Forecasting & planning

Why not the spreadsheet

Every firm has a forecasting spreadsheet, and every forecasting spreadsheet has an owner who is the only person who can update it. That is the case for a tool: not better maths, but a model that pulls actuals from the ledger each month without anyone re-keying, that a second person can open and understand, and that produces the same pack for every client. The spreadsheet remains the right answer for a one-off model with unusual structure; it is the wrong answer for a monthly service.

What to look for

Actuals from the ledger, automatically, mapped once. Three-way forecasting (profit and loss, balance sheet, cash) that stays balanced without the firm building the links. Driver-based inputs, so a client's forecast is expressed in things they understand (customers, headcount, price) rather than account lines. Scenarios side by side. A cash view short enough to be useful for a small client, usually weekly for the next quarter, alongside the annual model.

Then the delivery: a pack the client will read, a variance view against the forecast once the month closes, and a way for the firm to roll the forecast forward each month in minutes. For clients with several entities, consolidation of the forecast matters as much as of the actuals.

Building the service

The engagement that works is a rolling forecast, updated monthly with actuals, reviewed in the same conversation as the reporting pack. Firms that run it well build the client's model once with the client in the room, agree the handful of drivers, and then spend the monthly time on what changed rather than on the model. Annual budgets fall out of the same model rather than being a separate exercise.

The bank pack is a distinct deliverable: a three-way forecast in the shape a lender expects, produced when a client borrows. Firms price it as a project and reuse the rolling model to produce it.

Pricing and how firms recover it

Vendors price per client entity per month, often in bands, and sometimes per user for the firm's staff. The directory records what vendors publish; it does not say what a firm should charge for forecasting, and nothing here is fee advice. Firms describe bundling the rolling forecast into the monthly advisory fee, and pricing model builds and bank packs as projects.

The firm's own forecast

A practice that sells forecasting and does not forecast itself is a familiar sight. Point the tool at the firm: revenue by service line, capacity by month, the January or April peak, hiring. It is the cheapest training the team will get and it produces the plan the partners never quite wrote.

What to avoid

Building each client's model from scratch. Forecasts at account level that the client cannot read. Annual budgets set once and never compared to actuals. A model only one person can update. And selling forecasting without the reporting layer in place: the variance view needs both.