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Tag Archives: Business

Brand Aversion: Exhibit One

16 Sunday Apr 2017

Posted by Martyn Jones in 4th generation Data Warehousing, advertising, All Data, Big Data, Big Data 7s, Big Data Analytics, dark data, data architecture, Data governance, Data Lake, data management, Data Mart, data science, Data Supply Framework, Data Warehouse, Data Warehousing, Marketing, pig data, Sales, The Amazing Big Data Challenge, The Big Data Contrarians

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Business, Marketing, Martyn Richard Jones, Rant, Sales

Martyn Richard Jones

San Luis Obispo 16th April 2017

La-mode-sur-tous-les-tableauxTaking a Pop at Traditional Data Warehousing

Pitch: I recently read a report from a data visualisation company on the “Top Ten Big Data Trends for 2017”. This is what they told me “Hadoop is no longer just a batch-processing platform for data-science use cases. It has become a multi-purpose engine for ad hoc analysis. It’s even being used for operational reporting on day-to-day workloads—the kind traditionally handled by data warehouses.” Continue reading →

Who’s Who Mugs

12 Monday Jan 2015

Posted by Martyn Jones in Condiser this

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Business

whoswho

A couple of day’s back I was looking through some really interesting LinkedIn articles published via Pulse, and my mind started to wonder.

On each article page an advert for a professional Who’s Who service appeared, the same advert, again and again, just begging to be clicked.

So, I did something that I very rarely do, and that was to click through to the web site, completely ignoring long held views regarding professional Who’s Who services and other types of scams, and putting aside for once the tried and trusted heuristic of ‘there is no such thing as a free lunch’.

Curiosity had got the better of me. Superficially it looked like yet another networking opportunity, and the impression they carefully projected was that it was ‘for free’. So I clicked on the link. To be fair – to myself, I also wanted to see how elaborate the scam would be and when and how they would actually ask for more than information.

So after passing through to a registration web site I was then asked to enter some basic qualifying information which was supposedly to be used in a first stage assessment of my professional experience.

I entered the information, it wasn’t much and it wasn’t potentially compromising, and then completely forgot about the whole thing. That is, until I received a call today.

“Hello, this is Mini Beamer from Brie and Stilton ‘Big Cheeses in Who’s Who’. I am calling you in order to qualify you for entry into our prestigiously professional international networking and recognition hall of fame”.

So, for the best part of twenty five minutes I answer – candidly even – a succession of questions, and talked about myself and my business. We touched on education, skills, strong points, key aspects in personal and professional success, business and personal web sites, public speaking, lectures, published work, blogs, hobbies, sports, voluntary work, blah, blah, bloody blah, and more.

Towards the end of the conversation I was informed that given my exceptional professional knowledge and experience (oh, here we go) that I certainly qualified for inclusion in their Who’s Who. It was odd, because even after twenty five minutes I still hadn’t been asked for money.

Then the moment came.

“So, do you want the 5 year plan at 800 bucks or the life-long plan at 1200 bucks?”

Then the pitch came on the difference between the two offers.

“Most of our professionals go for the life-long plan because it’s the most cost effective.”

So I answered “let me think about it, and I will get back to you”.

Wrong answer!

I was told that this was not possible and that I must decide, there and then, between the five year plan and the life-long plan. I presumed that the credit card number would be the next piece of ‘necessary’ information.

The sales person then ratcheted up their game, and insisted on the extensive benefits that would accrue to me from having them extend my network ‘to the max’ and in them winning well-deserved global recognition of my work in my chosen professional fields.

Being a reasonable person I tried to calmly reason with the caller. My basic message was that I was not interested. The caller failed to hear me. I tried to stop the flow of the sales pitch – several times again and without success, and I eventually hung up the phone.

Did I know that there would be a cost involved? Of course I didn’t know, but I knew that this was a 99.9% possibility.

Did I really want to be included in such a Who’s Who? I wasn’t sure, but I wanted to find out what their angle was.

The strangest thing about the conversation was that when it came to websites and networking to achieve sales leads and real business, which was in the first five minutes of the call, I basically said:

“My company has a web site, I have a web site, I have a blog. We make no business through them. We need the corporate web site because people like to work with companies that have a web site. It’s like a relationship comfort-blanket. I am on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, but I don’t use them to generate business, at all. That’s not my shtick or that of my company. And there’s a reason for it”

I made it very clear, at least in my mind, that our business model was not based on generating any business via internet channels. I know, I know, it’s strange. I deal in bleeding-edge and leading-edge technologies, innovative strategies that address significant challenges, and in business performance and risk, amongst other things, and it’s totally on the commercial edge of ‘new’, innovative and predatory thinking. So it may sound odd that all of my business engagements and dealings, and that of my associated company, are made entirely from old fashioned networking and lead generation, qualification and actions – old boys and girls networks, just like how it was done in the days when there were only bricks and mortar businesses.

