Imagine you could predict which stocks would gain the most or how much house prices are going to be in ten years in a certain area? What if you could know how much revenue you could expect next week and how you could control your expenses to reflect it whilst driving efficiency to your bottom line. Now imagine if you knew the lottery numbers for this week, okay a little far on that one but you get the point.
Predicting the future has been a common theme over the millennia for us. Trying to predict the unknown or stay ahead of our needs and wants. Our obsession to know what lies ahead can be traced along many points in history from astrology during antiquity even to present day with those ever so dominant ads; “this is what the stock market will do next”?
Since the days of the Babylonian’s, we have grappled with forecasting, even Aristotle dipped his hands into the metrological nuances that can help predict the future. Back then this was more focused on survival and when to store or grow grain and create contingencies for dry crop seasons.
It has become more than survival for us, an industry of think tanks and consultants who promise to know or predict the future using a smart algorithm or tool, a self-help strategy for personal growth or business that just like the palm readings of the past and present align to tell you what you should do, and reduce that personal culpability, and reassure those that need and want it.
The risk of following “bad” advice, a wrong forecast isn’t just restricted to not getting that “good day” the newspaper horoscope told you about but have more resonating implications.
So where did it all start, let’s go back to 1859, after a large storm that wrecked the ship “Royal Charter” and hundreds of others with countless loss of life, (the storm would later become known as the Royal Charter Storm) two influential men with the Royal Navy, Francis Beaufort (wind scale guy) and Robert Fitzroy set out to scientifically predict the weather using data and facts. This eventually led to numerical weather prediction, where using the more data and sound data we could predict patterns and likely effects and conditions for safe sailing and commerce. This model and strategy have become what we know of today, as the basis for all meteorological models and scientific approaches.
Focusing on the right data, the right fact(s) to use is key. Misleading statistics and a data set to reduce us to being this week’s funny meme in the ever-growing library of failures. Asking the right questions leads us to the right collection of data and the ability to use it in a way that makes sense.
Just having the data doesn’t mean we can predict the future, it takes talent and skill to know what data to use, why to use it and more importantly, what context to use it in, what story does it tell. I am reminded of the story on survivorship bias with the WW2 plan and the plan to reinforce the sections of the plane that came back with the most bullet holes. That was until someone asked the right question, what if it were the data, we are missing that was key and the areas without the damage were key and that was downing those planes. In this case that lack of data was the key to saving lives and armouring the planes correctly.
Stone cold facts and history are the key to predicting, forecasting the likely events of the future. Hanging seaweed outside your door no longer cuts it. Knowing what data to use, when to use, what story it tells or doesn’t in the case of some or missing data are the skills and skillset needed to build a model.
In business, we look at companies and focus on large categories, like revenue trends, labour markets, the customers want or needs and try to predict what will happen so we can react accordingly.
At Canopic Consulting out team can logically and strategically approach each unique situation to build the model that applies the most probable outcome to a high level of accuracy. More importantly we can teach the skills needed to focus on the right data and learn to tell the story behind it. We learn from our past results; our history and we use it to guide us to the future.
Contact us: Info@canopicconsulting.com
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