Understanding of supply chain forms foundation for businesses: Meghan Nicholas

The image of shipping containers falling off ships into the ocean intrigued Meghan Nicholas and prompted her to pursue a career in solving the complex problems of supply chain management. That led to her current position as vice president for operations transformation and innovation at “Fortune 1” – Walmart.

Transcript

Narrator:

Welcome to the Harbert College of Business podcast with your hosts, Sarah Gascon and Currie Dyess. Today's guest is Meghan Nicholas, vice president for Operations Transformation and Innovation at Walmart. She's a Harbert graduate in international business.

Sarah Gascon:

Meghan Nicholas, War Eagle and welcome to the show

Meghan Nicholas:

War Eagle.

Currie Dyess:

War Eagle. So good to have you.

Meghan Nicholas:

Thanks for having me.

Currie:

For those new to the topic, can you briefly explain what supply chain is and why it's so crucial to the global economy?

Meghan Nicholas:

I think supply chain is the foundation of a lot of businesses. It is how we move products and goods from manufacturing all the way into customer's homes and provide the ability to support people around the world. And so supply chain is the transportation, it's the distribution network, it's the store operations folks who are stocking shelves. It is all of those components that come together to bring to life this beautiful supply chain that delivers.

Sarah:

You've made a name for yourself in a short period of time in a very competitive field. What made you choose supply chain management and what excites you about the industry?

Meghan Nicholas:

Oh goodness. First I was at Auburn and just absolutely fell in love with supply chain there. I originally was a finance major and I took a class where they were going through all of the different majors and they showed supply chain as containers were falling off a ship into the ocean and I was like, "That's it. That's it for me." I want to go solve the complex problems and that's really what supply chain is. And so I kind of fell in love with it at Auburn and have been really blessed to be able to continue my career in supply chain and now also in the store operations space, and it's just been wonderful. A lot of times you experience things in college and wonder how it's going to turn out when you're in the post-college, real world, if you will. And supply chain is exactly what I thought it would be. It is challenging every day, it's a constant puzzle. We get to solve the big problems and that's exactly what I love about it.

Currie:

You've worked for some very recognizable names that I'm sure have supply chain problems. Can you unpack your career a little bit and just explain to us how you got to where you are now?

Meghan Nicholas:

I spent the majority of my career in supply chain and operations. I cut my teeth out of college in distribution and so on the distribution floor, and what a wonderful place to start your career. I was with JCPenney and understanding the flow of goods through the distribution center, understanding what it's like to work with the incredible field operations team in the supply chain. Then I got to spend some time at Home Depot really seeing each and every part of both the supply chain as well as store operations, so transportation, distribution, final mile, international, all the pieces that you would consider part of a traditional supply chain.

The strategy and analytics piece came along there as well. I got to spend some time at Dollar General thinking through how do you automate and bring transformation to a supply chain with a store that has a bunch of different locations. And then went to Peloton to really support end-to-end supply chain there. So everything from factory manufacturing all the way through the supply chain and down to our customer's homes, and now I get to run transformation and innovation at Fortune One at Walmart and get to see the scale that is Walmart. So I've had a really enjoyable career where I've gotten to see lots of different parts of both the stores and the supply chain, and it's been really fun to see what that looks like.

Sarah:

What are some of the skills you acquired on your journey that are different from what you learned in school?

Meghan Nicholas:

So I think at Auburn I got to learn the foundations of supply chain. I love this example of when I was there, I remember taking a logistics class and we were learning about LTL and full truckload and I mean I understood the academic concepts of that, but then being in a distribution center and actually seeing the truck back up to the door and seeing what truly LTL meant or full truckload meant or how we think about flow of goods through the distribution center. So I think understanding it from an academic sense and then marrying that up with what happens operationally from a reality perspective was really beneficial for me.

The other thing that I think that I have learned, and I will think about the class that I took with Danny Butler Personal Selling. I remember I took it as an elective I think my senior year, and it was all about how do you build relationships? And he said, never discount the lunch that you have with someone and the knowledge and the relationship that you build there. And so I was thinking about that this morning. That class really set the foundation for how I think about the interactions and the interpersonal reactions that we have with folks and that really set the foundation for me. So I think it's like you've got this foundational knowledge that you learn in college and then you marry it up with how it all comes together in your career.

Currie:

What are some ways maybe your continued education or mentorship, what are some ways that students can expedite that learning curve as they go from the academic into the real world practical application?

