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How Grading Our Work Makes Us Better Forecasters

Nov 19, 2018 | 17:10 GMT

When we are smart and critical in our analysis, when we are diligent in applying our geopolitical lens to the world, we can begin to bring the future into a clearer focus.

As you might expect, grading our forecast is an incredibly time-consuming process. But it is perhaps the most necessary thing we do as a company.

(XIJIAN/iStock)

Editor's Note

We originally ran this On Stratfor column by Amelia Harnagel on Dec. 15, 2017, ahead of our 2017 forecast report card. As we put the finishing touches on our 2019 Annual Forecast and prepare to publish our 2018 forecast report card, we are reposting this column. It remains as pertinent now as it did then, and serves as a reminder to ourselves and our readers of the rigor we apply to the forecasting process and geopolitical intelligence in general. Some dates have been changed to reflect when the latest report card publishes. 

In action movies, "don't look back" may be good advice, but it doesn't fly here at Stratfor. As a geopolitical strategic forecasting company, we naturally spend a lot of our time looking forward, using our analytical framework to tell readers and clients what really matters in the long run. After all, our company was founded on the idea that with an advanced understanding of geopolitics and the employment of empathetic analysis (by which we envision what it may feel like to be in a world leader's shoes), we can anticipate the path that major global trends will follow. But for us to write intelligently about the future, it's just as important that we look at the past -- especially our own past performance....

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