Why AI is Your New Standard in Financial Forecast Accuracy and Insight

Forecasts are your organization’s superpower. They help you make confident decisions that guide the business forward. But their accuracy matters more than ever, because without it, that superpower can quickly become your kryptonite.

In our Global Finance Survey, we found 32% of finance leaders ranked data accuracy and modeling as their top priority, underscoring the pressure to deliver reliable numbers.

Yet outdated tools and manual forecasting processes make that tough. Data takes too long to gather, assumptions become outdated quickly, and errors creep in before analysis even begins.

That’s why AI has become the new standard in forecast accuracy — helping you stay ahead of change instead of reacting to it. Read on to see how.

Many forecasting challenges show up long before numbers hit the model. When consolidations, reconciliations, and data validation are manual and time-consuming, they slow down your team and introduce risk into every decision.

AI makes a transformative difference by removing these blockers. It automates upstream work, flags anomalies early, and standardizes data inputs, all before forecasting even begins.

What AI makes possible for your forecasting process

AI built for Finance strengthens accuracy, speed, and visibility across your entire forecasting cycle. With AI, you can:

• Generate forecasts in minutes instead of days
• Adapt forecasts in real time as conditions change
• Automatically surface anomalies and emerging risks
• Run complex analyses and scenarios faster than ever
• Free up analysts to focus on higher-value, strategic work

And the impact is clear. In our Global Finance Survey, Finance leaders reported:

• 59% improved forecast accuracy
• 57% more time for strategic work
• 52% greater transparency

Forecasting guides business decisions. With AI, you can deliver forecasts quickly and accurately enough to keep your leaders aligned, informed, and moving forward with confidence.

Aurorium, a global performance materials manufacturer, knows firsthand how outdated systems can hold Finance back.

Their FP&A team relied on a legacy financial analytics system that offered little clarity into how results were generated and lacked basic reporting functionality. Too much time was spent reconciling numbers instead of planning for the future.

When they switched to Planful, intelligent forecasting gave Aurorium faster, more accurate sales projections, while anomaly detection identified 89% of their GL balances had outliers—instances where actuals fell outside the expected range and called for attention or adjustment. As a result, Finance could proactively advise business leaders with confidence.

“Our FP&A teams can go into their next meeting with Planful forecasts and say, ‘Go ahead and run a bigger batch because we’re expecting more orders.’ Our sales leaders see how these insights help us make better business decisions,” said Robert Franz, Senior Reporting & Systems Analyst at Aurorium.

By adopting Planful, Aurorium:

• Unified financial forecasting and planning across business units
• Gained speed and agility in responding to market changes
• Empowered more than 30 Finance and business leaders with real-time insights

Planful AI’s financial forecasting software can generate intelligent baselines for planning and budgeting by analyzing historical data, identifying patterns, and embedding seasonality and trends.

Our human-in-the-loop approach means that Finance teams can then apply their own judgment and contextual knowledge to validate and refine baselines as needed.

The Planful AI forecasting suite is comprised of two complementary capabilities that enable Finance to drive the business forward with precise, adaptable forecasts:

• Projections pre-populates forecast baselines with scenarios grounded in department-specific data, historical patterns, and seasonal trends.
• Signals automatically flags anomalies in forecast data and provides detailed explanations to increase accuracy.

Since AI learns as it analyzes more data, forecasts improve over time and become better aligned with seasonal trends and changing conditions.

Bottom line: AI is the bridge that enables Finance to make the shift from reactively reporting numbers to proactively anticipating outcomes, testing scenarios, and shaping strategy.

While speed and accuracy are important value-adds of AI in financial forecasting, the real game-changer is the ability to equip business leaders with the foresight to plan with confidence, turning Finance from a reactive reporter to a strategic guide.

That’s the real promise of AI in finance: not just better forecasts, but smarter decisions and stronger alignment across the organization.

• Accurate forecasts build business confidence: AI strengthens Finance’s ability to deliver forecasts leaders can trust—reducing risk, improving decisions, and aligning the business around a shared view of the future.
• Finance always stays in control: AI reduces manual work and surfaces insights, but human-in-the-loop tools allow Finance teams to apply their own context and judgment—keeping humans at the center of every decision.
• Signals and Projections work together: With anomaly detection and predictive forecasting, Planful AI provides both the guardrails and the baselines needed to create precise, adaptable financial forecasts.

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Want to hear what CFOs think about AI in financial forecasting?

Watch our on-demand webinar with Planful CFO Dan Fletcher to explore how AI is reshaping forecasting, along with best practices for integrating AI into your existing financial processes.

 

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Why is anomaly detection important in financial forecasting?

Anomaly detection helps teams spot unusual variances or errors early in the process. This ensures data integrity, prevents surprises in reporting, and allows teams to focus on resolving high-impact issues rather than combing through every detail manually.

What role does AI play in improving financial forecasting agility?

AI accelerates the forecasting process by automating data aggregation and generating predictive baselines. This allows Finance teams to refresh forecasts more frequently, quickly run scenarios, and respond with greater agility to changing business conditions.

How does AI improve financial forecasting over time?

AI learns as it processes more data, continually improving the accuracy and adaptability of forecasts. Over time, this creates models that are better aligned with market conditions, industry cycles, and the unique dynamics of the business.