Meghan Nicholas:

Yeah, I think you have to immerse yourself. I think two things. I love what you said around mentors. Having a group of folks around you who you can lean on, who are going to invest in you, who you can ask the questions to, is really important. Throughout my entire career, there have been people along the way that when something has come up, they're my person, and so I think having that network is crucial. And very similar to what I learned in that class with Danny Butler was really around, take somebody to lunch, just take them to lunch and learn and immerse yourself in what they have to share and figure out how do you take that and apply it. And then the second is put yourself out there. I'm a big believer in saying yes.

If somebody asks you to go walk a distribution center or walk a store and it has nothing to do with the work that you do, go immerse yourself, because I think that helps expedite. Standing there and seeing it and living it is going to give you so much real world application or learning, and that's been really important to me. And then I think if no one ever asks you to go do that, put yourself out there and ask, say, "Hey, I see you're walk in stores all the time. How can I tag along? I just want to listen and learn." And ask the thoughtful questions along the way and poke and prod, that way you can learn even faster.

Sarah:

So as you transition from one job to another, it seems like you may have had to have some pretty challenging conversations, not only with your team but also your employer. How did you navigate that experience?

Meghan Nicholas:

Yeah, and I think it's not only with the external parties. When you decide to leave a career or an employer that has done so much for you, has invested so much into your career, you have to have some tough conversations with yourself as well. I would start there and say I had to really psych myself up. I had had an incredible career at Home Depot that I really loved and had a network of folks that supported me. I was very comfortable in what I had built up to that point from a network perspective. I had to psych myself up, "Hey, I'm investing in the long term of my career. This is the right move. I'm going to take a chance and I'm going to leave and kind of start over, if you will, going to Dollar General." So I'd say there are hard conversations you have to have with yourself, and then you have to psych yourself up again to go tell these folks who have invested in you and have really helped build you an incredible career that you're now going to walk away from that and try something different.

And so there are definitely a lot of hard conversations. I think those hard conversations are made much easier by the trust that you've built along the way and having good development conversations. I'll never forget when I left Dollar General, we had had so many incredible conversations about where my development was going, what my long-term career path was. And so when I had the opportunity to go to Peloton, I just sat them down and said, "Hey guys, this opportunity gives me the ability to look at the entire supply chain and they've made me this incredible offer to go do this." The team was so supportive, and I think those relationships and being really honest and having the tough conversations around development along the way help make those conversations much easier when you get to that point because everybody knew like, hey, here's what I'm trying to go achieve.

Here's the boxes that this checks for me and here's why I'm doing it. It's not personal. It has nothing to do with I'm unhappy and I want to leave. It's that I'm making a trade-off for something that helps get me to that long-term vision. And so they're always tough. Specifically for me, I consider myself an extremely loyal person, and so I always get this moment before I'm going to do it where I'm like, "Oh no, am I making the right decision?" And I always feel like, "Oh no, I feel really bad." Then I try to remember as a leader, when somebody comes to you and has those conversations, the reaction matters. I specifically think about Dollar General and how supportive they were and how that made the transition for me so much easier and the trust that was built. I still talk to the incredible leaders I had at Dollar General quite frequently, and I trust them. The way they handled the exit was just another mark of just how incredibly supportive they were.

Currie:

It seems as though what you're saying is because you laid the foundation of being clear and concise with what your career North Star is along every step of the journey, people were actually supportive of you leaving instead of trying to hold you back or maybe holding a grudge. Is that kind of what we're picking up here?

Meghan Nicholas:

Yeah, I think that's exactly right. When I mentor folks, one of the things that I try to make sure that they understand is that if you are not clear and intentional with what your plan is, the company or someone else will decide what the next move is or what's best. I will remember being early in my career and being really nervous to say what I wanted to do for two reasons. One, the fear of being perceived as overly ambitious, and then two, the fear of like, "Hey, what if that changes?" I had someone give me great advice that said, "Meghan, you can lay the foundation for what you think the long run is, but you reserve the right to evolve and you reserve the right to change that. And so go ahead and set the foundation for what you think that North Star is, and you can edit it and change it along the way, but don't make the mistake of not setting something out there because you fear the change."

