Project Type

Supply Chain Management

Role

Operations Consultant

Team

Client’s Logistics Department (Project Owner) / IT Department (Support)

Duration

3 months
(Oct 2020 – Dec 2020)

Summary
Summary - S&OP
Where in Supply Chain
Where in Supply Chain - S&OP

00

Context

About Project

✔︎ Because the responsibility for demand forecasting was unclear, the sales, marketing, product development, manufacturing, and procurement departments were each making different plans, and the company’s supply and demand planning had become dysfunctional.
✔︎ There was a discrepancy between the management’s value-based plans and the operations people’s quantity-based plans.
✔︎ Due to the large number of SKUs, man-hours required for demand forecasting was enormous.

 
Our Mission

Introduce new processes from demand forecasting to S&OP to organically link each function, including management.

What’s S&OP?

According to the Association for Supply Chain Management (ASCM), S&OP is

“A process to develop tactical plans that provide management the ability to strategically direct its businesses to achieve competitive advantage on a continuous basis by integrating customer-focused marketing plans for new and existing products with the management of the supply chain. The process brings together all the plans for the business (sales, marketing, development, manufacturing, sourcing, and financial) into one integrated set of plans.”
What's S&OP?

01

Task Overview

The project included understanding the current operations, formulating the ideal operational picture, selecting and verifying a forecast tool, and creating dashboards.  (This is an overview only, as the details are confidential)

Task Overview - S&OP

02

Outcome

✔︎ Gained alignment of business and operational plans by involving management in the process.
✔︎ Developed the planning, execution, and evaluation process led by the demand planner, so that the organizations involved can work together organically.

Outcome - S&OP

03

Significance to My Career

Collaboration - SCM

✔︎ Obtained valuable experience in aligning business plans with operational plans.
✔︎ Gained the following insights :
/ The importance of including key persons from the beginning of projects.
/ The significance of facilitation skills in breaking down barriers between organizations.
/ The difficulty and impact of visualizing complex data.
/ In the cosmetics industry, there are major barriers not only within internal organizations, but also with suppliers, which prevent collaboration.
✔︎ Got interested in prototyping methods for supply chain improvement projects.