Reference no: EM132233033

Sonia Miller cannot believe what she has just heard. Having joined Scalar Products as a Market Analyst and Planner she has just been informed that the company has no sales forecasting system and Finance simply examine previous sales when doing next year’s estimated sales for budgeting purposes. She cannot understand how the company has managed to operate effectively without one. Her marketing manager, however, a very competent technical engineer who has over the years moved through sales and into marketing in the company, believes that all forecasts are simply a waste of time. His view is that what is going to happen will happen and no amount of forecasting will affect this. Moreover, he has pointed out that in his experience forecasts are usually wrong and so it is better to do without them.

Although Sonia has already pleaded her case regarding the need for and uses of sales forecasts, her manager is adamant that she should spend her time on other ‘more useful activities’. Sonia, however, feels that she cannot effectively do her job with regard to helping prepare marketing plans without an effective system of sales forecasting. 

QUESTIONS:

1. How can Sonia persuade her manager that sales forecasts are not only useful, but essential, in the marketing planning process?

2. What should she advise her manager in relation to the types of forecasts and forecasting techniques might be useful in any newly established system of forecasting?