Some thoughts...
Step 1
Get Setup with Anaplan.
- Request a Free 90 Day Trial. You must have an Anaplan workspace in order to practice and to work through the training.
- Be patient though, there may be a waiting list.
- Once you get confirmation of your workspace, go ahead and change your password.
- This will be your login to Anaplan from now on. You can log in from the main website www.anaplan.com
- While you are waiting for your workspace, watch this YouTube video by Simon Tucker Chief Planning officer at Anaplan to get an Anaplan primer. 4 minutes.
- Then, watch this “connected planning” YouTube video, 9 minutes.
Step 2
Setup your Anaplan learning account. In order to obtain the free online training, you need to set up a Learning account.
- Start by going to the Anaplan Academy.
- Set up an account.
- Choose your alias wisely. It's very hard to change in the future. Mine is JaredDolich but others will choose a less conspicuous name.
- The certification path looks like this. Your goal should be to obtain the lime green certification, or the Anaplan Certified Model Builder.
Step 3
Start your Anaplan modeling training.
- Start by going to the home page for model building training at the Academy.
- Click on the Level 1 Icon.
- Follow the instructions and use your workspace to build your models.
- Level 1 takes about 20 hours. Level 2 takes about 40 hours. Anaplan Way takes about 5 hours.
Overall:
- Be patient this will take some time.
- Try to take video courses in one sitting if you can. They're short, 2-8 minutes each.
- Certifications should be done over 2-5 consecutive days, but try to work in 4 hours in a sitting.
- Practice. For example, I have a model I built that uses every function. This is a great way to learn and helps with the “activity” score you need later on with certifications.
- Remember there are many ways to solve problems in Anaplan. Some are better than others but if you get the result you’ll be fine. Later, you can learn optimization.
- Don’t hesitate to ask questions on the community site. You’ll get an answer within minutes. Probably 3-4 answers!
Some recommendations:
- Super Important Links
- Learning Center and Partner Dashboard – Put a pin on this one! This is the learning center where you will take all your courses plus a whole bunch of other things.
- Anaplan Anapedia – I stop place to get all online documentation
- Launchpad – this is where you log into Anaplan
- Anaplan Way Guide – this is the SCRUM adjusted methodology that has proven success to work
- Idea Exchange – this is where you log your ideas for improvement or to see what others are recommending. You can vote for your favorites too.
- Anaplan Platform Discussions – My favorite link. Here you can post any question and you will get a response usually within 5-10 minutes.
- Content Sandbox – Here is where you can write white papers.
- Best Practices Documentation – Memorize everything that is in this page. You’ll thank yourself 10 times over.
- All Functions – this has all the Anaplan functions possible (well, almost)
- Support - this is a one stop shop for all support issues. You can also log tickets here too.
- How to become an Anaplan Master – start here to begin your journey. Note: for most this takes about 1-2 years.
- API – Anaplan API guide and reference
- Python – For those of you that want to leverage the Anaplan APIs and interface with Python, you will need this site.
- Retail User's Group - get the latest thinking on how to implement Anaplan for Retail and to meet others in your industry
- Beyond Essentials
- Contact me. There’s a pretty deep rabbit hole.
- Join the Retail User's Group
- Read the invitation to join post
- Official Link to the Retail Anaplan User's Group
- Meet interesting retail professionals that have a passion for retail!
