MGF Sourcing, CIO: Adding Technology Footprint Is a Balancing Act

Ajay Jindal, CIO/Head of Global IT at MGF Sourcing, speaks with Nicholas Enger, CTO at Advanced Technology Consulting, about MGF and his role there, the organizational drivers, digital transformation and its challenges, the company's journey with digital transformation, and adopting automation to enhance productive change.

Making Great Fashion, or MGF Sourcing, is an apparel sourcing company with headquarters in Ohio. It works with scores of vendors and factories for product sourcing from multiple markets, Asia being a fundamental one.

Jindal started his career as a consultant for Limited Brands around 2011. MGF came into being as a business spin-off from L Brands and that was when Jindal started as MGF's IT system manager, eventually joining as a full-time associate. Speaking about the drivers within the organization, he pays heed to the smooth running of regular operations while prioritizing the security aspect of everything. He also highlights the need to build capabilities to deliver value to internal and external customers. Jindal further states that the pandemic has brought a shift in operating mindset, as the company now wants to offer new products and services to existing customers and also attract new ones.

Expressing his concern about speed versus long-term digital transformation. Jindal says that although an organization may wish to move fast digitally by adding the technology footprint, it is a balancing act between acquiring products and implementing services in haste and growing the technological aspect from a support perspective for the long-term. 

Regarding resource allocation, he highlights how difficult it is to find and retain talent. For an average-sized company such as MGF, which has a total of 700 resources across 12 countries, it adds to the existing complexities. 

Delving into MGF's digital transformation journey, Jindal says he considers the company to be “fairly transformed” in terms of operations. Although the journey came to a halt due to COVID, they are back on track in 2022. He states that the company is still in the infant stages of transformation, requiring more utilization of data — not only for decision-making but also for analytics —  and then adding on products and capabilities without increasing the cost of development.

Automation is necessary to fulfill these requirements so that resources can be developed with reduced costs. In this context, Jindal mentions using software such as Robotic Process Automation (RPA) and other UI/UX tools for internal and external users that aid in developing the processes and increasing efficiency. He states that leveraging Microsoft PowerBI RPA platforms helps with the adaptation.

In conclusion, Jindal notes the management transformation brought by RPA as it leads to minimal human interaction. The software automates repetitive manual tasks, transforming human work into digital work. It helps in refined products, which is a big aspect of transformation, both digital and non-digital.