One thing is for sure. Manufacturing has no shortage of buzzwords, catchphrases, acronyms, homilies, platitudes, advice, or New Age dogma. The terminology can be overwhelming! There's JIT, TQM, TOC, TQC, CFM, ERP, MRP and MRPII, Agile, and Lean! Recently, terms such as APS, ASP, CRM, MES, SCM, e-commerce, e-business, e-fulfillment, e-marketplace, e-procurement, e-manufacturing, WMS, ALM, C2b, ETO, PLM, EAM, and electronic have been added to the alphabet soup.

There is so much technology out there that we often feel we have failed in our duty to compare and contrast each to justify our decision to pursue one revolutionary technology versus another. We feel guilty that we have not had the opportunity to fully understand or be avid practitioners of each and every one of these wonderful technologies. We may even avoid peer discussions for fear of exposing our lack of detailed knowledge of each subject. It's just too hard to keep up!

It's easy to become intimidated by all this heady technology! It shouldn't be that way. We are all members of the manufacturing alliance. When the day is done, manufacturing professionals all seek the same thing gaining a larger share of our market using manufacturing as a market differential. Terminology simply describes the choice of methodology used to achieve that goal.

Why is the percentage of market share such an important measurement? It measures how much of one company's products is chosen over the competitor's. Consider the benefits of owning a 100% market share where all competitors have...