Dumb and Dutiful: Why MRP Does Exactly What You Told It – Jenn Claridge, Part 1

Jeff Brickler (00:00)
No way.
Jeff Brickler (00:02)
All right. All right. Uh so welcome back to the Integrate Intelligently podcast. I'm your host, Jeff Brickler. I'm joined today by my brother and CEO of CAD Talk, uh Scott Brickler, and the uh famous Jen Claridge of Sabre Limited. So J Jen, it is
Jenn Claridge (00:21)
I don't know what you've been told, but you're right. No, I'm kidding. I'm just kidding. That is so true.
Jeff Brickler (00:24)
No, it's so true, right? You're you're the you're the you're the you're the BC influencer. Uh
Jenn Claridge (00:32)
Oh, I don't know about that, but there is a gen spotted trend that seemed to have g you know, picked up a little bit, but we like to have fun a little bit. Like you gotta have some fun, you know.
Jeff Brickler (00:36)
I saw that, yeah. Yeah. Absolutely.
Jeff Brickler (00:43)
We take our fame however we can get it.
Scott Brickler (00:45)
Mm-hmm.
Jenn Claridge (00:46)
Hundred percent. Fun fact, I was voted most likely to become famous in high school. I was hoping that the pay would be a little better, maybe larger scale. But this this is fine, but no, I'm just teasing. It's been I love the community and talking to people in the community and having fun. So I I think that's what I love the most about this channel. So yeah, you know, but I always say we gotta have a little fun as we do it.
Jeff Brickler (00:51)
Nice.
Jeff Brickler (00:54)
Yeah.
Jeff Brickler (01:01)
Oh, absolutely.
Jeff Brickler (01:09)
Ah yeah, I agree. I remember uh one of my you were one the first people I met when I was w uh started working uh in this B C channel and and it you made it feel welcome. You made feel like uh it was a fun place to be, so
Jenn Claridge (01:23)
Yeah, absolutely. Um, sorry. This is gonna get edited, right? Okay, sorry, I have my cool guy and he's just asking me for something. I'll be right back. I'm so sorry. Okay.
Jeff Brickler (01:28)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jeff Brickler (01:33)
Okay, yeah. No worries, Jen. We'll keep this part in We'll keep this part in.
Jenn Claridge (02:07)
Great guy's story. Cool guy says I need a new cover. Well add it to the list. Alright, sorry about that. Okay.
Jeff Brickler (02:11)
Add it to the list. No worries. Okay, so so I guess we'll let's go ahead and get started again. Uh so Jen, you uh you've been at Saber since 2008. Uh so give us a little bit about your well to start these with your origin story. Uh most people don't when they're little little boys and girls don't go, I want to grow up and work at ERP. So like I know. We probably didn't I didn't know what how to spell it ERP.
Jenn Claridge (02:29)
Okay.
Jenn Claridge (02:34)
Yeah, I didn't either.
Jeff Brickler (02:39)
uh until until I came here.
Jenn Claridge (02:43)
So for me, I actually originally started at a soccer park. I was, you know, young, wanted to work with my friends, worked at a soccer park. And then all of a sudden the owner who is like the nicest guy in the whole world, he loved soccer, he could make that work. But the business side, not so much. So it was about a month in I'm going to work every day, kind of like office space, right? Like why you know I kept coming in. And I'm yeah, like I'm not getting paid because it was just he's like, I'm gonna pay.
Jeff Brickler (03:07)
TPS reports.
Jenn Claridge (03:13)
You but you know, the the Polish team for the World Cup has to pay me, so we're waiting on that. Finally, my dad said, like, Jen, you cannot keep coming to work. Like, you know, you you can't. I mean, and I was like, I live with you, you pay my bills. Like, yes, I can. So he said, We're migrating from an old DOS-based system to a more modern ERP. It was like the in for visual manufacturing. He said, It's not glorious work, but you know, it pays. So
Jenn Claridge (03:43)
So I ended up being as part of the implementation team, essentially somebody who, you know, would be with the filing cabinet and the Excel sheet and transposing all the data so that it could go into the new system. And I just learned a lot about connected, you know, inter like connected tables and databases and how things came together. And I wasn't afraid of software. I liked it. You know, I liked playing around and troubleshooting things. And so, anyways, it was a temporary position, ended up being full-time. I did the production.
