Performance documentation in this peak season is important to properly prepare for next year's peak parcel delivery season, says Justin Cramer, co-founder of ProShip.

Given that it’s too late to prepare for 2022’s peak season, companies need to be documenting what’s happening in the warehouse right now so there won’t be any surprises next year, Cramer says.

Both good and bad things need to be recorded, he says. “Absent documentation,” he asks, “how are we not going to have these problems next year, next peak season? So make sure that you start documenting today. Make sure that other members of your team are getting the good and the bad.”

In preparing for the next peak season, Cramer says, maximum flexibility is important when implementing anything. He sees inflexibility with prescriptive business rules. Algorithmic business rules are better to work with, in his estimation. “I'm going to throw a bunch of data at this algorithm and let it make the decision. Now I have control over what data I sent. So where we’re seeing a ton of volatility, and expect to see even more in the upcoming peak season, is in small-parcel carrier availability.”

Questions to answer include: Which small parcel carrier will you add next year? And which providers won’t even exist in the coming year? Cramer says it’s difficult to remove such carriers manually if you have prescriptive business rules. “On the other hand, if it's just changing the data that you feed into the system, that provides you the flexibility to take advantage of whatever carrier is available for you at that point in time, and even possibly change from day to day or in a particular warehouse, maybe in midday when a particular lane is full for you.”