Forecast Collaboration
Demand Works offers a progressive range of solutions for collaborative forecasting with Smoothie®. There are three primary approaches for collaborative forecasting with Smoothie and two primary user interfaces including Microsoft Excel® and Smoothie Collaborators. Together, and in combination with the Smoothie Mambo server, they provide a spectrum of choices that can be tailored to the unique needs of each user and your business objectives and infrastructure.
Desktop Collaboration Using Excel and Email
This is the most inexpensive and simplest approach for collaboration. Smoothie Plus and Smoothie SP licenses include capabilities for exporting pre-formatted collaborative Excel spreadsheets. Spreadsheets can be exported at detailed or summarized levels, and they include only the items or customers that are appropriate for the collaborative user. Exported spreadsheets can then be emailed to collaborators, returned with adjustments and notes, and then incorporated into the plan as adjustments or reference forecasts.
Since Excel and email are widely used within corporations, this option does not require any special IT or infrastructure support. Furthermore, since the collaborative user interface is Excel, little or no collaborator training is needed. Participants simply contribute as they do now: Receiving spreadsheets with initial forecasts, adjusting the figures and sending them back to the demand manager. (But with Smoothie the process will be much easier and more precise).
Automated Collaboration with Excel and Email or Network File Sharing
With Smoothie Mambo, pre-formatted forecast collaboration spreadsheets can be scheduled for automatic distribution to users via email, shared directories, or using a Microsoft SharePoint® collaborative workspace. This approach is similar to the desktop approach except the security-controlled spreadsheets are automatically distributed and imported back into the plan in an automated, scheduled set of processes. This approach does require some IT support for configuring the server and automation, however it offers the benefits of easy deployment and administration, a simplified interface for collaborative users, and automatic consolidation of collaborative input into the consensus plan. It also requires licensing of the Smoothie Mambo server software and collaborator licenses for the collaborative users.
Automated Collaboration with Smoothie Collaborators
The optional Smoothie Collaborator client provides end users with extensive functionality for reviewing and modifying forecasts. Smoothie Collaborator clients enable interaction with plans at flexible levels of aggregation, using alternative units of measure, prices or costs, etc. They also provide advanced graphic and spreadsheet-based views, the ability to interact and 'what-if' directly with the statistical forecasting functions, optional visibility to reference forecasts and other related demand information, plus easy viewing and exchange of notes with other users. Collaborators can even export graphs or spreadsheets.
The Smoothie Mambo server software tightly controls the information that users are allowed to view and/or modify, and forecast adjustments and notes are seamlessly synchronized with the host plan when users connect to the server. As with spreadsheets, Smoothie Collaborator users can conveniently work off-line while traveling or meeting with customers.
This approach offers all of the benefits of Pivot Forecasting® and
automated remote collaboration. It's a powerful, scalable, world class
user interface for collaborators. Since it offers advanced
functionality, it requires some end user training as well as IT
support. It also requires licensing of the Smoothie Mambo server
software and collaborator licenses.