And so that has been extremely beneficial for me, so every role that I come into and every leader that I have, I try to say, "Hey, here's the long-term that I want to get at. Here's the things I'm working on. What gaps do you think I have?" By having that clear vision and that we're all aligned on, when that next role comes or somebody says, "Hey, we want you to come think about taking this next job opportunity," you can very clearly marry that up with what your plan was. And actually for me, career-wise, it's made it very simple because I have an idea of what I need to go do to develop next, and if that next role doesn't get me that, then it's kind of an easy no.

Now, it doesn't always work like that and from a cut and dry perspective, but for the most part it has really helped guide and navigate me through that career because you always have people who want you to come take a job, because the best thing for somebody else, but is it the best thing for you? And being very clear and transparent is the best way to have those kind of hard conversations.

Sarah:

What are some of the greatest challenges you faced in your career and what do you see around the quarter challenges that you may face in the supply chain industry?

Meghan Nicholas:

Yeah, I think career-wise really around how do you bring people along for the journey? So I'll think about the role I'm in today. Leading transformation and driving change in a massive company, or you think about my time at Home Depot or Dollar General or even Peloton, you're driving this incredible change that is going to change not only the near term years, but the long years. And so getting people galvanized around what does that look like? How are we all moving in the same direction and how do we challenge the status quo that we live in today? That's a tough challenge. Especially when I hire for folks on this team or in the past, I always look for folks who are persistent because you are going to get a ton of pushback when you are driving change. You're going to have to bring people along, you're going to have to be collaborative and you're going to have to really tell the story well so that everyone is connected and moving towards the same goal.

And so I think I can apply that to every role that I have had that if you bring people along and you try to make sure that they're all on the same page with what you're trying to drive, that really helps manage the fear of change and really just the entire change management process. So that's probably the biggest work challenge that I have faced. An industry-wide challenge, I think back through my entire career, there's been a lot of macro challenges at play in the industry and I think we'll continue to see supply chain evolve and there will always be the next challenge. If you think about the tariffs or you think about COVID, there just are so many big things and the supply chain sits at the base and is often impacted by those macro inputs. So I think as we think about the industry as a whole, it is very critical that we continue to evolve.

I kind of think about it as the golden age of supply chain. Years ago you had different silos of the supply chain. Even when I was in school, it was very logistics or transportation or distribution or inventory and maybe a procurement arm, and now what you're really seeing industries and retailers move towards is this interconnected supply chain where it's all woven together. As you think about those macro challenges that come, that connectivity across the supply chain is going to be what helps us continue to navigate those challenges. And I think if you talk to anybody who's in the retail space or even in the industry, I think they would tell you that's a very big focus for where their companies are going because we've got to make sure we're thinking about it all connected together because that's what truly drives a best in class supply chain.

Currie:

Supply chain has been in the news probably more than it would like to be in the last few years. We suspect that there's probably going to be quite a few more changes and problems that will also be in the news, specifically geopolitical issues. Is that something that you and your team look at? Is this something that concerns you? Obviously what has transpired over the last few years has affected most consumers, is this something we need to continue to keep an eye on and worry about?

Meghan Nicholas:

I'll comment on your first first. Supply chain has been in the news, especially if you think about the last three years, a lot. And folks are like, "Man, the supply chain is getting more challenging." And I would argue that yes, it is getting more challenging, but I think those of us that have been in supply chain for a long time are like, "Wow, we've been dealing with these same things and now they're just coming to light because of where we are from a macroeconomic standpoint." So I think we've been dealing with these challenges for a lot longer than maybe they've been in the spotlight.

I think we will always have to keep an eye on the macroeconomy. We're going to have to keep an eye on geopolitical things. We will always have to keep an eye towards what that looks like, but I really think what we've learned in the past several years is that we have to create supply chains that are dynamic and nimble because there's always going to be something that's going on. And so increased visibility, increased ability to be dynamic is really what will keep us ahead of those macro environmental changes.

Sarah:

What has been your greatest accomplishment?

Meghan Nicholas:

That's such a hard question to answer, and the reason why is because I think about my career and I think of all of these bright spots along the way that kind of culminate up to really fun and interesting career. There are moments along the way, those bright spots that I think of as incredible accomplishments. I think about all the people that I've gotten to work with along the way that I've gotten to invest in and see them get promoted and help them go on to achieve the career that they wanted to lead. Or I think about driving supply chain transformation at Home Depot and being able to really transform the way that home improvement products get to the shelf or Dollar General and how we transformed their supply chain network to really be automation based and really be focused on the future. And now here at Walmart really focused on what transformation looks like and shaping retail and Walmart over the next 1, 3, 5 years is really incredible. So it's hard to put a pin into just one accomplishment because it all kind of culminates up to this feeling of an accomplished career, if you will.

