2 different quotes come to my mind when I read ‘Keep it simple’.
The first is the quote by Steve Jobs who said, “Simple can be harder than complex: You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple. But it’s worth it in the end because once you get there, you can move mountains.”
But if Simple is so much better, then why do we have so much complexity around us?
George Brooks seems to have an answer for that. He said, “Simplicity is hard to build, easy to use, and hard to charge for. Complexity is easy to build, hard to use, and easy to charge for.”
Companies can end up paying so much for complex systems which never get used.
Complex is not always better when it comes to demand planning. The demand planning method and tools that are right for a particular company depends on the level of support they need and the level of data they have. The right solution could be a statistical approach or a consensus approach, a stand-alone tool or an enterprise wide solution.
There are many factors that can impact a company’s ability to plan demand and react to it accurately.
Knowing these factors in advance helps companies plan.
Companies should ask themselves:
• How consistent is your demand?
• What are the factors that influence the variable, or variables being forecast?
• What level of supply chain visibility do you have?
• How reliable are your modes of transport?
• Do you have access to multiple modes of transport?
Understanding the drivers of uncertainty is the first step in reducing the uncertainty.
