Sales & Operations Planning (S&OP) Process

Sales and operations planning (S&OP) is the key business process to balance customer demand with supply capabilities. The general objective of S&OP is matching demand and supply in the medium term, by providing an instrument for the vertical alignment of business strategy and operational planning, and for the horizontal alignment of demand and supply plans. The Sales & Operations Planning (S&OP) process determines how much of which products to make, where to make them, and which markets to send them to on the basis of demand forecasts, cost factors, risk profile, and strategic objectives.

This course provides an introduction into how to develop a dynamic sales and operations planning (S&OP) process- business processes and technologies- that will enable an enterprise to effectively respond to demand and supply variability with timely determinations of the right market and supply chain mix, all through the S&OP time horizon.

After completing Sales & Operations Planning Process, students will be equipped with a basic understanding of the following:

A general understanding of supply chain management is recommended, but not required

Students will be assigned 5 homework assignments, and 1 final exam for each course.

1. Introduction
   What is S&OP?
   Advantages
   Inputs
   S&OP time horizon
   Top down planning
   Bottoms up planning
2. Sales Revenue Planning
   New product planning
   Sales opportunity planning
   Revenue, margin, opportunity planning
   Alignment to corporate goals
3. Demand Planning
   Demand forecasting
   Demand collaboration (sales, marketing, operations input)
   Demand shaping (promotions, new product introduction, other events)
   Consensus forecasting
4. Supply Planning
   Capacity planning
   Inventory optimization
   Material planning
   Transportation
5. Profit-based Supply/Demand Planning
   Product mix
   Constraint management
   What-if analysis
   Allocation of demand to supply
   Consensus
6. Management Review
   Key Performance Indicator (KPI) measurement
   Working capital
   Gross margin
   Inventory turns
   Plan vs actual
   Forecast errors
   Root cause analysis

This course is Instructor-led and delivered through our award-winning online Learning Management System.