In addition to dealing with supply chain challenges or shocks, businesses have had to deal with a massive shift in consumer preferences over the past two years.

Demand and preferences for products are now evolving, and safety concerns, economic uncertainty and a continued focus on sustainability have led consumers to realise that there are many things they can do without, and a few they can’t.

Consumers rapid shift to online shopping as well as the shift to working from home has driven a largescale digital transformation. This digital shift has forced companies to evaluate or even transform their business models. Consumer brands have traditionally been able to rely on historical data and performance trends to forecast the future of the business.

Now, disruption and quickly changing market conditions has turned retail planning on its head.

To meet these customer expectations and win in the market, retailers must anticipate and adjust to rapid shifts in demand, supply, as well as changing customer sentiment and expectations. The most successful businesses, going forward, will be able to connect with their customers in new ways, with omnichannel solutions.

This requires organisations to move from an episodic planning approach once or twice a year to a continuous planning cycle in which the planning decision making and execution happens on an ongoing ‘always-on’ basis. This will help organisations anticipate and adjust more quickly to supply chain challenges.

In many businesses continuous planning process might happen monthly. In a business that manages the supply chain and inventory decisions, the planning process might happen weekly. Although, in top resilient organisations globally, planning and execution decisions are made in near real-time based on the data and insight that resides in a platform, such as Anaplan.

That coupled with the preoccupation with sustainability, which is now more important than ever, can add yet another layer of complexity for businesses.

For further information, including details on how to improve end-to-end supply chain transparency, download our full supply chain resilience whitepaper.