What is the typically time period start to end of plan of an aggregate planning problem?

What is Aggregate Planning ? - Importance and its Strategies

Introduction

An organization can finalize its business plans on the recommendation of demand forecast. Once business plans are ready, an organization can do backward working from the final sales unit to raw materials required. Thus annual and quarterly plans are broken down into labor, raw material, working capital, etc. requirements over a medium-range period (6 months to 18 months). This process of working out production requirements for a medium range is called aggregate planning.

Factors Affecting Aggregate Planning

Aggregate planning is an operational activity critical to the organization as it looks to balance long-term strategic planning with short term production success. Following factors are critical before an aggregate planning process can actually start;

• A complete information is required about available production facility and raw materials.
• A solid demand forecast covering the medium-range period
• Financial planning surrounding the production cost which includes raw material, labor, inventory planning, etc.
• Organization policy around labor management, quality management, etc.

For aggregate planning to be a success, following inputs are required;

• An aggregate demand forecast for the relevant period
• Evaluation of all the available means to manage capacity planning like sub-contracting, outsourcing, etc.
• Existing operational status of workforce (number, skill set, etc.), inventory level and production efficiency

Aggregate planning will ensure that organization can plan for workforce level, inventory level and production rate in line with its strategic goal and objective.

Aggregate planning as an Operational Tool

Aggregate planning helps achieve balance between operation goal, financial goal and overall strategic objective of the organization. It serves as a platform to manage capacity and demand planning.

In a scenario where demand is not matching the capacity, an organization can try to balance both by pricing, promotion, order management and new demand creation.

In scenario where capacity is not matching demand, an organization can try to balance the both by various alternatives such as.

• Laying off/hiring excess/inadequate excess/inadequate excess/inadequate workforce until demand decrease/increase.
• Including overtime as part of scheduling there by creating additional capacity.
• Hiring a temporary workforce for a fix period or outsourcing activity to a sub-contrator.

Importance of Aggregate Planning

Aggregate planning plays an important part in achieving long-term objectives of the organization. Aggregate planning helps in:

• Achieving financial goals by reducing overall variable cost and improving the bottom line
• Maximum utilization of the available production facility
• Provide customer delight by matching demand and reducing wait time for customers
• Reduce investment in inventory stocking
• Able to meet scheduling goals there by creating a happy and satisfied work force

Aggregate Planning Strategies

There are three types of aggregate planning strategies available for organization to choose from. They are as follows.

1. Level Strategy

As the name suggests, level strategy looks to maintain a steady production rate and workforce level. In this strategy, organization requires a robust forecast demand as to increase or decrease production in anticipation of lower or higher customer demand. Advantage of level strategy is steady workforce. Disadvantage of level strategy is high inventory and increase back logs.

2. Chase Strategy

As the name suggests, chase strategy looks to dynamically match demand with production. Advantage of chase strategy is lower inventory levels and back logs. Disadvantage is lower productivity, quality and depressed work force.

3. Hybrid Strategy

As the name suggests, hybrid strategy looks to balance between level strategy and chase strategy.

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With the primary goals of minimizing costs and maximizing profits, the strategic objectives of aggregate planning include:

Minimize inventory investment – Aggregate planning software optimally balances efforts to minimize the cost of inventory management and storage with efforts to ensure sufficient inventory to meet both independent and dependent demands through material resource planning.

Minimize workforce demand and fluctuation – Aggregate planning software uses data from demand forecasts and material resource planning to calculate an optimal workforce plan – one that balances the cost of onboarding/layoffs due to workforce fluctuation with the cost of worker idle time and/or overtime.

Maximize production rates while minimizing fluctuation – Aggregate planning software analyzes production capacity versus demand forecasts to maximize the overall production rate while avoiding periods of idle capacity.

Maximize facility and production equipment utilization – Aggregate planning software accounts for available production equipment and facilities, and targets maximum utilization over the aggregate planning period.

To achieve these objectives, aggregate planning software may employ one of two approaches, or a combination of both. The chase approach attempts to match production capacity with demand. With this approach, a manufacturer adjusts resource procurement and availability to keep up with fluctuations in customer (or make-to-stock) orders. This approach enables a manufacturer to minimize inventory levels and maximize resource utilization, but the manufacturer must contend with costs associated with adjustments to capacity: workforce onboarding and layoffs or underutilized floor space, for example.

The level approach to aggregate production planning, on the other hand, avoids the cost of adjustments by keeping production rates steady. This means that the manufacturer builds up inventory at times of lower demand to be able to fulfill orders during periods of peak demand. Alternatively, the manufacturer may maintain a steady level of workforce and production capacity and ramp up productivity during periods of high demand. In either case, the level approach encounters costs associated with inventory management, idle capacity, workforce idle time and/or overtime, and other expenses associated with fluctuating utilization of resources.

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