Integrated Business Planning

Let’s Rethink How We Manage Business

 

IBP is provocative, challenging, and, at times, contentious, yet the benefits are unquestionable. We have experience navigating the dynamics which impede IBP implementation in a variety of different businesses. This experience affords us the opportunity to help others take the concepts of IBP and provide pragmatic operational solutions, avoiding rabbit-holes, minefields, and some of the frustration associated with the deployment.  This site is created to provide online support, answer questions, and help others on their IBP implementation journey.

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Capability

Advance S&OP to IBP – simple right?

I’m going to reframe from a lengthy affirmation of how your S&OP process is rocking; The effective ownership of the unconstrained demand forecast, systemic bias controlled within +/-2%.  The ability and accuracy of the process to constrain demand based upon material, resource availability and machine capacity. Generating a credible supply plan and measuring production adherence weekly and monthly against this plan to ensure sales commitments to customers are respected. Controlling abnormal demand when customer orders are over forecast, worst still when they drop orders inside published lead-time. Your ERP is effectively driving the materials requirement plan and accurately performing production…
Kim Britton
September 7, 2021
CapabilityIntegrated Business Planning

Why is my Integrated Business Planning process not working?

Why is my Integrated Business Planning (IBP) process or Sales and Operations Planning (S&OP) process not seem to work? I have encountered many frustrated IBP or S&OP leaders with a question on why they seem to have a good output from their monthly IBP or S&OP process, which includes an agreed plan that balances demand planning with supply chain. However, what is actually produced in the plant ends up being completely different. Delivery performance doesn’t seem to improve, commercial teams are frustrated that customer orders are not being fulfilled.  Supply chain leader continues to blame an inaccurate Demand plan, finance…
Debbie Evans
June 14, 2023
BusinessIntegrated Business PlanningOperations

The Importance of Capable People in the IBP Process

Integrated business planning facilitates a systemic cadence that enables leadership to make the appropriate business decisions to achieve their long-term ambitions.   This is accomplished by aligning plans, understanding assumptions, evaluating opportunities and vulnerabilities, and perpetually reviewing the different scenarios for optimization.  Too often during an IBP implementation, the process is focused on establishing the various reviews centered on the mechanics of the process rather than the intent.  The process itself will not yield the desired results for the business, it is dependent on the right capability of the people to be thoughtful about what is important for discussions.  Consider…
Debbie Evans
September 24, 2020
OperationsStructure

The S&OP Merry-Go-Round

“Demand and supply are happening at the same time, don’t separate them integrate them”. The notion that ‘demand’ occurs and ‘supply’ responds is a fallacy, in fact, the two are symbiotic whereby one is as dependent upon the other as much as the other on the one. These two entities have a mutually beneficial relationship that should, must, be leveraged however there’s one significant issue; they speak different languages. When I say ‘different languages’ I don’t mean variants of the Germanic language, I mean one speaks Klingon and the other Dothraki. Although by no means an expert linguist I can’t…
Kim Britton
October 6, 2020