Jenn Claridge (04:13)
Like I worked in the production department, I did the inventory control. I ended up writing a lot of the reports that the management team needed. So I, you know, had to make sure I knew how things connected and how to pull data. Um, the company that I work for now, Sabre, they actually were our implementation partner. So I had known them before I started working with them. And then when the girl that was the consultant on the Sabre side, it was called Creative back then, she was moving.
Jeff Brickler (04:33)
Right, right.
Jenn Claridge (04:43)
And so she needed to leave that role and she was like said to my boss, like, well, why don't you talk to Jen about it? So, anyways, long story short, I ended up then working for Saber, and I have been there since, yeah, 2008. So, like a good minute. Yeah.
Scott Brickler (05:01)
Yeah.
Jeff Brickler (05:01)
Yeah, it's been a minute. Yeah. I that's that's similar to what I've heard. I mean, uh, we've done a lot of these interviews and and I think Scott's stories is similar. Is that basically you're working at a company and someone says, Hey, hey, I think I think you would be great for this. And they don't they don't tell you is well they don't tell you what it is. And then before you know it, you're you're in this and you're like, Oh. And then after that's over, somebody like, You're an expert at this. You're like, Well, I just I just did the one.
Jenn Claridge (05:15)
Yeah.
Jenn Claridge (05:21)
Right.
Jenn Claridge (05:24)
Yeah.
Scott Brickler (05:30)
Mm.
Jenn Claridge (05:30)
Yeah, yeah. I I I I don't know if I'm like the one eyed what is it, the one eyed something in the land of the blind or truly an expert, but I guess that's like what we figure out over time and imposter syndrome and all those things. But yeah, I think the biggest thing for me is I wasn't afraid of software. Like people would come to me with a problem and they're like, I'm afraid to break something or play with something and I'm like, Well, the one thing I've learned about software is you can you can usually fix it. So let's do that, right? Or go into a test company and then
Jeff Brickler (05:37)
Oh yeah, yeah.
Jenn Claridge (06:00)
What I have found with ERPs is when you kind of figure out the brain of it and how it thinks, then it becomes easier to apply that lot like that knowledge to different areas as well. So I could do that. And then so I worked with visual manufacturing, you know, in a manufacturing environment, doing manufacturing roles. I did shipping for a while and inventory control and production, like I said. So I kind of moved around. And then we started with GP actually. So we did visual at Sabre.
Jenn Claridge (06:30)
In the early days. Then we moved to G P because Microsoft was like, You should sell GP and we're like, Yeah, we should sell G P like why not?
Jeff Brickler (06:37)
Sure.
Jenn Claridge (06:40)
Well, the kids are doing it. So then we started with GP, but being in the manufacturing space, it was just like, should we be selling GP? Like, is this really kind of the right thing? And then we moved to nav because that just did seem to be like a really, really good fit. And we had some development background. So to be able to extend it and to be able to not have to say no as much to customers was obviously really great. And then moved into BC, kind of the natural progression. But each ERP kind of got easier and easier.
Jenn Claridge (07:10)
easier to learn because like I said, the more that you do, the more the next one just becomes a little bit more intuitive. So yeah, that's kind of my origin, I guess, my history.
