Fedex : A Series Of Good Management Decisions

The key success to UPS was efficiency. Every route is time down to the traffic light. Each vehicle was engineered to exacting specifications. The drivers endured a daily routine calibrated down to the minute. This demand for machinelike precision met with resistance by UPS heavily unionized labor force.

In early August of 1997 the United Parcel Service (UPS) had a predicament on its hands, a teamsters strike. UPS, the world 's largest package distribution company was coming off a year [1996] in which they reported sales of $22.4 billion. UPS Employed 75,000 management and non-union employees compared with 185,000 teamsters who are part of the AFL-CIO that were going on strike. The teamsters rejected a contract extension offer from the company leaving the fate of millions of packages carrying everything from lobsters to laser printers up in the air (Johnson).

     In early August of 1997 the United Parcel Service (UPS) had a predicament on its hands, a teamsters strike. UPS, the world’s largest package distribution company was coming off a year [1996] in which they reported sales of $22.4 billion. UPS Employed 75,000 management and non-union employees compared with 185,000 teamsters who are part of the AFL-CIO that were going on strike. The teamsters rejected a contract extension offer from the company leaving the fate of millions of packages carrying everything from lobsters to laser printers up in the air (Johnson).

In the case file for FedEx, Fred Smith the founder of FedEx mentions how business were having trouble figuring out how to get urgently needed packages to the right places quick and Smith knew that the need for business to move packages fast would only grow with time. From the beginning, FedEx was built on a foundation of obsessive customer focus (“FedEx,” 2015). Needs in marketing is the state of self-deprivation (Vander Schee, 2016). The tenacious pursuit of fulfilling customer needs in FedEx’s early days led to developing what is known at the company today as the purple promise, a

FedEx’s external environment both positively and negatively affects the organizations operations. Their external environment consists of government, weather, and the economy. FedEx does not have a very large external environment because their operations are not affect by many outside sources.

Studying FedEx, UPS and their competitive relationship in the decade from mid - 80's to mid - 90's gives a good insight for the companies' and industry's future. The two companies have different strategic goals and are operating in the same industry but in different main markets: FedEx is working on "producing outstanding financial returns" and focuses on the overnight air market while UPS is looking for "earning reasonable profit" and its core business is the two-day ground delivery. However, by 1981, the two companies started to have a strong sense

By capitalizing on this strategy, FedEx was able to boost its average delivery volume in 1976 to 20,726 packages per day via its three services, Priority-One, Standard Air, and Courier Pack, compared with an average of 10,521 delivered daily the prior year. Clearly the company’s calculated use of strategically-located hubs, nighttime flight routes, and limited package size allowed the company to carve out a niche by reliably delivering packages on an immediate, overnight basis.

FedEx is a highly centralized organization, with decision-making for the firm centralized at the Memphis headquarters. While national branches of the company have some autonomy in hiring, head office controls hiring policy. Decision-making on large capital projects is also centralized, because the network structure of the company's distribution means that such decisions have global implications. As a result, FedEx has a heavily-centralized structure where very little power is delegated to local managers. Instead local managers are charged with operating the company's strategy efficiently and effectively.

Brynn greets the client politely and informs she contacted the title company assisting with the disbursement to obtain the FedEx tracking number.

FedEx was first established in 1973 as a logistic company with the name Federal Express that be created by founder and first CEO Frederick W Smith. The Headquarters is in Memphis, Tennessee in the US. The company became well known for its fast and reliable delivery service around the world. On its first night of operation FedEx delivered 186 bundles to 25 urban locations in the US with only 389 employees and a 15 Dassault Falcon aircraft. In 1980 FedEx purchased a system for live updates on the packages. In this system, FedEx drivers share the current locations from the trucks to provide updates of the packages to the customers. This information was sent to a central computer of FedEx then the company improved the update system by introducing FedEx.com webpage. This webpage allowed the tracking data to be easily accessible. However, recently, FedEx uses Savvy bundle for packing and tracking the products across couriers. (Baldwin, 2016)

My company is FedEx. The company's stated mission, as per its website (2013) is that it "will produce superior financial returns for shareowners by providing high value-added logistics, transportation and related business services through focused operating companies." This mission statement highlights the following stakeholders: the shareholders and the customers. A further stakeholder not mentioned but critical to FedEx is the company's employees. For example, an often-cited maxim at FedEx is People-Service-Profit, highlighting that it is the people who deliver the value-added for the customers, and that this is how FedEx delivers profits. The company also mentions its partners as key stakeholders, and there will be the usual tangential stakeholders like governments, competitors, potential customers, and suppliers. Most of these are external stakeholders the internal ones are the employees and the shareholders. All managers, even senior managers, are employees and most are shareholders as well.

UPS is the largest parcel delivery service in the world. They also help their customers its customers with supply chain management,

United Parcel Service (UPS) founded in 1907 is the largest transportation company and the largest air freight carrier in the world. In 1987 due to rapidly changing external environment UPS faced serious challenges to its long-established policies of on-the-job training and promotion from within. With the increase in competition UPS realized that it is lagging in computerization and it thought of seeking technical expertise which it could not get from within. The concerns they had are how to hire new talent, how to assimilate, and to what extent new people would conform to UPS culture.

The main station is located in Memphis, Tennessee in the United States. The company started off by delivering couriers to some American cities, which was the first time for parcel delivery to take place at that time. As stated before, the industry’s goal is to fulfill the needs of customers, developing relations with different companies, and ensure a high investment for its shareholders. This is made possible through their six shared principles: people, service, innovation, integrity, responsibility and loyalty (FedEx). In order to satisfy its clients, FedEx has3 branches which provide customers with different services regulated on different demands; this include FedEx Corporation, FedEx Express, FedEx Kinko’s, FedEx Ground, FedEx Freight, and FedEx Services. It delivers more than 10.5 million shipments daily, covering more than 220 countries. Monthly, it has over 50 million visitors. In order to… it has 1250 express stations, 33 ground hubs, 370 freight service centers, and more than 1800 offices. The company also possessed 656 aircrafts and more than 100,000 motorized vehicles for express, ground, freight and expedited delivery service (FedEx). Through these aspects and values, Smith achieves to develop a company with a productive way in controlling time, space, and

This research paper is written to explain the importance of globalization and supply chain management of the United Parcel Service (UPS). In this document, the reader will obtain the history and development of UPS as well as the supply chain strategy and strategic network optimization developed for their business. In addition, this report will also discuss the distribution network of UPS and how it operates to deliver packages to their destinations around the