I recently returned from the 117th Annual Conference of the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) held in Orlando, Florida. It was a tad surreal to be back with the association members and colleagues with whom I worked so closely for almost eight years when I called IACP my
In his introductory address, public sector session moderator Thomas Spiller of SAS neatly summed up some of the biggest challenges faced by national governments: dealing with the current economic climate and managing a crisis of confidence within their governments. In his experience, government responses seem to fall in to three
Earlier this week, I had a quick meeting with Mikael Hagström, our VP of Operations for Europe, Middle East, Africa and Asia Pacific. As you might imagine, he has a pretty good handle on the use of business analytics around the world. Mikael provided some good suggestions on content for
I've been spending the last few months working on a major business transformation programme, and it's an exciting place to be. As part of the steep learning curve involved in adapting a generic approach to something specific for the programme I find myself occasionally having an "ah ha!" moment -
SAS has a rich heritage in academia, and we know that lots of colleges (and even some high schools) use SAS to teach students statistics and research methods. Now SAS (the company) has made it easier for professors to offer courses that use SAS. This fall, SAS offers the SAS
In the UK there is debate forming about how best to target benefits on the most deserving cases without building a dependency culture. For some time the UK Government has been using 'means tests' to ascertain whether a claimant needs State support, or whether they have independent resources that they
The majority of governments around the world are parties in a 'social contract'; simply put, citizens give them permission to raise funds through taxation etc, decide on policy (what to spend the money on) and then invest or disperse funds on their behalf. However, many governments are faced with increasing
I've read lots of coverage recently about the new Butler Group report that says public sector agencies could be making better use of business intelligence. That's good to know and not too surprising - but how? Peter Dorrington, head of industry marketing strategy at SAS UK, has a few ideas.