Jeff Brickler (07:20)
Yeah, I can I can echo that. Like you start you see one and then you and then you learn the one, then you learn the second and the third and the fourth and the fifth. You go these things are all the same. They they they're all the same. They do the same thing. Uh they all have their they have their nuances, of course, but
Jenn Claridge (07:30)
Right. Yeah, and I think the the the
Jenn Claridge (07:36)
That was what I was gonna say. Like the evolution of ERP is interesting because like now most ERPs have a core functionality that can do similar type things, just maybe slightly differently or slightly different features. But what I've always loved about Business Central is the extensibility in the marketplace, right? Being able to go out to the marketplace when there is a gap or Business Central doesn't quite fit a need. And, you know, just like CAD Talk, being able to go out and say, Okay, I need a thing. Let's please pause for the promotional.
Jeff Brickler (07:52)
Yeah.
Jeff Brickler (08:01)
Right. Let's plug, let's do the plug.
Scott Brickler (08:04)
All right.
Jenn Claridge (08:06)
I'm just kidding. But the yeah, but the idea though, that's what I do truly love about Business Central is that you can go and say, Well, I don't have to say no to my customers anymore, right? Like I can say, like, I got a guy for that. And sometimes that's a developer, and sometimes it's an app, and sometimes it's just Microsoft doing new releases, like the subcontracting and the quality and increasing and making the product better. So yeah, I that's kind of how it started.
Jeff Brickler (08:07)
Right, like
Jeff Brickler (08:39)
Uh that that's yeah, I mean tha I think that's really interesting because like every ERP sort of ecosystem is a little bit different, right? Like you said, like B C's cool because it has the the app store and all the ISVs and all the stuff and you can extend it uh and make it do more and then of course they they also produce uh Microsoft also releases, so you get all these avenues for achieving what you want, right? It's like kind of a bit of a smorgasbord of of stuff.
Jenn Claridge (09:08)
Yeah, absolutely.
Jeff Brickler (09:11)
So Jen, I wanted uh I mean you you you worked in operations and you worked on ERP and and uh recently I think on LinkedIn you talked about like uh MRP and and and data and data quality. And that's uh been all the rave since with uh with AI. So can you talk a little bit about like about that, about data and about getting data into the system and how that works and and
Jenn Claridge (09:35)
Yeah.
Jenn Claridge (09:36)
Yeah, and I think like that's the thing which is funny because a lot of people will say, Oh, business central doesn't work or doesn't work the way that I want, or specifically about MRP. Like MRP is broken. I love that. MRP is broken. So part of what I did was I did a video and a blog on like basically saying like you're the problem and not like it's funny, it's tongue in cheek, right? It's kind of a joke, but it's not them, it's you. But the idea there is that like a lot of the times people will blame the software, but you really do need to
Jeff Brickler (09:44)
Very common for people, yeah.
Jeff Brickler (09:57)
No way, right. No way.
Jeff Brickler (10:02)
Yeah.
Jenn Claridge (10:06)
look at your data and I think MRP is just such a like MRP and scheduling specifically are two areas that I think like is so dependent on your data because if it's wrong, it's dumb and dutiful. So the software is not doing something it shouldn't do, but the inputs that you have, what you've put into that, what it's using to make its decisions or its suggestions, that comes from you. So if you're not really understanding what the BC fields are, how do they work together?
Jenn Claridge (10:36)
If you're not piloting the outcomes and comparing them and fact checking against what you thought it should do.
Jenn Claridge (10:43)
I just think that that is like that's that's a people problem, that's a process problem, that's not a technology problem. But I think a lot of people just think, oh, I'll turn on MRP, it's fully automated, life's gonna be good. And all of that can be true, but your inputs have to be good, right? You have to make sure that that data is good, garbage in, garbage out. We hear it all the time. I think you're scheduling an MRP is like a much bigger risk than a
Jenn Claridge (11:13)
lot of the different areas. And that's the reason I did it specifically on MRP was because I find that is the area quite a bit where I have this conversation where I get a support call or I'm on with a customer and they're like, MRP is broken. Microsoft has a bug and I'm like, well let's look at your data. And it's always a data problem.
Scott Brickler (11:34)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, I think I you also see people think that the software decides to do something different today because it's like in a bad it's like it's in a bad mood or something. You know, that's a that's a common
Jeff Brickler (11:34)
Yeah.
