From Order to Dispatch: Starting from the Beginning

I Planning & Scheduling. Why they are so important and what the differences are between them.

In supply chain and manufacturing chain management, obstacles arise daily. These obstacles prevent a manufacturing environment from reaching its true potential, and also obviously cost money.

The manufacturing chain is becoming increasingly demanding: very dynamic markets that affect raw materials, suppliers that give us very long delivery times and often have delays, a manufacturing process that is becoming more complex with a high mix of products, operations, constant format changes and increasingly shorter manufacturing runs… and finally the uncertainty with the distribution channel and the variability so frequent that both our supply chain customer and the end customer who ends up buying our product present.

Therefore, being excellent in all steps of the manufacturing chain is mandatory:

• Starting with order reception.
• Going through the planning and sequencing of tasks.
• Executing the tasks ensuring the highest quality and tracing everything that happens in the process.
• Optimizing our processes to the maximum to obtain the best results in production KPIs, such as OEE.
• And finally, ensuring that delivery times are met, the amount of stock is minimized, and a correct distribution flow is ensured from the warehouse to the next customer in the supply chain.

Manufacturing Chain: Planning and Sequencing

Then, customer orders arrive and the manufacturing chain begins. How do we start?

The first step always involves creating an accurate and realistic production plan, which allows manufacturers to react quickly to changes. It is important to have a production plan that is aligned with the sequencing process of resources and materials, as well as the actual status of plant resources (machines, shifts, operators…). Having any discrepancy or divergence between the planning process, sequencing and execution creates inefficiencies that can be costly for the business. The greater the divergence, the greater the cost.

In addition, within this first step, the concepts of production planning and sequencing can be confused since they have similar connotations and use cases, although they can be well differentiated between them so as not to confuse them. In essence, the main difference at a conceptual level is that planning determines WHAT and HOW MUCH needs to be produced, while sequencing defines WHO and WHEN the operations are going to be carried out.

Production Operations Scheduling

Although we are talking about different processes, both converge within operations and production scheduling. As one depends on the other, it is important to ensure that the initial planning part is carried out correctly, since an efficient scheduling of operations will ultimately derive from this. Both are essential for manufacturers looking to have a complete production plan and want to use their resources to the fullest. There are several reasons why planning and sequencing are different. Let’s look at the conceptual definition of both terms:

• Planning – The planning process consists of creating a plan in which resources and materials are taken into account to satisfy a demand (which can be real or a forecast). This process is essential and crucial to be able to ensure that you will have enough materials and resources (capacity) to produce all orders on time. As I mentioned earlier, this process is related to the “WHAT” and the “HOW” of any project: what you want to achieve exactly and how you will do it.
• Sequencing (scheduling) – The sequencing (or scheduling) process consists of being able to specify when specific resources will be used in production. In production management, sequencing (or scheduling) involves creating schedules for workers, equipment, and material usage. In this case, that process reflects the “WHEN” of a project, assigning the appropriate resources to achieve the completion of the production plan in a specific period of time. Being able to create optimized production plans can achieve things like reducing costs, increasing productivity, and always delivering products to customers within deadlines.

Advanced Planning and Scheduling Software

In short, correctly addressing this first step of planning and sequencing manufacturing is crucial for the entire supply chain to flow in a realistic way, and for this, advanced planning and scheduling software (or APS – Advanced Planning & Scheduling) is used. In essence, advanced planning and scheduling software (APS) helps operations managers and planners to be more efficient, while providing greater agility to update priorities, production schedules, and constantly changing inventory plans. In addition, APS systems can be quickly integrated with ERP/MRP software to fill the gaps where these systems lack flexibility, accuracy, and planning and scheduling efficiency.

With our APS – Advanced Planning & Scheduling offering you could:

• Create optimized schedules that balance production efficiency and delivery times
• Maximize production on bottleneck resources
• Synchronize supply with demand to reduce inventories
• Provide visibility of capacity across the enterprise
• Enable data-driven scenario decision making