The Little Book of Operational Forecasting: A short introduction to the practice and pitfalls of short term forecasting...and how to increase its value to the business.

Dr Steve Morlidge

Jun 2018 · Radical Pragmatist Series Book 4 · Matador

About this ebook

Operational forecasting sits at the heart of many businesses because it informs every decision taken to get the right amount of product (or service capacity), in the right place, at the right time.

But is also one of the most misunderstood and undervalued activities. 

As a result, most businesses carry enormous amounts of unnecessary inventory while simultaneously failing to offer their customers the level of service that they expect. So, any efficiency or performance improvement initiative is automatically held back by having to drag around this wastage

At best, the managers in these businesses may suspect there is scope for improvement but have no idea how much ‘weight’ they can lose or how to go about shedding it. At worst, they assume that trying harder and investing in more “sophisticated” software will automatically take care of the problem because they are blind to the amount of surplus baggage they are dragging around. 

This book demystifies operational forecasting through a series of bite sized ‘lessons’ supported by simple illustrations, that address the fundamental questions that anyone with an interest or stake in operational forecasting needs to be able to answer:

·      Why forecast?

·      What do we need to understand before we start forecasting?

·      How do we forecast?

·      What does success look like?

·      How can we improve?

Aimed primarily at forecasting practitioners and anyone responsible for, or reliant on, what they do, this book also is an excellent primer for anyone wanting to understand the process but not the mathematics that comes with most books on the subject.

And if you need extra motivation to keep reading, research has shown that poor forecasting is often the single largest source of corporate waste – adding around 2% to your cost of sales. So, read on – your only risk is becoming a corporate hero!

About the author

Steve Morlidge has 30 years of practical experience in designing and running performance management systems in Unilever, including three years as the lead of a global change project. He is a former chairman of the European Beyond Budgeting Round Table and now works as a management thinker, writer and speaker, drawing on his years of experience at the leading edge of performance management thought and practice.

 

Steve Morlidge published Future Ready: How to Master Business Forecasting, John Wiley, 2010, ‘The Little Book of Beyond Budgeting’and ‘The Little Book of Operational Forecasting’ through Matador in 2017 and 2018 respectively. His latest book ‘Present Sense: A practical guide to the science of measuring performance and the art of communicating it, with the brain in mind’ was published in November 2019.

He is on the editorial board of Foresight, a forecasting practitioner’s journal published by the International Institute of Forecasting to which he regularly contributes. He is also a cofounder of CatchBull, a supplier of forecasting performance management software and sits on the non-executive Board of the Beyond Budgeting Institute.

 

Steve Morlidge is a visiting fellow at Cranfield University, Bedfordshire, UK and has a PhD from Hull Business School in Yorkshire, UK focusing on the application of systems concepts to the design of complex organizations. He completed his BA with honors, and he is a qualified management accountant (CIMA).