Jenn Claridge (11:40)
Yeah.
Jenn Claridge (11:43)
Yeah. Well it's it's funny.
Jeff Brickler (11:44)
Right. Let me say that'll don't even don't even humanize it, but like it's mad at me.
Jenn Claridge (11:48)
I started to do a lot of yeah, like I do um the last couple kind of conferences I've been getting more into the psychology of like what's happening in people's brains. And one of the things I talk about is there's the people, the process, and the technology. And I think we like technology, so we're always like, oh, technology is the most important thing. But I'm also I I'm now saying like the technology is sort of the easy part because it doesn't wake up in the morning and say, like, you know what, Jeff
Jeff Brickler (12:13)
It is.
Jenn Claridge (12:18)
Jeff is irritating me. I'm gonna break. Like the technology is the predictable part. But then you've got the the process, which sometimes it's the process that's broken. It's the sequencing of things and and the event, and that can be something with MRP, right? Like you're running it too much, you're not running it enough, you're depending on your changes. But the people side is kind of the most complex side because everyone has their history, you know, what they think the setup should be, what their interpretation of the safety stock is.
Jeff Brickler (12:19)
Yeah.
Jeff Brickler (12:40)
There is
Jenn Claridge (12:48)
Or the reorder points, or so it is interesting, but it's funny, Scott. Exactly. I always say that. BC doesn't wake up and just decide it's in a bad mood and not work a certain way for somebody. It's it's dumb and dutiful. I always say that, right? Like it's consistent, but you do have to learn how it thinks. And and that is a difficult thing with MRP, I find, is because you really gotta pilot it, you know, and you've got to pilot your different scenarios. I can't just
Jenn Claridge (13:18)
Set it up and be like, it's gonna be this way, like, well, I guess it would be that way a hundred times, but there's so many combinations. So it's like, have you tested what happens when your your dates are in the past? Have you tested what happens when you, you know, you have excess inventory, when you have a negative in a location? I can't in
Jenn Claridge (13:38)
Even a hundred training sessions go through all those variations. So you need to understand the baseline of what that field is supposed to do, but then stress test the combinations of those. Yeah.
Scott Brickler (13:49)
Mm. That level of complexity often masks itself as being like that. It's like the um I like the I like the dumb and dutiful term. That's like I haven't used heard that one before. The one I always use is like software is consistently wrong and people are sporadically right. Yeah, and and it's because like the the beauty of software is it's consistent, but it doesn't mean it's always right. And but it's but it's but it's when it is wrong, it's consistently wrong.
Jenn Claridge (14:05)
Yeah, yeah. I haven't heard that one, but I'll use it.
Scott Brickler (14:16)
You know, and that's you actually can do something about that. You actually can redirect it and make it right. People are kind of all over the place but sometimes sometimes I get it right. You know, that's that's
Jenn Claridge (14:17)
Right. Yeah.
Jenn Claridge (14:21)
Exactly.
Jenn Claridge (14:25)
Well, and that's the thing, the people side, right? Like so you and Jeff, let's say you both work in in the same department, but your interpretation of Business Central and how it should work and like I said, dates and fields and your setup, all that, like if you guys have a different interpretation of that and you set it up differently, you're gonna get a different outcome and that is not a software that is not a software thing.
Scott Brickler (14:47)
Yeah. Oh yeah. That's it's yeah, it just it literally is like um mathematically impossible for it to take the same inputs and make different outputs. Now with AI that's not the case because it's probabilistic, but like in the case of uh in the case of like mystic code, just not to get too eggheady, but it's is literally impossible to do it though.
Jenn Claridge (15:00)
Yeah.