That said, I have been given business leads by people I am connected with on the internet sites such as LinkedIn, but in my case it’s because I know these people personally, some are even really good friends, I get new business because I know them and they know me, not from being on a social or professional network site. That’s just the way the business has evolved, even if for other people the story may be completely different.

Maybe in the future we will start to generate leads from internet based networking. At that time I would need to consider what strategy to adopt. But right now we’re not there, nor need to be, and I will certainly never contemplate paying 1200 bucks to a dodgy Who’s Who company to manage my network and to generate professional recognition.

Later I looked up the web site of the Who’s Who Company. I just wanted to see if any of my closest partners, friends and colleagues appeared on their listings. Not one of them was registered. Then I looked for some big names; Branson, Gates, Ellison, Dell, and Bezos? Again, not even one.

What little rascals!

Thanks for reading.


File under: Good Strat, Good Strategy, Martyn Richard Jones, Martyn Jones, Cambriano Energy, Iniciativa Consulting, Iniciativa para Data Warehouse, Tiki Taka Pro

Responsible Use of Corporate Data

03 Monday Nov 2014

Posted by Martyn Jones in Ask Martyn, Best principles, Data governance

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Big Data, Business, business intelligence, data governance, data management, Data protection, Data Warehouse, privacy, Strategy

IMGThere was a time, when absolute discretion was an important maxim in the relationship between a liberal professional (doctor, banker, solicitor, architect etc.) and their clients, but times have changed, and are continuing to transform at an ever increasing pace. Continue reading →

Developing and Aligning IT Strat

24 Friday Oct 2014

Posted by Martyn Jones in Ask Martyn, information

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Behavioural Economics, Business, business strategy, corporate assets, Corporate IT, Information Technology, Offshoring, Outsourcing, Strategy

Imagen3I wanted to call this piece ‘A random drive down Camino Real’.

But that is an ‘in joke’ and no one would get it.

So instead I called in ‘Developing and Aligning IT Strategy’. Continue reading →

The Great Information Struggle: Us and Them

14 Tuesday Oct 2014

Posted by Martyn Jones in Architecture, Assets, business, Business Intelligence, Data Warehousing, Management, Value

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Big Data, Business, business intelligence, Data Marts, enterprise data warehousing, hadoop, information management, knowledge, knowledge management, Risk Management

In the dim and distant past most organisations struggled along with what they euphemistically referred to as Information Systems.

They were Information Systems with no overall design, no elements of management and no architecture.

Information Systems were built to show how the company had been performing in the immediate past, and that was it. Continue reading →

Strategy and Market forces – Get your ducks lined up

10 Friday Oct 2014

Posted by Martyn Jones in Data Warehouse, market forces, nine competitive forces, Strategy

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Behavioural Economics, BI, Business, business analysis, Business Management, business strategy, Challenges, corporate assets, Creativity, Crisis, Data Warehouse, Dogma, Goal Setting, Information Technology, marketforces, operationalwareness, Strategy

Strategy and Market forces – Get your ducks lined up

Let’s now take a brief look at my ‘nine competitive dimensions’  model.

This model will be familiar to some who will readily connect with the inclusion of government as an environmental dimension.

Continue reading →

Operational awareness isn’t for wimps! So, get it right

08 Wednesday Oct 2014

Posted by Martyn Jones in awareness, Big Data, business, Business Intelligence, Data Warehouse, operational, pig data, Strategy

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Analytics, Banking, Behavioural Economics, BI, Big Data, Business, business analysis, Strategy

I frequently include the term Operational Awareness in talks.

I think it’s important for strategy.

So I wrote a piece that tried to convey what I mean by the term.

But first, a diagram:

Image1

Figure 1 – Operational awareness

This is a simplified high-level example of business data objects found in certain organisations. In the above diagram I have reused an industry example of nine business data objects to represent operational data[1].

