CB hosts 2015 Strategic Product Supply Excellence Workshop

The Executive Education Unit (EE) of the College of Business organized a two-day intensive training programme for VF Asia Ltd. (VFA) at the VFA office in Kowloon Bay from 24th to 25th of August.

VFA is a new business partner of the College of Business. It is the Regional Head Office of VF Corporation (VFC), a US listed company with annual revenue of US$12 billion specializing in apparel and footwear.

The training aimed to enhance the strategic business thinking of the delegates, specifically in the areas of supply chain management and global sourcing. The programme was customized for the 12 Directors and General Managers of VFA from different countries.

Dr David Li, Associate Professor of the Department of Management Sciences, Programme Director of MSc Operations and Supply Chain Management, and Concentration Coordinator of the MBA programme, was the lead instructor of the programme. Dr Li is an experienced consultant with major clients such as China Telecom, PARKnSHOP, METRO GROUP Buying HK Ltd., and Golden Resources.

In efforts to cater for the needs of VFA, the EE Unit conducted a series of surveys and projects to customize the training. Key highlights of the programme included:

• Pre-course questionnaire
  Participants’ background, training preferences, and expectations were collected prior to customize the programme design.
  
  
• Pre-course assignments and communication with instructor
  Projects were pre-assigned to participants so that they could reflect the way they work and prepared for sharing session before coming to class, speeding up the learning progress.

• Interactive class setting and case study
  Lectures with interactive models such as beer game and case study were employed to help delegates develop their supply chain oriented mind-sets (Supply Chain Management) and sharpen the Total Cost Ownership concept (Strategic Sourcing).
  
  
• In-depth industrial exchange
  The delegates visited METRO GROUP Buying HK Ltd. (MGB), a subsidiary of the METRO GROUP responsible for the international procurement of direct imports of the sales divisions, and exchanged sourcing strategies and insights on business operations with MGB experts. The company was established in 1976 and runs representative offices in China, India, Bangladesh, Vietnam, and Turkey. It is serving over 2,200 locations in 32 countries, with more than 900 active non-food suppliers. A questions list from VFA was compiled prior to the visit where MGB addressed the questions during the meeting.
  
  
• Discussion on business challenges
  Each participant shared their own business challenges encountered at VFA where the group brainstormed recommendations together with Dr Li. The delegates had a vivid discussion forum.

Dr Li concluded the training with a certificate ceremony. The EE Unit is looking forward to future trainings with the VFA elites.

For more information about Executive Education programmes, please visit EE website.