Trading Places The storyline is an old one. It was the theme of the 1983 American comedy titled Trading Places starring Dan Aykroyd and Eddie Murphy. You may remember it; It is one of my favorite funny movies in which an upper class commodities broker and a homeless street hustler switch roles when they...
I came to work at SONY 16 years ago with lots of passion and energy. I worked across several countries and held many different responsibilities from marketing to finance to supply chain. Now, at my present vocation, being operations director at SONY, I find myself responsible for many different areas of the business. My...
The IBF’s 10th annual Supply Chain Forecasting and Planning Conference turned out to be an incredible three days at the Villas of Grand Cypress Resort in Orlando, Florida. We kicked things off with a spectacular golf outing where we got to meet new friends and enjoyed the summer like conditions. We all did our...
I started my demand planning career in the summer of 2008. Looking back, I know now that this turned out to be the worst possible time to break into the field. At Ingersoll Rand, we were just starting to feel the initial pains of ‘The Great Recession’, but our system forecasts did not provide...
Back in the spring of 2010, business forecasters were filled with trepidation about whether or not an economic recovery was either reasonable or imminent. At Loud Technologies Inc our planning staff wanted to forecast a conservative level of market recovery but didn’t want to commit too much working capital into material spending. Little did...
I suffer from a recurring dream. In that dream, I am standing in front of 300 Stock Controllers explaining how an external baseline will work alongside causal forecasting. The results of this will generate a Simple Exponential Smoothing forecast which in turn will produce auto sourced algorithms over your Bayesian plan. “Don’t worry though,”...
Sometime during the 20th century sales forecasting went from being a necessary part of someone’s job to being someone’s entire job. Sales forecasting, has made the move from being only 1 step in the inventory/production analyst’s planning to a forecaster’s full time position. This is definitely good news for those of us who wanted to...
How many times have you heard your Forecast Accuracy is too low and it must improve? Then you think, “It is a forecast!! If I could predict it to 100%, I’d have gone to Vegas and be retired now.” Well, we may not be able to help out your early-retirement plan that comes from...
Statistical models are important, but they are not the be all and end all of forecasting. Forecasts can be further improved if: 1) Data is properly analyzed and treated before using a model 2) Have a process in place for obtaining data/information/feedback from various stakeholders, both within and outside the organization 3) Have a...