You are a Planner If...

My ultimate tryst with Planning came 7 years too late. I was actually offered the Ops Planning role way back in 2002 when I was about to complete my engineering assignment as Project Manager (or one-woman army, more like it). But then I chosed to go the technical path and many other challenging roles thereafter.  Of course, I have always worked with the Planners and the Supply Network team over the years until the inevitable came which made me an official part of this network.

This blog is dedicated to the Planners. With this article is my awe and respect to these extraordinary people - the planners I work with, behind the scenes. It is an honor for me to have now added planning as part of my journey.

You are a Planner If...

• You are (or have at least been) the scapegoat for undershipment. Supply Issue.  Even if MTD is 33% vs 65% par and inventory is overflowing. Supply issue pa rin.
• You are wearing glasses. Or candidate for wearing one.
• You have mastered Excel and knew features no one ever thought of using. You might have even enrolled to the advance excel course. And everything has to be on an excel table.
• You have 50 windows or more open all at the same time.
• You have backache. Or ulcer. Or migraine. In my case, I now have all three of them.
• If you work in an office, you probably eat lunch in front of your laptop/PC.
• When natural disaster strikes, apart from worrying about your family and loved ones, you literally worry about the state of the nation and the plant. And the suppliers. And their suppliers. And the lists goes on....
• You are glued to the computer 24 hrs a day you might as well be married to it. Even on weekends and holidays. And if you are off for a minute people wonder if you have been working.
• You are a miracle worker. Like saving a hopeless CPS. All the time.
• You have superpowers. Like reading minds. Even if they can't make up theirs.
• You are the bearer of bad news or provide perspective of what could latter lead to more bad news. Supply issue. Delayed CPS. Ridiculous CPS. Less than believable forecast. Delayed equipment. Late delivery. Overflowing inventory. Remnants. etc etc.
• As they say, "Dont shoot the messenger." Good thing we have nine lives.
• You are the Historian Extraordinaire. You live to tell people why things are the way they are. And for that you need an exceptional memory. Or archive. Coz well, (some) people have either short term or selective memory.
• You have probably mastered writing issue sheets. If you haven't, go flex that brain and write one!
• You create RCCP for your team's capacity. I know, I made one years before I became a planner.
• You have Safety Stocks for your fast moving items at home. I do.
• You have monthly NPI clean up at home. I do too.
• You implement contigency planning beyond work.
• You have probably the most number of meetings in a week. We have pre-meetings for meetings.
• Now I understand why during my Operations days, our planners need hours to answer a simple question. :-)
• You have at least experienced working on a complex spreadsheet and forgot to save it before the PC hang! Bummer. BUT you can recreate it back from sheer memory.
• You have a polarizing impact with Operations, Engineering and QA-- that is, they either love you or hate you. Well, perhaps the latter.  During my DLP days, we were one happy family for as long as people share the same vision!

And, you will never be right! Go figure!



Picture from my 1st SG Bday with CSP and friends



Winning the AGILE Category for VSM Lead Model.
SNO Tool with team work at its best.

My Team (MPD) Christmas Party circa 2005 with our Planning, MSM and QA friends.
I decided that our team will sponsor this party with people we work with most- we are the folks nobody invites. With Ed Macias sponsoring the venue.



Camphone shaking. The other half of CSP team.