Operational Excellence (OPEX) Insight – Thursday January 22, 2026: From AI Tools to System Capability: Wayfair Receives Global Supply Chain Recognition 2026.
Góc Nhìn Vận Hành Xuất Sắc – Thứ Năm, Ngày 22/01/2026: AI Từ Công Cụ Thành Năng Lực Hệ Thống: Wayfair Được Vinh Danh Toàn Cầu 2026 Về Chuỗi Cung Ứng.
Welcome To Operational Excellence (OPEX) Insight Article For The Paid Subscriber-Only Edition.
This is the bilingual post in English and Vietnamese. Vietnamese is below.
Đây là bài viết song ngữ Anh-Việt. Tiếng Việt ở bên dưới.
English
PART 1 – OFFICIAL INFORMATION
Looking back at the entire narrative of AI in supply chains during the 2025–2026 period, one common point becomes very clear: companies are not investing in AI because the technology itself has become more attractive, but because the existing operating systems have reached their limits of tolerance. Volatility in demand, costs, logistics, and customer expectations is no longer a series of short-term shocks, but has become a permanent condition. In this context, the existential question is no longer “Is the plan good enough?”, but rather “When the plan is wrong, how does the system respond?”
What AI is truly delivering is not a forecasting miracle, but the ability to keep the system from panicking when reality deviates from expectations. When small adjustments can occur continuously, automatically, and with discipline, organizations no longer need to trigger emergency mode for every fluctuation. Variability is absorbed instead of amplified, and people are freed from the role of being the system’s shock absorbers.
The greatest lesson lies not in technology, but in operational honesty. Companies must ask themselves: Is our system operating because it has the capability to absorb variability, or is it merely surviving by loading pressure onto people, inventory, and defensive processes? If the answer is the latter, then costs and risks will inevitably surface sooner or later.
After 2025, competitive advantage will not belong to the companies that forecast best, but to those that remain most stable when forecasts are wrong. AI is only a catalyst. The real decision lies in whether a company dares to redesign how its system responds to variability. Those who continue to pile more resources onto a fragile system will soon hit a ceiling. Those who build systems flexible enough to absorb uncertainty will be the ones capable of going the distance.