For completeness and to maintain rationality in this section here follows a summary list of the nine key groups of business data needed to have a coherent and cohesive operational awareness (these data groups are also frequently referred to as business data objects):

  • A: Party embodies all of the participants that may have contact with the organisation or that are of interest to the organisation and about which the organisation maintains data. This includes data about the organisation itself; data about external organisations; data about external and internal individuals; and, data about the roles of involved parties.
  • B: Arrangement represents a prospective or existing agreement, between two or more individuals, organizations or organizational units that provides and affirms the rights, rules and obligations associated with a transaction between parties.
  • C: Condition describes the specific requirements that pertain to how the business is conducted and includes information such as prerequisite or qualification criteria and restrictions or limits associated with the requirements. Conditions can apply to various aspects of an enterprise’s operations, such as the operational parameters of a resource item, the sale and servicing of products, the determination of eligibility to purchase a product, the authority to perform business transactions, the assignment of specific general ledger accounts appropriate for different business transactions, the required file retention periods for various types of information kept by an enterprise and the selection criteria for a market segment.
  • D: Product/Service describes the services, merchandise or facilities that can be offered, sold or purchased by the enterprise, its competitors and other Involved Parties during the normal course of its business. This concept also includes goods and services that are of interest to the enterprise such as supplies for manufacture.
  • E: Location covers a place where something can be found, a destination of information or a bounded area, such as a country or state, about which the enterprise wishes to keep information.
  • F: Classification is used to organize and manage specific business information by defining structures that represent classification categories. Classification also organizes and manages groups of business concepts that apply to multiple concepts.
  • G: Business Direction/Organisation Direction refers to and records expressions of a party’s intent with regard to the manner and environments in which it wishes to carry out its business. Business direction items contains, keeps data about, and is used to support the enterprise’s business and financial plans, policies, procedures and schedules.
  • H: Events describe a happening about which the organisation wishes to keep information as a part of carrying out its mission and conducting its mission.
  • I: Resource object includes and describes any value item, either tangible or intangible, that is owned, managed or used by, or of specific interest to, the organisation in the course of accomplishing its mission.

The key facets of operational awareness detailed above constitute a potential of fundamental importance in the formulation of organizational strategy.

Timely, accurate and appropriate data at this level can temper ambition with the facts on the ground, with operation insight, and with the effectiveness of time and place utilisation.

But take care. In most organisations there will be a spread of attention to the key facets illustrated here, and they will be treated with varying degrees of intensity relative to their overall contribution to strategy formulation. In addition, organizational specific facets may also be introduced where needed in order to complement the overall set of operational awareness facets described here.

[1] IBM’s IFW/BDW.

Creativity – Three Stories

05 Sunday Oct 2014

Posted by Martyn Jones in Best principles, Creativity, Dogma, Knowledge, Management

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Behavioural Economics, Business, Business Enablement, Creativity, Dogma, Strategy

Here are three stories that illustrate the connection between creativity and what we do in business. Jacks’ Retail Story, talks about the expansion of retail business; Jill’s Colour Book Story highlights a hugely pervasive tendency, even in these times; and, Martyn’s Summer Story argues that there is a strategic time and place for some things.

Continue reading →

Mugged in Data Hell – Perils of embracing the Faustian Side of IT – Part 3

03 Friday Oct 2014

Posted by Martyn Jones in Business Intelligence, Data Warehouse, Process

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

Behavioural Economics, BI, Big Data, Business, Business Enablement, Business Management, Demagogism, Dogma, enterprise data warehousing, Information Technology, IT Strategy, MDM, Offshoring, Organisational Autism, Outsourcing

Continued from Part 2 which can be found here -> Part 2

I look over at Crème, who is now staring out the window watching the rain. I cough, theatrically, for effect. “So, Crème, would you like a rest, or do you want to tell us about what happened next?”

“Oh, yes” Crème says, “Sorry, I was wandering there for a while”. She continues.

Continue reading →

Mugged in Data Hell – Perils of embracing the Faustian Side of IT – Part 1

02 Thursday Oct 2014

Posted by Martyn Jones in Business Intelligence, Data Warehouse, Knowledge

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

Business, Business Management, Demagogism, Dogma, Information Technology, IT Strategy, MDM, Offshoring, Organisational Autism, Outsourcing, Requirements management

It’s Friday morning in Canary Wharf, and I have been asked to facilitate a meeting of a chapel of IT Dogma and Snake-oil Victims, the self-help recovery chain for people who have fallen victim to the pernicious and debilitating effects of IT dogma and professional rip-offs. Continue reading →

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