Currie:

Meghan, how has technology, particularly the rise of AI and blockchain influenced the supply chain landscape?

Meghan Nicholas:

Specifically in the last couple of years and kind of back to the point we had earlier around supply chain has been in the news a lot, I actually think if you think through what we saw in 2020 and some of the previous years, technology is really at the base of what we're looking at. If you look back, lack of visibility and technology is really what halted a lot of supply chains in 2020 and 2021. And so I think you've got a lot of folks in the industry, a lot of retailers who are heavily investing in the next layer of technology and it's going to continue to shape what the future of supply chain looks like. And I think that is AI, that is blockchain. There's a whole host of solutions. I think several years ago a lot of folks thought it was going to be like one technology that we saw heavily invested in.

I think what you're seeing is just a really diverse pool of technologies that all come together to create robust technologies for supply chains, and there were probably a lot of companies that were further behind where they wanted to be pre-2020 that saw an acceleration in technology coming out of COVID into 2020, 2021. But I think we'll continue to see rapid expansion of technology. You're seeing it in distribution centers, you're seeing it in the inventory systems, you're seeing it really just across the entire supply chain. The challenge with that, that I will call out, is how do you take all the systems and string them together? I talked earlier about the cohesiveness of the supply chain and the ability for us to see end to end. One of the challenges that we have to think about from a technology perspective is making sure that as we're putting new technology in, it's interconnected so that we can see start to finish.

Currie:

What roles do you see human workers playing in the modern supply chain, given the shift to technology? Are we looking at working ourselves out of it With the AI thing?

Meghan Nicholas:

I don't think so. I think the way a lot of retailers are thinking about it is people-led tech-empowered, and I think that's exactly the way it'll continue to work. We will always have workers that play an important part in the supply chain, in operations. I think what we're hoping, and I think what a lot of folks are hoping is that the technology just continues to empower those people because that's who make a difference in the way we think about supply chain and operations.

Sarah:

What advice would you give to businesses looking to make their supply chains more resilient and adaptable in the base of unforeseen challenges?

Meghan Nicholas:

I think making sure you're building your supply chain in a way that is flexible and adaptable. And I think if you think back 20 years, we were married to solutions, and I think we have to be married to a flexible solution where we can ebb and flow with things that change. We talked about the macroeconomics, we talked about some of the macro industry things. I think you've got to make sure your supply chain is flexible and that will keep you resilient, and I think you've got to marry it up with technology. That technology layer, the visibility allows you to then go on to be dynamic.

Sarah:

What advice would you have for our listeners as they hear your story and your career?

Meghan Nicholas:

Put yourself out there. Get to know people, not just on a what-can-you-do-for-me basis but truly invest in others. I've always found that when you start to invest in others, others will also invest in you, and it's kind of this incredible flywheel that really pays off. Take someone to lunch, get to know them, ask their opinion, ask the tough questions. So I would just say, put yourself out there. Be willing to learn, be willing to work hard, and I think you'll kind of see it all come together.

I think that mentorship and that circle is so important and understanding exactly what role you want that circle to play. And what I mean by that is there are folks when I call when I've got a tough people problem, or there are folks that I call when I'm evaluating career moves, and there are folks that I call when I might just need a pick me up because you've got a tough situation at work. And so thinking about what's in your tool belt, who's that board of directors that you may have surrounding you that you can trust and lean on. I think that's really important.

Currie:

For those of our listeners who are interested in keeping up with your story and following your next moves, how can they keep up with you? How can they contact you if maybe they have questions or want to follow in your footsteps?

Meghan Nicholas:

LinkedIn's probably the best place to get in touch with me. I am always open to talking about folks. I mentioned investing in others. It's something that has been really impactful in my career and is frankly the most fun that I have every day is when I get to pour into somebody else where I get to pull the curtain back a little bit for somebody. There are a lot of folks who've done that for me along the way, and so I like to think about it as like a pay it forward moment, and I really enjoy that. So reach out, I'm always happy to chat and I think that would be great.

Sarah:

Meghan, we appreciate your time. Thank you so much. War Eagle.

Meghan Nicholas:

War Eagle. Thank you.

Narrator:

Harbert, inspiring business.