The first seminar of 2024, following the renewal of the Chair, was dedicated to S&OP, and brought together some 30 face-to-face participants for an in-depth exploration of this key process in supply chain management. The subject of S&OP was chosen to enable the partners to discover and get to know the new entrants, Decathlon and Argon & Co.
The seminar, supported by Decathlon teams, took place in Lille, and immersed participants in the dynamic environment of Decathlon's « value chain », including a visit to the Lompret warehouse.
The program was built around feedback from the partners and an external contribution from Kiabi's supply chain team, and enabled the sharing of practices and transformations associated with S&OP in the respective organizations of Decathlon, Louis Vuitton, Renault and Michelin.
Context:
In a VUCA world, the aim of S&OP is not just to align demand and supply, but to align all the company's players on common assumptions, so that together they can make the best decisions.
The challenges are numerous. How to better share the impact of different risks and opportunities, better anticipate market fluctuations while controlling costs, better manage inventories or improve collaboration between sales and operational teams.
But there are also challenges involved in implementing S&OP. For example, the need to integrate multiple data into high-performance planning tools, and above all the need to be action-oriented at all levels of the organization throughout this rhythmic and demanding process.
Practices shared by the Chair's partners:
- Decathlon: setting up global routines for optimal decision-making and rethinking roles for a smooth S&OP cycle.
- Louis Vuitton: an agile process with total data accessibility, daily execution, and direct CEO involvement.
- Renault: adoption of a monthly cycle structured by escalation and arbitration mechanisms.
- Michelin: introduction of a “forecasting license” to reinforce expected managerial behavior.
- Argon & Co: highlights persistent S&OP challenges such as alignment, forecast reliability and cross-functional collaboration.
This first seminar was first and foremost an opportunity for the partners to get to know each other better and learn from each other, by immersing themselves in the heart of their respective S&OP processes.
Over and above this, the very role of S&OP emerges as a decisive element in the ongoing transformation of the “supply chain of the future”, requiring ongoing efforts to raise awareness and ensure ownership across all teams within an organization.
To continue this awareness-raising effort, the Chair's partners have pooled their S&OP practices in a short video to be discovered here.
Read all about the Supply Chain of the Future Chair in the press