It’s Gotten Hard to Forecast

Professor Chaman Jain emailed me the request last month that I dedicate this JBF column to the topic of forecasting the “un-forecastable.” Sounding like a contradiction in terms, I asked him what he meant. He stated that “all products are not equally forecastable” and that I should discuss “how to handle the products that are difficult to forecast— products with intermittent demand, new products, etc.” So the topic of this column is largely forecasting the hard-to-forecast (HTF), which also turn out to be the type of forecasting that will be needed more during the turbulent economic times where we currently find ourselves.