I recently took part in a SYSPRO office challenge cycle race at the Cape Argus 2014 event. If you’ve read anything about the race, you’ll know that the charitable fundraising by the UK team was for a cause very close to my heart. The cause in question is a special needs school near the K3 SYSPRO offices, where my mother has worked for over a decade.
The unexpected beauty in all of this whilst I was preparing the plans for both fundraising and race tactics, was how much the SYSPRO community became involved. Not only did we receive correspondence and support from the SYSPRO Australia and US offices, but we managed to leverage our own supply chain in an unexpected, but lovely twist:
For example, Rompa, a manufacturer and distributor of play, leisure and therapy products for the multisensory market signed up with K3 SYSPRO twelve months ago and are now have their system up and running. Their products are used in schools, charities and organizations just like the school that has employed my mum for the last decade or so.
So a few brainstorms and phone calls later and we had our primary jersey sponsor! And I learnt a valuable lesson too: whatever the cause and purpose, leverage your supply chain from all sides to maximise your output or return. We also leveraged links with a dozen other suppliers and customers, leading in this instance to much more concerted, well-publicised and concentrated fundraising effort. What this has now resulted in is a £3,000 total raised towards the Sensory room, on which work began this week, during the UK Easter holidays.
It just goes to show the unexpected value of communicating regularly with all involved in your supply chain, it can (and does) reap rewards! I’m absolutely certain we’re not alone in this, and it would be great to hear your stories of similar leveraging of your own supply chain.
We’ll be paying a visit to the school in the forthcoming weeks to have a look at how this work is moving along and will post an update in a future blog.
