Breaking the service paradox Going on a family holiday entails a whole host of decisions. Some are made early on in the process, such as the period of time, destination and means of transport, and others much later, such as when and where to stop to eat, to refuel and to go to the toilet. There is a clear reason why you make the latter decision...
According to Gartner, the adoption of supply chain software continues to accelerate. That has confirmed my gut feeling and spurred me to put some thoughts on paper. There is indeed a lot happening in the world of S&OP/IBP software; functionalities are rapidly improving and companies are afraid of getting left behind. So you decide you need to...
Many organizations have a basic S&OP process in place and now want to take the next step to integrated business planning (IBP) in order to maximize the benefits of the process. Supply Chain Media and Involvation have developed this roadmap showing typical obstacles on the path to IBP and how to overcome them. Download the Roadmap to Integrated...
Technology advances; Moore’s law It is amazing how fast things are developing and how quickly the number of options is expanding; Apple’s Siri, Google’s Assistant, Amazon’s Alexa, Alibaba’s Genie, etc. Who would have believed 10 years ago that a computer could talk to you and that your smartphone would order your groceries or your Latte...
On 4 June 2018, a diverse group of supply chain professionals gathered at the Shell Pernis refinery in the Netherlands for an inspiration session called ‘Grip on projects’. Although the participants came from a wide variety of companies, including machine builders, maintenance companies and grid operators, it quickly became clear that they all...
Every day, we work with our customers to optimize their supply chains, whether as part of consultancy projects in which we explore better approaches to processes, systems and organizations, or by providing training to increase our customers’ knowledge of supply chain management so that they can continue to make lasting improvements themselves.
Last week I had a discussion with a customer about his S&OP process, which in his view was not delivering enough value. Useful, but it did not really make the needles move and he could not get his fingers around the reasons why. The amazing thing was that in 2 minutes, we got to the core of the problem and I am happy therefore to share the...
Last week I found myself in a roomful of supply chain professionals where, as Involvation, we’d been invited to chair a discussion on ‘S&OP: achieving and maintaining S&OP effectiveness… and keeping all disciplines on board’. The key issue is how to motivate people and increase their action readiness in terms of Sales & Operations Planning...
A new year is always an opportunity for a fresh start. When making my new year’s resolutions for 2018, I first took stock of what I am happy/unhappy with in my daily life, before deciding what I want to change and how to do so. In our assessments, we basically apply the same logic when supporting our customers in their journey from Sales &...
In 2017, a lot has again been written about S&OP. One of the main topics still is how to ensure true buy-in of non-supply chain stakeholders, which is indeed a key challenge in many cases; not because they are genetically different, but because companies often fail to make clear links between S&OP and functional targets and incentives. In this...