Jenn Claridge (15:06)
Yeah, but it's funny because with AI I'm always saying to customers, like use AI for your data cleanliness. Like that's what I love about the configuration worksheets or packages. Like dump all your data to Excel and then use Copilot and your different, you know, opportunities to say, like, hey, have I done silly things, right? Like have I put maybe like a maximum order quantity that's higher than a minimum or lower than a minimum? Like do you know what I mean? Like you can ask it questions to try and help draw your attention towards things.
Jeff Brickler (15:32)
Mm-hmm.
Jenn Claridge (15:36)
things that you've done that are maybe going to get you some really kind of wacky and wild results or like my my favorite is people who will set up a a reordering policy of fixed reorder, but then they don't put any kind of reorder point or reorder quantity on it. And it's like, so are we just gonna let business central decide or how's that gonna work? And it's not to say that you could use AI or copilot or something to fix all of that data. Like that this is the human element of it, right? It doesn't replace people.
Jeff Brickler (16:02)
Oh yeah.
Jenn Claridge (16:06)
But it can draw your attention to the data that needs to have some attention drawn to it and people to look at it and to scrub it and to make sure that it's right. And another important part is that it is not going to be static, right? So you should be going back and looking at your safety stocks and your reorder points and your reorder quantities and looking at trends. And that's where AI and Copilot can really help with stuff like that too. Like based on my trends and analysis, do these quantities still make sense?
Jenn Claridge (16:36)
But you need to be looking at that at some kind of frequency, which kind of depends on the size of your business, but it's not like a Betty Crocker set it and forget it type situation. And that's also a mistake I think people make with their data and MRP. They're like, oh, good, it's working. I'm never gonna touch it. But the industry changes, trends change, some things are seasonal, you know, all those things.
Scott Brickler (17:01)
Yeah, the environment the environment is infinitely variable, right? So like it's it just things change all the time and then like you're modeling reality with your software and the reality changes off from my read you all the time.
Jenn Claridge (17:12)
Exactly. Exactly. But people don't kind of go back to it and make sure that they're quality checking that does this still make sense, right? But then but then MRP is broken. My planning worksheet didn't know what was well. You know, you haven't set up a forecast. You haven't done the thing that you were supposed to do. So it's just it's supposed to work in tandem. All these things work in tandem. They work together.
Jeff Brickler (17:27)
Yeah.
Jeff Brickler (17:40)
What's the what do you think the number like one or two most common things are that they say when they when they customer calls you about MRP, right? Is it that it's something that it it broke and it screamed at 'em? Or is it just not working the way they want? Like what what is it that uh you would say is the number one thing when they call you up and say, hey Jen, MRP's not working because
Jenn Claridge (18:02)
It could be too many messages, right? There's way too many lines. So it's confusing. It's distracting. It's not how they would actually do it on the shop floor physically. Um, and then the other thing is just like that it's wrong. Like it's giving the wrong suggestions. So they won't understand, like include inventory, right? So all of a sudden now they're like, Well, I have a thousand pieces on hand. Why is it telling me like it's not looking at that? So there's kind of stuff like that that they'll see. They just don't really understand the planning parameters.
Jenn Claridge (18:32)
And then the biggest thing is just the noise, the number of messages, because they don't understand dampeners, they don't understand a lot of accumulation periods, just things like that. So those are kind of the biggest things are the noise and then the number of lines that they have to look at. Because the thing is, is you can't just run MRP and carry everything out and call it a day, right? And I don't think there was ever an intention that you would do that. The reason that there's the accept action message and
Jenn Claridge (19:02)
A user has to carry those out is because a user should be reviewing that and making sure that it makes sense. It's a suggestion. They're looking at what's actually going on with raw material and suppliers and the shop floor, and they're carrying out what makes sense. So yeah, the noise can sometimes be the biggest one too.
Jeff Brickler (19:26)
And so like what do you when when they call you, they say this, i is there like a fuse you know, mo most things are repetitive, right? People if you have like it's the eighty twenty rule, most people have the same things wrong with it each time. So I'm sure you point them in the in that direction. Where would you they call you up, where would you point them, uh, in terms of like, Hey, go look here, go do look there, or what questions would you ask them?
