Reference no: EM133767064
Data-driven Decision Making and Forecasting
Assessment Title: Forecasting for a Business Problem
Assessment Type: Video Recording and Individual Written Report
Your Task
Develop a real-world forecasting project plan/proposal based on the learnings from the subject. This assessment is to be done individually.
Two weeks before the report is due, in Week 11, students are to record a 5-minute video talking about what progress they have made so far in their report with evidence to support and submit.
Students are to write a 1000-word report on Forecasting for a Business Problem and submit it as a Microsoft Word file.
Assessment Description
This assessment seeks to simulate a real-world task that you may have to undertake in the future. Therefore, the assignment is non-prescriptive and requires you to pose a relevant, small, creative and significant forecasting problem to solve that could result in benefits to the organisation of choice.
In this assessment, you need to consider an organisation in an industry of your choice and articulate the steps this organisation needs to take to enable forecasting for data-driven decision making. You are required to source an example time series to demonstrate expected forecasting outcomes.
The report should address:
The organisation you have chosen and your familiarity with its business.
Why forecasting would help this organisation given their current operations.
The time series you have sourced.
The forecasting technique you would recommend, with your reasons for doing so. But you are NOT EXPECTED TO fit other forecasting models and compare error statistics, or to compare training and test error statistics.
The results of applying your chosen technique to your time series, including visual display, the actual forecast, and error metrics to comment on accuracy.
The benefits of this forecasting project for the organisation (The benefit could be financial, such as Return on Investment (ROI) or societal benefits).
Submit your Microsoft Word file via the Turnitin portal + zip your data files along with your forecasting model files and submit them via the File Submission portal by Wednesday 5 pm AEST Week 13. Uploading files to the incorrect place or not uploading the data/model files late/at all will be treated as poor project management practice and penalised
accordingly.
Assessment Instructions
By the beginning of Week 10 identify a company and industry you are familiar with that would benefit from a forecasting application. Note:
The application needs to be based on forecasting (not some other aspect of analytics).
Focus on a single, well-defined (small) application.
Sample datasets maybe sourced from:
an organisation if you work there,
public repositories
Open government data
Open data such as share prices and commodity prices.
By the beginning of Week 11 draft some preliminary points pertaining to the report. You are encouraged to consider the current mode of operation, possible inefficiencies, available data, and how this data may be used to provide efficiencies based on the concepts and techniques covered in the subject. Think of yourself as a consultant or a founder.
Your facilitator will advise on the appropriateness of your choice and proposed methodology regarding the requirements for the assessment.
Include a list of references that are directly related to the content. Each reference needs to be linked to at least one specific point in the content of your assessment. It is expected that you will have at least 4 relevant references, web sites are ok, including a reference to the source of the data.
Video recording:
By the end of Week 11, you should record a 5-minute video briefly discussing:
The company of choice and the business problem identified.
How forecasting will be a solution to this problem.
What data you have gathered.
What progress you have made so far including pain points/hurdles/issues/challenges you are facing with your written report.