A base plan beside the live plan, with the drift measured
Keep the base plan you committed to beside the live plan driving orders. Promotions, scenarios and overrides all move the live plan; the baseline shows by how much.
Two plans, kept side by side
The base plan is what you committed to. The live plan is what you are buying against today. They are expected to diverge; the question is by how much.
Drift measured as a number
Six promotions, two launches and a retail deal later, the live plan is a long way from January. That distance is the clearest read on how the year is going.
A baseline for judging scenarios
When you approve a scenario, the baseline shows whether everything approved this quarter still adds up to a plan you would sign off on.
What the agent does with base vs live plan
Every night
The overnight run works against the live plan, so what the agent brings you every morning reflects what you are actually buying against today rather than the version you agreed to in January.
What it can’t do
It cannot approve a scenario, reset the base plan, or change either one. Changing the plan is always a human step.
Example: nine months of drift nobody could measure
Take a working plan that by September bears little relationship to the annual operating plan: six promotions, two launches, a rollout that slipped. Everyone knows it has moved, but nobody can put a number on it. With a baseline kept beside it, the drift is a figure on the screen.
How it fits together
Every capability runs on the same demand forecast, so each one makes the others more useful.
Measure how far the plan has moved
See a live plan against its baseline, with the distance between them as a number.