Ackerman Company, a management advisory service. You can reach Ken at ken@warehousingforum.com.

Articles by Ken Ackerman

• Defining the role of warehouse supervisor

  Most people want to do a good job every day, and warehouse workers are no exception. However, management…

  Tuesday, March 14, 2017

• Understanding the costs of warehousing

  ​All companies with warehouses incur the same elements of cost, but they compile them differently.…

  Tuesday, January 17, 2017

• The search for a perfect unit load

  ​It is an established fact that the cost per pound to move materials will decrease as the size of the…

  Tuesday, November 08, 2016

• The DuPont model’s impact on LSPs and distributors

  ​At the end of World War I, a venerable chemical company in Delaware purchased about one quarter of…

  Tuesday, October 04, 2016

• Finding a blue ocean in the warehouse

  "Blue Ocean Strategy: How to Create Uncontested Market Space and Make Competition Irrelevant," a book…

  Tuesday, September 06, 2016

• Seeking a profit island in the warehouse

  Many buyers of logistics services regard their vendors as purveyors of commodities. While providers tend…

  Wednesday, August 03, 2016

• How warehouses can avoid the contract trap

  ​Until a few decades ago, agreements between logistics service providers and their customers were seldom…

  Tuesday, July 19, 2016

• Succession planning in the warehouse

  Succession planning is the development of a formal program to provide timely replacement for every key…

  Tuesday, July 05, 2016

• Can the alliance proposition work in managing warehouses?

  ​One of the greatest misunderstandings in business is the illusion that employment is permanent. Few…

  Tuesday, June 28, 2016

• Disengagement: Your greatest threat in the warehouse

  Senior management in the warehousing industry has every reason to worry about the many external challenges.…

  Wednesday, June 15, 2016

• Slimming down to a lean warehouse

  ​Some say "lean" was the biggest management idea of the past 50 years. If that is true, the concept…

  Tuesday, May 24, 2016

• Connecting the disadvantaged with warehousing opportunities

  Decades ago, warehouse managers discovered that people with certain disabilities could perform some kinds…

  Tuesday, May 10, 2016

• Using a performance scorecard to measure your warehouse

  When you embark on a project to measure warehouse performance, the first step should be to ask why you…

  Tuesday, April 19, 2016

• Is your warehouse truly agile?

  ​Two key words dominate the field of logistics: Lean and agile. Lean warehousing has been the subject…

  Tuesday, March 29, 2016

• Why should you audit your warehouse?

  ​When it comes to auditing the warehouse, most of our attention focuses on "how to," but underlying…

  Tuesday, March 15, 2016

• Risk management for the warehouse operator

  ​Warehousing always has been a risky business. In our present-day global economy, the risks are more…

  Tuesday, March 01, 2016

• Chance vs. execution in business decisions

  ​Much of the stress of 21st-century corporate life is generated by the decision-making process. Warehousing…

  Tuesday, February 16, 2016

• Achieving excellence in warehousing

  ​The emphasis of warehousing should go beyond cost-cutting to creating increased value for customers…

  Tuesday, February 02, 2016

• The differences between B2B and B2C warehousing

  Perhaps there was a time when warehousing was almost entirely "business to business," or B2B. Today,…

  Tuesday, January 19, 2016

• What is your company’s culture?

  Every organization has a corporate culture, defined by Harvard professor James L. Heskett as "the way…

  Tuesday, January 12, 2016

• Why and how to prepare a warehouse operations manual

  It is possible to operate a warehouse in the absence of written procedures or a manual, and we have seen…

  Monday, December 14, 2015

• Strategy, connectivity and measurement in warehousing

  ​If there once was a time when executives considered a strategic plan as a sacred document that is…

  Tuesday, December 01, 2015

• Finding and keeping the right talent in the logistics industry

  ​In most metropolitan areas of the U.S. today, the unemployment rate is lower than it has been for…

  Tuesday, November 17, 2015

• Practicing Pareto practically in the warehouse

  One of the most useful rules in warehousing, as well as many other commercial activities, is called the…

  Wednesday, October 28, 2015

• Justifying the cost of warehouse improvement

  ​Have you ever had difficulty obtaining approval of capital investments for your warehouse? Many warehouse…

  Tuesday, October 13, 2015

• Pricing for profit in warehousing

  Many logistics firms experience both cost pressures and price pressure. Most logistics executives believe…

  Wednesday, October 07, 2015

• Does your warehouse cut costs or add value?

