“Why am I focused on the supply chain? The answer is simple. It is a barometer of my business. All the problems show up first in the supply chain….”
— Dell Founder, Chairman and CEO, Michael Dell
I love this quote from Michael Dell. It came from an interview when I was writing the book, Bricks Matter.
Leaders are clear that good planning matters. The rest of the world continues to look for evidence. As a researcher, I am attempting to measure the impact.
Over the course of the last week, I have been writing about maturity in supply chain planning. This week, we will be sharing research from over 90 respondents on Sales and Operations Planning (S&OP). It is from a new quantitative survey. Check out our new report.
In this report, we find that S&OP processes have grown more complex in scope and governance over the last decade. The average company over 3B$ in annual revenue has four S&OP processes. We also find that S&OP maturity matters. As companies mature in S&OP that they rate themselves 2X more mature on ability and 46% better on cross-functional alignment. To accomplish this, the goal of the S&OP process needs to move from a focus on volume to evaluate product mix/profitability. Companies the most mature in “what-if” analysis and the use of optimization tend to rate themselves higher in maturity.
Who doesn’t want a more agile and aligned organization? Don’t miss this webinar on Thursday, June 13th at 1:00 PM. We hope to have you join us!
Teaching Your Organization to Jump
September 25, 2026
11:18 pm
Remember the story of the frog in the pot of water? If the water temperature rises slowly, the frog doesn’t recognize the danger until it is too late. Put the frog directly into boiling water, and it jumps.
I think the analogy applies to today’s supply chains.
Companies are absorbing increasing volatility and complexity without fundamentally redefining how work gets done. Companies have confused historic practices with best practices. They are now taking those same processes and attempting to automate them with agents and agentic AI—without first stopping to ask a more fundamental question: Is it time to jump? Here I give a five-step action plan.
