Rethinking S&OP (The Future of Supply Chain) - Ep 158

Full transcript available: https://www.lokad.com/tv/2024/3/13/re... Lokad CEO Joannes Vermorel critiques the Sales and Operation Planning (S&OP) process as outdated and inefficient for modern businesses. He argues that S&OP, designed for simpler times, struggles to keep pace with today’s complex, fast-moving business environment. Vermorel criticizes the process’ slow refresh rate, its reliance on meetings and spreadsheets, and its focus on unified forecasts. He suggests that large companies should eliminate their S&OP divisions, likening them to obsolete fax machines. Instead, he proposes a shift towards improving access to information, transforming S&OP teams into data lake teams. 00:00:00: Introduction 00:01:49: S&OP: Quantitative alignment and decision making 00:04:08: S&OP for company-wide synchronization, not value alignment 00:06:56: S&OP: Team collaboration, unified forecast, and deliverables 00:09:36: Commitment agreements and bureaucratic challenges in S&OP 00:13:12: S&OP: Slow process, qualitative insights, and information flow 00:18:59: Evolution of companies, product complexity, and supply chains 00:23:19: S&OP: Costly, slow, outdated, and software-mediated 00:26:37: S&OP: Origins, formalization, and impact of technology 00:30:33: S&OP: Need for alignment, critique of meetings 00:33:30: S&OP: Comparison to cancer, forecast generation, and auditing 00:36:35: S&OP: Informational problem, data flow, and software necessity 00:40:52: Focus on unchanging fundamentals, critique of unified forecast 00:45:11: Consequences of stock out, repetition, and e-commerce questions 00:48:42: Difficulty of decision-making, critique of S&OP formalization 00:52:47: Value of qualitative analysis, critique of S&OP deliverables 00:56:43: Termination of S&OP division, removing unnecessary divisions 01:00:00: Upskilling, importance of accessible information, and data access 01:03:40: Converting S&OP team into data lake team 01:05:33: Conclusion of the interview ****** Check out our website: https://www.lokad.com/ Follow us on LinkedIn:   / lokad   ******