Presented by Tom Vandervort, Founder, and Don Archibeque, Principal, Planifi

With the advent of AI it is now possible to forecast backlog based on a number of factors, including project history, automated scheduling, and real time staffing with very little effort. Imagine if your backlog and capacity forecasts always projected 100% of your bookings. This can include opportunities as well as booked work. This would dramatically change how firms managed themselves. Benefits would enable firms to accurately forecast revenue, billing, staffing needs as well as to make earlier hiring decisions. For active projects, you could see budget issues sooner and take corrective action. With better information about capacity and demand firms can focus sales efforts on areas where demand and capacity are not aligned. All this together will enable firms to consistently achieve profit targets.

In this session, we will discuss how AI and technology will change the planning landscape, through increased accuracy in both the short and long term. We like to refer to the ability to plan in both the short and long term as the insight to see the forest and the trees.

• Discover ways to automatically forecast revenue, backlog, and capacity.
• Understand the limitations of your current backlog report.
• Identify the importance of workforce capacity and schedule context in forecasting backlog.
• Learn how to empower discipline leaders, principals, and managers with accurate real time backlog and capacity forecasts.
• Gain proficiency in refining forecasts by various criteria such as phase, discipline, office, or project type, using Planifi’s project management tools.