For S&OP to be effective across the supply chain, functional silos must be connected and a robust feedback loop needs to be implemented. But the typical approach to S&OP isn’t designed to do that — and can’t match the pace of today’s supply chain, which requires greater speed and agility in both strategic and execution planning. Monthly S&OP processes are too linear and rigid: each function (e.g., demand, manufacturing, logistics) works in its own silo, focused only on evaluating its own plans, which are then passed down the line to the next link in the chain. Too often teams don’t work together to evaluate conflicting plans or negotiate tough decisions on how to respond to changes in demand and supply. Key performance indicators (KPIs) are also often misaligned across functions. This leads to an inability to make rapid adjustments like short-term promotions or last-minute price changes, or to deal with unexpected interruptions outside of regularly scheduled planning cycles. The time it takes to analyze, model and make informed decisions increases exponentially with every silo involved in the S&OP process. Another issue is how long it takes to capture and analyze data from extended supply chain partners and customers. If that data is housed in multiple systems with little to no integration, or if planners are still using Excel spreadsheets to create operational roadmaps, it is impossible to get the most up-to-date information across all nodes of the supply chain. As a result, the data used to make critical trade-off decisions during each month’s S&OP meeting could already be weeks out of date. Plus, the bottom-up aggregation of this information for presentation to executives often provides limited feedback down the chain before the start of the next planning cycle.