  ​As a warehouse manager, is it your job to cut costs or to add value? You might answer that you do…

  Tuesday, September 01, 2015

• Driver shortage: What warehouse managers should do

  ​For more than two years now, we have seen a growing discussion about the driver shortage problem,…

  Tuesday, August 11, 2015

• Unions pose a continuing threat to warehouses

  The inauguration of Barack Obama in 2009 gave the U.S. its most union-friendly president since Harry…

  Tuesday, July 28, 2015

• In turbulent times, Drucker’s advice still rings true

  Peter Drucker, a world renowned pioneer in management theory, died in 2005 at the age of 95. Yet his…

  Tuesday, July 14, 2015

• Marketing your warehouse magic

  Some managers believe warehousing is a task that can be handled adequately by anyone with a strong back.…

  Tuesday, July 07, 2015

• Freight brokerage: What the warehouse manager needs to know

  ​A freight broker is a company or individual who serves as a liaison between a buyer of transportation…

  Tuesday, June 16, 2015

• Finding metrics that mean something in the warehouse

  "You cannot manage what you cannot measure," yet the majority of warehouses we inspect have either no…

  Tuesday, June 02, 2015

• Don’t forget the service aspect of warehousing

  Because warehousing is essentially a service business, the nurturing of relationships is at the heart…

  Tuesday, May 19, 2015

• A warehouse manual on manual handling

  ​For thousands of years, humans have handled cargo manually. Visitors who see ancient structures in…

  Tuesday, May 05, 2015

• Mastering the basics of leading warehouse people

  ​In the warehouse, it is not uncommon for an outstanding forklift operator to be promoted into management.…

  Tuesday, April 14, 2015

• Making your warehouse more effective

  ​So much has been written on the subject of warehouse productivity improvement that one is tempted…

  Tuesday, March 31, 2015

• Ethics in logistics come down to a matter of trust

  ​Whether business ethics are improving or declining is a question that is highly debatable. Whether…

  Tuesday, March 24, 2015

• The critical importance of sequence in warehouses

  ​One aspect of warehousing that is readily overlooked is the order in which tasks are performed. In…

  Tuesday, March 03, 2015

• Better ideas for warehouse construction

  A quiet revolution has been growing in the construction of warehouse buildings. While the price of other…

  Tuesday, February 17, 2015

• Basics of benchmarking for warehouse operations

  Just what is benchmarking? When, why and how might it be used? When should it be not even considered?…

  Tuesday, February 10, 2015

• How to wreck a warehousing business

  ​Compared to most businesses, the distribution industry is reasonably stable. New enterprises frequently…

  Tuesday, February 03, 2015

• Employing a staffing service at your warehouse

  ​Using staffing-service employees is one way to hedge the risk that warehouse employers will be sanctioned…

  Tuesday, January 27, 2015

• Building and keeping a great warehouse team

  ​Nearly every appraiser of warehousing quality agrees that the most critical element in a successful…

  Wednesday, January 07, 2015

• When is a warehouse obsolete?

  ​When does a building have no current value as a storage or distribution facility? Let's look at an…

  Tuesday, December 09, 2014

• Do warehouses still need 8-hour work shifts?

  Not long ago, the typical warehouse operated eight hours per day and five days per week. That was a normal…

  Tuesday, November 18, 2014

• Self-directed work teams in the warehouse

  Groups of people working together in a warehouse have typically been called a crew, a shift or a workforce.…

  Tuesday, November 11, 2014

• Designing tomorrow’s distribution centers today

  At a time when the warehousing industry is relatively prosperous, it is natural for operators to be working…

  Tuesday, October 28, 2014

• Management by asking good questions

  The concept of "management by wandering around," or MBWA, was created by David Packard of Hewlett-Packard.…

  Tuesday, September 30, 2014

• The critical importance of warehouse floors

  ​The single most important element of warehouse construction is the quality of the floor. As stacking…

  Tuesday, September 16, 2014

• Pitfalls in logistics partnerships

  ​Four decades have passed since a logistics magazine published an article about how the relationship…

  Tuesday, September 02, 2014

• Make quality an important part of your warehouse

  ​The process of recognizing quality has been applied for many decades. Quality is the result of eliminating…

  Tuesday, August 19, 2014

• Managing the inventory in your warehouse

  ​There is a difference between inventory management and inventory control. Every warehouse manager…

  Tuesday, August 05, 2014

• Why warehouse operators need a strategy

  Your people — especially your senior management team — will be motivated if they understand where…

  Tuesday, July 22, 2014

• Developing dashboards: The right data for warehouse managers

  Like the dashboard on your car, your business system should be designed to provide the essential information…

  Tuesday, July 08, 2014

• Improve your warehouse by using what you already have

  The process of warehousing is essentially a management of space and time. ​Before we spend excessive…

  Tuesday, June 24, 2014

• Warehousing and transportation: Creating a perfect marriage

  The value of a foot of space in a trailer, boxcar or plane is always higher than the value of a foot…

  Tuesday, June 10, 2014

• Maintaining a productive relationship in the supply chain

  Two of the dirtiest words in supply chain management are commoditization and disintermediation. In fact,…

  Tuesday, May 27, 2014

• Automation and innovation in the warehouse

  Full automation of materials handling in a warehouse exists only in the imagination of the technocrat.…

  Monday, May 12, 2014

• Don’t overlook the human element of systems implementation

  Nearly all of the emphasis on implementation of warehouse management systems (WMS) and other software…

  Tuesday, April 29, 2014

• Why you need to develop a storage strategy

  ​A surprising number of warehouse operators do no storage planning at all. In the absence of any instruction,…

  Tuesday, April 15, 2014

• Why you should view warehousing as real estate

  ​It is not surprising that real estate and warehousing go together like ham and eggs. Yet, despite…

  Wednesday, March 26, 2014