Steelwedge Software

Based on feedback from customers regarding the deep expertise the Steelwedge team brings to bare as companies improve their sales and operations planning, Steelwedge has formed a new Strategic Services Group.  Steelwedge offers fours categories of services to address customer needs: 1. Discovery, 2. Improvement Program, 3. Maintain, and 4. Training & Education.

1. Discovery

The Steelwedge Discovery service enables customer to better understand improvement opportunies, identify challenges, and develop analytic solutions that address those needs.  Key services include:

– Benchmarking

– H2F2 Forecast Analysis

– Hierarchy Selection

– Optimal Forecast Levels

2. Improvement Program

The Steelwedge Improvement Program enables customers to clarify processes, enable best practices, and drive improvements.

– Current and Future State Assessment

– System Enabled

– Value based

– Executive Review Sessions

3. Maintain

The Maintain program enables customers to manage change and improve existing processes.

– Change Management Support

– Expert Analysis

– Business Process Outsourcing

– S&OP Leadership and Guidance

4. Training & Education

Steelwedge offers a variety of Training and Education options for its clients that are tailored to their needs.  Onsite, offsite, and virtual training programs are offered in a variety of topics.

– System Training

– S&OP

– Forecasting

– Demand Planning

– Supply Planning

– Inventory Planning and Optimization

– Procurement

– Supply Chain Management

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Steelwedge is pleased to announce the first user forum named Steelwedge Solutions Summit.  This gathering will be a unique opportunity for users, partners and prospects to learn about and discuss Steelwedge product evolution & roadmap, best practices in S&OP, demand planning and forecasting.  Presenters will include Steelwedge, client and industry leaders.  Further, participants will have ample opportunities to network, develop connections with other participants and establish user group communications beyond this event.

 The event will be held May 19, 20 and 21, 2008 in and around Pleasanton, CA.  On Monday May 19, attendees may choose to participate in one of two optional activities, golf or sailing.  On Tuesday May 20, users, partners and prospects are welcome for a full day of presentations and discussion.  The event concludes Wednesday May 21 with sessions exclusively for current clients.  This half day program will conclude with lunch.  Optional client meetings may be scheduled in the afternoon.

We look forward to welcoming our partners, prospects and clients to join us for some great food, fun and lively discussion.  More details to come…

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Each time I meet with a member of the Executive team at a client I am reminded as to how difficult and important change management is to successful S&OP.   And, almost without exception, Steelwedge customers look to us to assist in driving change management.  This reflects partly reflects the new world of Software-as-a-Service world we live in where people, process and technology are fully integrated.  But more importantly, it represents a milestone that Steelwedge has achieved which is that we have become a “trust adviser”  to the executive team.  They look to us for best practice expertise, widsom, lesson’s learned, and the kind of insights that only an outside team can provide.

Living up to this expectation can sometimes be challenging.  On one hand we have many constituencies inside an organization that need to be supported and nurtured, on the other hand, we sometimes need to be firm and direct when it comes to providing honest feedback.  In addition, it is easy for us to get wrapped up in the technology and forget that our broader mandate is to improve operations, drive change, and fulfill the unique S&OP mission set out by our sponsors.

In any case, transforming an organization from being silo-based, crisis-driven, spreadsheet-based, manual and sometimes rather unsystematic, into one that operates as an efficient whole — one driven by teamwork, cooperation, facts, analysis, and common objectives is never an easy objective.  

 It is for this reason that Steelwedge has recently established a Strategic Services team — there mission will be to assist our customers in driving change, instilling best practices, and ensuring project success.  This means moving well beyond a focus on technological success and examining S&OP adoption by all participants, effectiveness of the S&OP process, evaluation of S&OP outcomes, creation and management by metrics, and measuring bottom-line results.

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“Emerging Trends in S&OP” with Bob Boehm and John La Bouff of Deloitte Consulting takes placeTuesday April 29, 2008.  Please join us and share your comments after the event.

Link to our “News & Events” page  for more information:  http://www.steelwedge.com/events/

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The question as to whether the process must be defined before a system is installed is frequently asked.  The traditional answer was that the process needs to be clearly defined before any system is installed.  This advice is based on a long legacy of experience implementing ERP, traditional SCM, and CRM systems.  However, S&OP solutions are a new and unique animal — fundamentally they are automating a process, driving collaboration, and pulling together disparate sources of data.  This unique category of application demands a different approach — Technology-enabled process automation.

 Today’s S&OP systems such as the Steelwedge solution are designed to enable process automation or design.  Trade-offs in regard to the timing, level of detail, and steps in a process are often dictated by the availability of data, the timing and sequencing of various systems and activities, and many other details which can only be resolved in the context of the S&OP solution driving the S&OP process.

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