The Technology Industry needs Bill Deanes and James Franklins

‘Tis the season to make forecasts, so let me invoke Bill Deane and James Franklin

Bill Deane has quite a track record predicting who will make it in the annual Baseball Hall of Fame balloting. He presents his credentials here

This is my 33rd year predicting Hall of Fame elections.  I think the acid test of prognostication performance lies in guessing the fate of men who finish within 10% either way of being elected (i.e., who receive between 65-85% of the vote).  Among such candidates, I have gone 50-12 (.806) in correctly predicting who would or would not make it over the years.  I was one of the few who correctly, publicly forecast the 2013 shutout.

James Franklin, presided over the National Hurricane Center which I profiled in The New Polymath, and which has this track record:

The track forecast error in the 1980s, 48 hours out, was 225 nautical miles. Today, that error is a little less than 100 nautical miles.

and it subjects its forecasts to annual public audits.

Now let’s look at the IT industry. We have spent trillions in business intelligence, forecasting and Big Data tools and have you seen many customers or vendors brag about specific track records? And how many allow for a publicly shared audit?

Yes, that includes my alma mater, Gartner. Sure they say they self-audit their forecasts – how about a public audit?

BTW, baseball fans check out Deane’s 2014 HOF forecast. Not afraid to stick his neck out. And yes, open to all kinds of public audit.