Demand Planning and S&OP in Depth: Forecast, Agree, Deliver
Signature Course No. 497 — A Signature AI Socratic Coaching Course.
No experience needed — your coach starts where you are.
A New Kind of Learning
Socratic coaching, delivered by an agentic AI coach.
Not a course you watch. An AI coach you work with.
The Lighthouse Coach begins by discovering how you think about the subject, teaches what is missing, and gives you realistic practice before asking you to prove that you can use it. You may test out of concepts you already understand, while capstones turn the learning into a practical plan, decision, conversation, or other real-world result.
The curriculum is deliberately authored; the AI delivers it through coaching. It is not an AI randomly generating lessons.
A coach that teaches by asking — not by lecturing
The Lighthouse Coach is an AI Socratic coach built on Cognosco Learning's Demand Planning and S&OP in Depth: Forecast, Agree, Deliver course, in the Frontline & Industry Leadership category. It does not play videos at you. It holds a conversation: it asks you a question, listens to your answer, names the misconception it hears, affirms what you got right, and asks the next question — the way a great coach works in the room.
Most companies do not have a forecasting problem. They have an agreement problem wearing a forecasting costume. Sales carries one number, operations builds to a second, finance budgets a third, and the warehouse discovers all three in the same week. This course teaches the discipline that ends that arrangement: sales and operations planning — S&OP — run at depth, as a monthly cycle of agreement.
It starts with the cycle, not the number. A governed, repeating process — plan, agree, commit, review — with named steps in a fixed order, named owners, fixed dates that do not move for convenience, one issued output, and a review of itself. You work on one business throughout: Selwick Consumer Products, whose stipulated quarter — a statistical base of 22,000 units and an agreed demand plan of 23,500 — is printed once and never changes, so every figure in the course recomputes from the same inputs.
It works in two movements. First, Module 1 — The Demand Plan at Depth — work through Concepts 1–9, finishing with The Demand Plan; then, Module 2 — Supply Response and the S&OP Agreement — work through Concepts 10–18, finishing with The Cycle Pack.
Both capstones produce real artifacts — a complete unconstrained demand plan package for Selwick's next quarter: the base frozen and method-defended, the adjustment layer audited, the hierarchy reconciled with its gaps named, the accuracy evidence and assumption register attached; and a complete S&OP cycle pack for the stipulated quarter: the supply response in units and dates, the scenarios priced, the functions reconciled, and the executive decision issued as the agreed single operating plan, translated into money a finance partner can audit.
The honesty standard is part of the course. Statistics and judgment never share a line: every number is either computed from history by a stated method or entered by a named human as a labeled adjustment with a reason and an expiry — and every accuracy figure, scenario total, and financial translation in the book recomputes from the printed inputs, so you can check the arithmetic yourself. This is the depth sequel to No. 128, Supply Chain Management Essentials: the essentials are incoming here, never re-taught.
The course is self-paced and always on — roughly 30 minutes per concept, about 9 hours in full, taken in as many sittings as you like. You can type your answers, or talk out loud: the Voice Coach speaks its questions and listens to your spoken replies. Learners who already know the material can test out concept by concept.
Demand Planning and S&OP in Depth: Forecast, Agree, Deliver is part of The Lighthouse Signature Series — the online counterpart to the one-day, in-person learning Cognosco Learning delivers.
Course Facts
One full concept, coached end to end — free: verify your email and we’ll send you a link to start.
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Diagnose → Learn & Practice → Prove → Capstone
Every learner moves through the same discipline a Cognosco instructor would insist on in the room.
Diagnose
The Coach starts where the course starts: with your own planning cycle. Count the versions of next quarter's demand currently in active use in your organization, and name who would be surprised by each of the others; score your process against the cycle's five properties and name the weakest, with what it costs each month; and say where your planning horizon ends — and which real decision needs a longer view than that. Every concept opens with three questions that locate where you actually stand, and your answers shape how deeply the Coach works the concept with you. Everyone begins with Module 1 — no skipping the foundations you only think you have.
Learn & Practice
Work each concept in conversation with the Coach — spoken or written — then practice it against realistic situations until it holds up.
Prove
Every concept ends in proof: answer the check cold and demonstrate the skill. Know it already? Test out and take credit immediately.
Capstone
Finish with two capstones — The Demand Plan for Module 1 and The Cycle Pack for Module 2 — that pull the whole course together, and earn the certificate.
What You'll Learn
Forecast, agree, deliver — in that order, every cycle. A forecast is an argument, not an answer, and an S&OP plan is an agreement, not a spreadsheet. This course teaches you to build the number honestly — statistics and judgment kept visibly separate, every adjustment owned, every error measured where it actually lives — and then to run the meetings that turn the number into a commitment the whole company keeps.
