Wow, what a couple of days!! I was involved with the SAS Business Forecasting Conference the last two days and I am impressed with all that I saw and learned! F2010 brought 238 people together from 16 countries to share best practices around business forecasting. You have to take a
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We’re getting ready for the third webinar in the SAS Applying Business Analytics webinar series. This webinar explores how to ensure the success of advanced analytic applications. It’s designed for line-of-business vice presidents, directors, managers and others who want to explore, develop, act and collaborate on making fact-based decisions. So
It’s fashionable these days for executives to say they want their employees to be healthy. Employer-sponsored wellness initiatives are popular, and it’s easy to understand why, given the bottom-line benefits of reducing health-care costs. But how many executives actually work out alongside their workers? At SAS, where employee wellness has
Information has a cost; good data doesn’t come for free. Bad business decisions have a cost too. Consider product cost and customer profitability. If you are using standard accounting approaches (developed a century ago to meet the needs of manufacturing), then you are most likely in that camp of bad
Whether it be ash clouds, strikes or financial difficulties, the airline industry is having a turbulent time right now. When I used to live in London, I’d pass Heathrow airport regularly. On a clear day you could see at least 10 planes stacked on their approach to the runway –
This is the second entry in my series interpreting what it means for Chief Marketing Officers to become analytical marketers. Part 1 in the series, which covered planning, can be found here. This post describes phase two, the project kick-off. I'll start by listing phase two objects, and then provide
A recent article in the Wall Street Journal shows the perils, real or imagined, of product flaws in this emerging age of social media. Proctor & Gamble is a highly admired company especially for its careful stewardship of its many premier brands. Can it be that any American mother, in
While reading a datadoodle blog post, Self tracking is business intelligence, I was taken back to my days in the advertising and PR agency world. The blog references Peter Drucker’s book, The Effective Executive that suggests tracking your day (or having your secretary do it) in increments of 15 minutes
Is innovation being squelched during belt-tightening optimization efforts? If long term benefits aren’t balanced with short term gains, that’s often the case. Passion is quickly extinguished when new ideas meet with budget constraints that can’t be disregarded for the sake of innovation or creativity. It’s time to look at ways
Earlier this week, Greece received its first tranche of EU bail-out money. Stock markets rallied. The Euro made gains, but fell back in later trading. According to the BBC, there were still concerns among investors that the package does nothing to address the fundamental problems of high debt levels in