Jenn Claridge (19:52)
Yeah, uh I point them to my blog. Sh please pause for the commercial. No, I'm just teasing. The um I yeah, but I mean, there's a joke really, but in in actual reality, there's tons of like content online, like YouTube videos and things like that where you actually want to show that they understand like I said, the item card, the planning parameters, the replenishment tab. Like so I'll first point them there and and just maybe draw their attention to fields that they're probably
Jeff Brickler (19:57)
uh Please see my blog.
Jenn Claridge (20:22)
Not using. I'm a strong believer in set the least amount that you can up and then pilot it through and build it up. Don't start with everything on at the same time because then it becomes difficult when you have a weird suggestion to figure out like is this the minimum that's driving that? Is that you know some kind of reorder point? Is that old dates? Like it's it's just harder to find. So start with less on and then add more to it. So what I usually find with customers is that they just they kind of
Jenn Claridge (20:52)
set it up and they forgot about it. So that activity of saying I'm gonna add more now because I have been running it and I realized that instead of it looking and saying hey this same item is due Monday, Wednesday and Friday, I would actually just produce everything I need for that week and set up a lot of cumulation period. They just are like ah MRP told me to make something Monday, Wednesday, Friday. Then they're just saying well that's not how I physically do it. So they manually create a production order
Jenn Claridge (21:22)
And then they'll update the quantities because that's how they're actually going to produce it. But it's like, well, go back to the item card and tell it that your lot accumulation period would be a week or would be two weeks, or if you get something that's a weird suggestion that you know you need to change it, then go back to its engine, which is the item card, and make the adjustments based on it on that. So I find that people are just so happy to launch and get it.
Jeff Brickler (21:30)
Go fix the
Jenn Claridge (21:52)
Going that they just run it and then they kind of live with the pain after that. But I really just encourage them to go and revisit those cards and those fields that are there, retrain them a little bit on that. Like I said, maybe point them to a Microsoft Learn or a video or have a training session with them and then get back in your piloting company to pilot some scenarios. Turn on a lot of accumulation, period. And does that give you what you want? Let's turn on a dampener quantity or a dampener.
Jenn Claridge (22:22)
Or period. Did that help to streamline the noise? Right? But it's just it's human nature. People get busy, so they're just like, meh, I I I just know what to do. And then later it's telling you to cancel that order, re-change the quantity, because it doesn't understand why you made the order for a hundred when it needed, you know, 33, 34, and 33. So that would be sort of my my recommendation. Like go back to your basics and then.
Jeff Brickler (22:30)
Sure.
Jenn Claridge (22:52)
revisit and rebuild a little bit. But don't just forget it.
Scott Brickler (22:56)
Yeah, it's like the somebody buying like a car that, you know, is stuck in second gear and they're like, this thing engine runs really loud and I can I go really slow and I can't but it gets me there and I just kinda and sometimes like I just you know, it's just easier for me to run down the street, you know, I just do that instead. You're like, Hey, you don't need that that two, you make it a three and it'll run a lot better. Oh.
Jenn Claridge (23:10)
Yeah, yeah. I get my bike. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Jenn Claridge (23:22)
Do that because it's like
Jenn Claridge (23:24)
We say this saying at at Saber all the time, you gotta slow down to speed up, right? So people are like, I don't have time to do that. I don't have time to go back and revisit all of this stuff and make sure that it but it's like how much time is that costing you, you know, instead of just driving your car and getting it fixed to run or to walk or to take your bike, right? Like every day you're borrowing from the next day because you're not taking the time to go back and, you know, fix your data or properly clean it up.
Scott Brickler (23:54)
Yeah, like the sharpening the saw analogy from like the, you know, how if you had to cut it down a tree, how long would you spend sharpening the saw? Right.
Jenn Claridge (24:01)
Yeah, exactly. Yeah, it puts it into kind of a real life context.