Why Aren’t Demand Planners Adopting Machine Learning? Why You Should Take the Leap

Despite the hype, most companies are cautious about adopting AI-based techniques for their demand planning. This is because machine learning wasn’t developed specifically for demand forecasting, rather it is a broader discipline whose elements are being applied to demand forecasting—with varying results. In this article I reveal how uptake is hampered by the fact that machine learning was built for the digital world and not the real world that Planners live in, how ML outputs are difficult to apply to business decision making, and how the data requirements exceed what many companies can access. At the same time, despite these challenges, I make the case that implementing AI is a journey all Demand Planners should take.