Constant Disaggregation for Breakback

JaredDolich · July 30

In as much detail as possible, describe the problem or experience related to your idea. Please provide the context of what you were trying to do and include specific examples or workarounds:

CONSTANT disaggregation for breakback line items. Currently, only summable line items can utilize breakback. So, editable line items formatted as prices, ratios, and percentages cannot be used at a parent level with an expectation that the same value appears in the child levels. Hold and Release must also apply. Lastly, the line item should be able to disaggregate constant on one list and sum on another. Wouldn't be a bad idea either to add NONE, MIN, MAX, FIRST, LAST, and AVERAGE but these are far less important.

EDIT (8/13/2024) - The RATIO aggregation rule should be the default option for changes made at a child level. It's important that the parent level be a weighted average.

Today, the workaround is to create a system module for the parent hierarchy level and have the child levels LOOKUP the value. But, this requires a formula which means an entire override strategy has to be used, such as a BOOLEAN override, a line item for the new value, and another line item for the final value. The override features is non-intuitive and when you have 100+ editable line items its simply too much to ask.

Candidly, this is a must have feature for most retailers using Anaplan for MFP, merchandise financial planning. Also, consider that Anaplan's competition has this feature natively, as do most OLAP planning solutions.

Here's a screenshot of the workaround:

How often is this impacting your users?

Always impacts and in some cases, retailers will not use Anaplan. Good example of the type of values that need to disaggregate using CONSTANT:

AUR - Average unit at Retail
AUC - Average unit at Cost
IMU% - Initial Markup percentage
Sell Thru - Sell Thru percentage
Store Count - CONSTANT on the location hierarchy, but SUM on product hierarchy
GM% - Gross Margin percentage
Price - Retail or Cost price

Who is this impacting? (ex. model builders, solution architects, partners, admins, integration experts, business/end users, executive-level business users)

Any planner that needs to disaggregate a price, ratio, or percentage, which is everyone.

What would your ideal solution be? How would it add value to your current experience?

Please consider making the solution provide these three features:

CONSTANT disaggregation on all lists and time hierarchy used for breakback line items.
Allow some lists to use CONSTANT and some SUM or None.
Hold and Release. Ability to hold some children levels from being affected by a parent change.

Please include any images to help illustrate your experience.

Do we really want planners to plan this way?