Ensuring business planning in these times of disruption is the need of the hour. Synchronize your business with speed and scale through an integrated business planning solution.
Setting up a commercial discipline with a future planning lens is essential for any enterprise. Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, many CPGs in the US have done well in orchestrating resources to meet the demand surge for categories like food, beverages, personal care, home care, etc. The last couple of quarters have seen many of them posting double-digit growth, which has not happened in decades. Penetration, consumption, and spending patterns have changed for these categories, some temporarily and some more permanently.
Enterprise planning in this new normal also needs to evolve into a fully integrated cross-functional management and strategic execution process.
Figure 1: Integrated business planning (IBP)
An integrated vision for Enterprise Management processes
Integrated Business Planning (IBP) –’The latest evolution of Sales & Operational Planning (S&OP) – builds on S&OP’s historic production planning roots to include the entire organization and deliver a seamless management process.
Figure 2: IBP Processes
Fractal approach to enable IBP
We believe the three pillars for a successful IBP implementation in an organization are – People, Processes, and Tools. We enable IBP by mapping the process decision journey and identifying the right metrics and tools that business leaders require to make their decisions.
Figure 3: Process decision journey
IBP client enablement
We recommend a 3-pronged approach to kick start the journey of transforming IBP in any organization:
- Simplification
A commonly observed challenge in most organizations is an overload of reports and tools – leading to a lack of a single source of truth, an overworked team, and frustratingly long data to decision journeys. The simplification exercise objective is to identify, consolidate, and enhance an organization’s existing digital assets. We start with low hanging fruits, create a great user experience for all business users, and gain a tremendous understanding of:- What decisions are being taken, and the data & tools that enable them
- What the unstated business challenges are and that remain unresolved through the AS-IS digital assets?
The entire simplification journey is planned via agile execution process – delivering value to business every 2-3 weeks and consolidating the assets. We typically recommend working backward from the user interface – this enables early value recognition by the business while the larger work on data and latency is resolved in the background through seamless continuous automation and deployment.
- Transformation roadmap
The objective of this exercise is to understand and document in detail the existing AS-IS processes enabling IBP. At the end of this exercise, we deliver the following artifacts:- Gap analysis of AS-IS processes,
- Blueprint for the TO-BE process,
- Implementation plan of the TO-BE process, broken down into Minimum Viable Products (MVPs) that can be released for business users in 4-8 weeks,
- Prioritization framework for the MVPs.
This exercise builds on top of the simplified digital assets to identify the next generation of tools, technologies, and processes required for a seamless digital IBP process
- Value derivation
This exercise focuses on ensuring we lock in the value derivation framework early in the IBP transformation journey. Critical components include:- Documentation of decisions, action items, and value impact
- Building robust governance to ensure continuous enhancements (stagnant products die)
Figure 4: Deriving value from IBP
Excerpts from past engagements
This year has illustrated how crucial it is for enterprises to continue adapting and evolving with technologies. Our IBP solution:
- Is designed to enable enterprise-level data to decision journey at a speed,
- Utilizes behavioral nudges in user interface design to increase adoption,
- Enables scenario planning across demand, supply, and financial metrics,
- Enables integration across functions through processes and data flow for truly cross-functional decision making.
Here are excerpts from our past engagements:
- C-suite enabled: An integrated view for global performance management
- Setting up a Commercial Analytics Center of Excellence for a Fortune 100
- C-suite enabled: An integrated view for predictive forecasting, planning & tracking
- Enabling Supply Review through visibility of key metrics
Conclusion
We can simplify decision making by empowering executives with data that are readily available on their devices. The information is available right on their laptops, mobiles, tablets for quick access to office spaces on desktops and collaborative rooms.
We can use algorithms to take away the tactical and operational tasks daily from thousands of people in an organization and allow them to focus on their health, family, hobbies to work in this new normal.
Intuition and judgment can finally be backed by historical evidence and learning. Through this disruption, legacy organizations can also leapfrog to digital transformation – converting traditionalists to self-serve using next-generation technology. This transformational program can show quick wins, thus leading to the highest adoption of tools ever, that can be celebrated to propel the organization forward.
Having implemented these transformative set-ups for Fortune 500 companies for various contexts, we feel confident in helping entities – businesses, governments, and every individual-navigate this tough time with less pain, even if work-life becomes a less significant part of many of our lives.
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