FORESIGHT, Issue 52

Description

Winter 2019

Special Feature

1. Forecasting the Future of Retail Forecasting by Stephan Kolassa
   Stephan Kolassa, forecasting researcher and developer of retail forecasting software, describes here the “breathtaking” changes occurring in the retail industry due to new digital technologies, cloud computing, social media, and artificial intelligence. He examines the implications of these retail trends on the shopping experience and the retail industry and details the challenging new requirements that will be imposed on retail forecasters.

Articles

1. Predicting Medical Risks and Appreciating Uncertainty by Spyros Makridakis, Ann Wakefield, and Richard Kirkham
   In this paper, the authors present a number of specific examples related to risk and uncertainty in the context of clinical decision making—some more than a little alarming—including extremely high incidences of misdiagnosis, reluctance on the part of medical professionals to abandon treatment regimens that are doing patients no good and may be causing harm, and systemic flaws in medical research methodology that can impede important new data from reaching practitioners. The article concludes by exploring ways medical practice could change to reduce health risks, uncertainty, and errors.
2. A Classification of Business Forecasting Problems by Tim Januschowski and Stephan Kolassa
   While we have many taxonomies of forecasting methods, the authors present a classification of forecasting problems in modern industrial settings. Such a classification can help decision makers understand what resources to draw upon when facing a particular problem and may lead to more scientific discourse about the relevant data sets for benchmarking forecasting performance.
3. Scenarios and Forecasts: Complementary Ways of Anticipating the Future? by Paul Goodwin
4. Book Review by Simon Clarke
   The Little (Illustrated) Book of Operational Forecasting by Steve Morlidge