Module 1 builds the demand plan at depth. The Cycle, Not the Number; The Forecast Hierarchy; Choosing the Statistical Method; Judgment Kept Visible; Forecast Value Added; Bias and Accuracy at Depth; Launches and Endings; Demand Sensing; and The Unconstrained Demand Plan.
Module 2 runs the supply response and the agreement. The Supply Review; Inventory Inside the Cycle; Scenarios That Price the Gap; The Pre-S&OP Meeting; The Executive S&OP Meeting; Money in the Cycle; When the Plan Breaks; Measuring the Cycle Itself; and The Planning Standard.
And it holds its boundary throughout. The essentials this depth builds on — forecasting basics, forecast error, inventory costs, service level, safety stock, lead times — are taught in No. 128, Supply Chain Management Essentials, and the buying side — spend, sourcing, contracts, supplier management — in No. 356, Procurement and Strategic Sourcing. Planning systems appear here at workflow and configuration-judgment level only: no click-paths, because the judgment must survive the next software change intact.
What you will learn
- Run S&OP as a governed monthly cycle — named steps in fixed order, named owners, fixed dates, and one issued plan the whole company works to
- Build a demand plan in a hierarchy that reconciles across product, location, and time — and treat disagreement between levels as information, never as a difference to split
- Choose statistical methods by demand pattern, and keep judgment as labeled, owned adjustments on a statistical base that is never edited by hand
- Measure forecast value added, bias, and accuracy by segment and by horizon — and remove the process steps that subtract value
- Run the supply review in units and dates, set target stocks as cycle decisions, and price demand-up, demand-down, and supply-short scenarios from the plan's own inputs
- Reconcile before executives sit down, decide the gap to one agreed plan, translate it into auditable money, handle mid-cycle breaks on a recorded path, and measure the cycle itself
Everything in the course
- All 18 concepts of Demand Planning and S&OP in Depth: Forecast, Agree, Deliver, in 2 modules
- A starting-point check first — the Coach finds where you actually stand before teaching
- Learn, Practice, Prove for every concept — no passive video watching
- A test-out on every concept: prove you know it and move on
- The Voice Coach: talk with the Coach out loud — it speaks, listens, and replies
- A personal Learner Record of your work across the course
- Two capstone exercises: The Demand Plan and The Cycle Pack
- A printable session summary whenever you pause
- The Lighthouse Coach completion certificate (Signature Series)
- Your progress is saved as you go — stop anytime, resume where you left off
Built for the people who run the planning cycle
Demand planners and supply planners — who build the numbers the company argues about, and who need the depth methods and the meeting discipline to defend them; and S&OP process owners and planning managers who run the monthly cycle and are accountable for whether it produces agreement or theater.
Operations, commercial, and finance leaders — who sit in the executive S&OP meeting and must decide gaps on evidence rather than on volume of voice.
Supply chain managers moving up from essentials practice — who know forecasting, error, and service level at the level No. 128 teaches, and now need the organizational process those skills serve. This course assumes the essentials of No. 128 are in hand, and comfort with percentages and with reading a table; everything at depth is built here, concept by concept.
Prefer to learn live and in person? The same material anchors Cognosco's one-day programs — browse the in-person catalog.
Start with The Cycle, Not the Number
$195 — introductory price. One payment. No subscription, no password to manage.
Here is exactly what happens when you enroll:
- Pay securely with Stripe — you are taken straight into the course
- Create your learner profile and begin the Module 1 starting-point check
- Save the access key you are given — it restores your enrollment on any device
- Learn at your pace; your progress is stored in your browser on your device
For the full voice experience, use Chrome and allow the microphone when asked. Typing your answers works everywhere, all the time. Questions before you enroll? Email hello@cognoscolearning.com.
Before you enroll
What is a Socratic coaching session?
A conversation, not a video. Your coach asks a question; you answer — out loud by voice, or by typing — and the coach responds to what you said: naming the misconception it hears, affirming what you got right, and asking the next question. You advance only when you have mastered each concept, so a finished course means the learning held.
How long does it take — and how long do I have?
About 30 minutes per concept. Learn in sittings of any length; your progress is saved as you go. You have a full year from purchase to finish, and you can revisit and retake within that year.
What does the certificate verify?
That you completed every concept and both capstones of this course. Anyone can confirm a Cognosco certificate online — enter its certificate ID on our verification page.
What if it isn't for me — what are the refunds?
If you have not started, cancel for a full refund within seven days of purchase. Once you have started, there is no cash refund — stop before finishing and we credit the full amount you paid toward any other course in the library (credit valid one year from your original purchase). Once you complete the course, no refund or credit applies.
More Signature Courses are coming
Demand Planning and S&OP in Depth: Forecast, Agree, Deliver is Signature Course No. 497. Leave your email and we'll send you news of future Signature Courses and Lighthouse updates as they are announced — nothing else.