Before you can consider ‘what-ifs’, you need to forecast your baseline.

Once you’ve forecast the baseline, you can begin to plan for and strategise around possible challenges and opportunities outside of ‘business as usual’.

Forecasting what-ifs enables you to answer questions like:

Fathom has several tools for planning and strategising in your forecast. When forecasting what-ifs, we suggest the following workflow:

Each tool or a combination of the above tools will enable you to answer your what-if questions.

When planning and strategising, you want to track the impact of your decisions.

At the bottom of the forecasting grid, you can see how changes to your forecast affect key metrics. The quick metrics bar consists of a primary metric that is always visible and secondary metrics that you can view when you expand the bar.

Periods highlighted in red show that a metric’s threshold is not expected to be met according to your current plans or scenario.

You can use quick metrics to ensure that minimum key metric values are met or to track your business’s goals.

You can have up to 5 quick metrics, all of which you can choose.

To change or configure your quick metrics bar:

You can view a chart of a metric’s result by clicking the mini chart next to the name of the metric.

The metrics you choose to track depend on your industry, business life stage, goals, and other factors. If you’re concerned about cash flow, we recommend setting 'Cash on Hand' as the primary quick metric.

Once you’ve set up your quick metrics, you’re ready to plan and strategise with microforecasts and scenarios.

Microforecasts and scenarios can be used individually or in combination to address potential "what-if" questions. The tool you use depends on the question you’re asking or the decision you’re considering.

Both microforecasts and scenarios interact with the business roadmap.

Microforecasts and scenarios are both planning and strategy tools in Fathom, and it can be challenging to determine when you should use one over the other.

There are several differences to keep in mind:

A forecast's baseline is generally used to predict how the business would perform if everything continued as usual. Value rules, timing profiles, drivers, and schedules & journals are used to forecast the baseline in Fathom.

Microforecasts are singular decisions or events that are explored as part of a forecast. Common examples of microforecasts include new hires, equipment purchases, loans, and large-scale projects or contracts.

Microforecasts do not change the underlying baseline rules in a forecast but occur in addition to the baseline.

Scenarios enable you to create an entirely new forecast while maintaining your main forecast. The main forecast and a scenario may only differ by one factor or nearly every rule.

The baseline rules and assumptions can be changed in a scenario without impacting the main forecast. You can change the following baseline rules in a scenario:

Microforecasts may also be configured differently in a scenario. A microforecast can be turned off in the main forecast and turned on in a scenario or vice versa. A microforecast can also have a different start date in a scenario compared to the main forecast or other scenarios.

Microforecasts and scenarios can be turned on or off easily. Because microforecasts are singular decisions or events separate from, rather than intertwined with, the baseline, the timing of microforecasts can quickly be changed.

The Business Roadmap lets you grab and drag a microforecast along the forecast timeline. The main forecasting grid will reflect any changes in the Business Roadmap.

Microforecasts are ideal for modelling decisions for which the timing may not be exact. They are also helpful for determining when a decision or event should happen.

Scenarios have the same date range as the main forecast, and each scenario has its own version of the Business Roadmap. So, you can experiment with the timing and combination of microforecasts in a scenario without impacting the main forecast.

While you can report on scenarios and microforecasts in a Fathom report, scenarios can be more easily compared.

The scenario comparison chart can be added to a report to compare scenarios across a metric visually.

Creating scenarios can help you compare outcomes in reports for microforecasts. You can have a microforecast turned off in your main forecast, while a scenario with all the rules and assumptions of the main forecast has the microforecast turned on.

To address broader questions, you will often use scenarios, microforecasts, and the business roadmap together.

To plan for increased expenses, you'll likely create a scenario. In this scenario, you can add a configuration for expenses increasing 5%.

You might consider decreasing other expenses that you have more control over. You could use a baseline adjustment rule in your scenario to model decreasing specific expenses.

How you address the increased expenses may involve microforecasts. Perhaps you'll hold off on additional equipment purchases or hires. If you have microforecasts for purchases or hires, you can push back their timing on the business roadmap for the scenario. You can also turn the microforecasts off in the scenario if you plan to forgo the purchases or new hires.

You could plan on hosting a marketing campaign to increase sales. You could model the campaign's impact with a microforecast.

The tool or combination of tools depends on the question you're asking and how you plan to address the what-if situation.

Now that you've forecast the baseline, learn how to use each planning and strategising tool:

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