Forecast consensus
Sales, finance and operations submit adjustments to the statistical forecast with a reason; your company’s rule turns them into one consensus, an approver publishes it and, once real sales arrive, StockAI measures who was right.
The Consensus screen is the S&OP process for the forecast: each function (Sales, Finance, Operations) says how much it would raise or lower a product’s demand in a period, and why. Every version is kept with who, when and why. Your company’s rule turns those adjustments into a consensus; an approver publishes it, and only then does planning read it.
At the top you pick the Forecast (the finished run you work on; by default the one the app plans from). If there is none, the screen says “There is no completed forecast yet to build a consensus on.” Below are the four tabs: Adjustments, Consensus, Accuracy and Rule.
Who can do what
| Action | Who |
|---|---|
| See every tab | Every role |
| Submit adjustments | Analysts assigned to that function on the Rule tab; an admin can speak for any |
| Propose a consensus, refresh the evidence | Analyst and admin |
| Approve and publish, reject, withdraw | Admins and designated approvers |
| Change the rule and who speaks for each function | Admin only |
Adjustments tab
- Product (code)
- The product code as it appears in your sales.
- You speak for
- The function you submit for. Only the functions you are assigned to are listed.
- From / To
- The period the adjustment covers. Today by default.
- Adjustment (%)
- +10 raises demand by 10%, -5 lowers it by 5%; up to 2 decimals (comma or point).
- Reason
- Promotion, Price change, New customer, Lost customer, Seasonality, Supply issue, Market news, Data error, Budget target, Capacity constraint or Other.
- Note (required when the reason is "Other")
- Up to 300 characters.
- Type the product code.
- Pick the function you speak for, the period, the percentage and the reason.
- Click “Submit adjustment” (enabled once there is a code).
- You will see “{function} adjustment saved for {code}.” and it appears under Current adjustments.
The Current adjustments table shows Product, Function, Period, Adjustment, Reason (with the note), Who and when, and Revision. If you are not assigned to any function, instead of the form you see “You do not speak for any function. Ask an administrator to assign you on the Rule tab.”
Consensus tab
“Consensus under the current rule” is a preview: “N periods across N products, from N current adjustments”, the rule in one sentence, and a table with Product, Period, Consensus (the agreed percentage), How it was decided (“Sales decides” or “Weighted average”) and What each function said (with “limited by the cap” when a figure was trimmed). “Show more” loads more periods.
- Review the preview.
- Type a Version name (empty uses “Consensus {month year}”) and optionally a Note.
- Click “Propose this consensus”. You will see “Version "…" proposed. It stays frozen until an approver decides.”
- An approver opens the version with “Open”, optionally writes a Decision comment, and clicks “Approve and publish” or “Reject” (rejecting needs a comment of at least 3 characters).
A version’s details show the rule it was frozen with (priority and caps, or weights and caps), its lines, and the history (who proposed, approved, rejected or withdrew it). When a consensus is published, a green line at the top reads “Published consensus: "…". Planning reads it instead of the manual adjustments of the same dates.”
- Proposed
- Frozen, waiting for a decision.
- Published
- Approved: planning reads it. Only one at a time; publishing another replaces it, and the old one stays on record.
- Rejected
- Rejected with the comment. No purchase changes.
- Withdrawn
- It was published and was withdrawn with “Withdraw” (asks for a reason): planning goes back to the statistical forecast and the manual adjustments.
- Superseded
- A newer version was published.
Accuracy tab
“Value added by each adjustment” compares, once real sales arrive, the statistical forecast, the adjusted one and what sold. A positive Improvement means the adjustment came closer to reality than the model alone.
- Upload recent sales in Files.
- Click “Refresh with real sales” (analyst or admin). You will see “Evidence refreshed: N product-periods with real sales.” or why it could not be measured.
- Read the tables: Published consensuses, By function, By person, By reason and By adjustment. Each has Points, Statistical error, Adjusted error, Improvement and Verdict (Improved, Worsened, No difference, Too little data, No data).
With no adjustments, the tab says “There are no adjustments or consensuses to measure yet.”; with adjustments but no compared sales, “No real sales have been compared yet…”.
Rule tab
- Priority: the first function that submitted an adjustment decides
- You order the three functions in Position 1, 2 and 3. For each period, the first one in the list that submitted something wins.
- Weighted average with caps
- A Weight of 0 to 1000 per function. Only the functions that submitted an adjustment count; a weight of 0 is no vote.
- Downward cap (%, from 0 to -100) / Upward cap (%, from 0 to 1000)
- Every submitted figure is first limited to these caps.
- Who speaks for each function
- Checkboxes per person and function. An analyst can only submit for the functions they are assigned to.
- Pick the rule and fill in the order or the weights.
- Set the caps.
- Tick who speaks for Sales, Finance and Operations.
- Click “Save the rule”. You will see “Rule saved.”
A non-admin sees the rule read-only and the list of who speaks for each function.
Related
- Demand plan: freeze the plan with its adjustments and approve it as a version.
- Forecast vs. reality: the “Value of your forecast adjustments” card.
- Approvals: where approvers are designated.