Jan 27, 2014 | Change, Governance, Marketing, Small business
In Australia today, January 26, it is “Australia Day”, the day we Aussies, or most of us, think the place was started, conveniently ignoring the thousands of years of habitation before Captain Philip turned up with a bunch of convicts in Botany Bay.
For most of us it is also the start of the working year, the end of any summer holiday, back to the grindstone.
For me, thinking about the coming year over everyone else’s break (we self employed do not get one) I came to the conclusion that 2014 was going to be the year of Analytics, Big Data if you prefer, the year when we finally recognised the now central place analytics hold in our commercial and private lives.
It does not have to be the geek version of analytics. Most of the businesses I work with are small, some tiny, but every one has potential assets hidden amongst the various databases they collect, usually without trying. Riverina Grove, a manufacturer of fine Italian food products in Griffith has 6 years of pretty simple data held on excel that can describe by line item every transaction over that time by a range of parameters. Not hard to collect, as it comes out of their standard accounting software, not hard to analyse, Pivot tables in excel do a great job, certainly not “big data” by most measures, but Gold to an SME, should they choose to use it.
At the other end of the scale, is Netflix, an institution in the US, disrupting totally the movie rental industry, and whilst it has not always got it all right, their use of analytics has driven their recovery from stumbles, and success with customers. This long piece in “The Atlantic” outlining Netflix’s data capability to turn data into useable marketing information is a “must read” for marketers.
Data is the secret weapon of organisations, the challenge is to use it, to approach the data with the view that somewhere in here are answers I need, but to get them out, not only do I need the data skills, but the creativity to find ways to extract and enhance them. Josh Wills has a definition of a data scientist, that new profession that has emerged in the last few years I like, “better at software than any statistician, and better at statistics than any software engineer” that comes from this terrific Slideshare presentation on data science.
As Warren Buffet so famously said, “In God we trust, all others bring data”.
It is up to us all to figure out how to use it, but while you are procrastinating, your competitor is probably ramping up his capability.
Happy Australia Day.
Jan 23, 2014 | Communication, Governance, Management
Peoples reaction to a question, choice, or situation is always coloured by their experience, education, background, and a myriad of other qualitative factors. Where there is a divergence of views, it can become heated, as people invest emotionally in an outcome consistent with their existing mental frameworks. This step from a simple divergence of views to an emotional disagreement can be very small, and quick to make.
Mediating many disagreements over the years ,I have found that arriving at a sensible conclusion rather than just a compromise, is usually achieved in a three stage process:
- Recognise and agree on what is data, supposition, and opinion.
- Understand what the data tells you, and what you can agree on
- Ask what would have to be true for the parties to the conversation to alter their position on an issue.
This simple device of separating what we think from what we know, identifying the gaps, then filling them with data that is agreed serves as a useful tool to both diffuse volatile discussions, and usefully identify information gaps needed to be filled for a sustainable decision to be made, rathe than a compromise reached that falls apart under pressure.
Try it, next time ask “what would have to be true” when faced by a decision, emotion, and a lack of objectivity.
Jan 22, 2014 | Communication, Marketing, Small business, Social Media
Analytics is perhaps the buzzword of the moment, it seems to be attracting some of the same purveyors of snake-oil previously touting SEO as the saviour of all sins.
Amongst the detritus, however, there are some gems. Avinash Kaushik’s “Occum’s Razor” blog is one such gem, as is Scott Brinkers” Chief marketing technologist” blog. I am sure there are others, but the weight of numbers is with the snakes.
A mate of mine has a small business specialising in collecting data from HR environments, applying analytics and offering advice on areas of improvement. Tasks like board performance assessment are his bread and butter.
A few weeks ago in a casual conversation, he was down cast, as he had been beaten in a tender by a competitor, for the third time recently, when he knows from long experience the algorithms in his analytics are way more robust than those of his competitor. The difference in the tenders was made not by the analytics, but by the visual representations of the analytics. His competitor has invested in visuals, whereas he has continued to invest in the data integrity.
Visuals sell, as they offer simplistic answers to complex questions, but the question remains, how good are the answers.
Jan 21, 2014 | Branding, Change, Governance, Management, Strategy
It has been pretty certain that control of Warrnambool Cheese and Butter (WCB) would change since the opening bid by Bega Cheese in September last year. It rapidly became an auction as rival bidders emerged, and WCB shareholders struck the short term jackpot.
The only real question left was whether control remained in Australia, or it went overseas. Seems that question is now answered, as Canadian Saputo becomes the beneficiary of Bega’s 18.8% holding lifting their stake to nearly 50%, with a rush of acceptances expected in the last few days of the offer period.
Progressively, the Australian dairy industry in particular, and Australian food manufacturing in general has been sold off, slice by slice, overseas to the point where there is not much left. Now that the $A has retreated,so that on paper it looks like local suppliers should be more competitive with the global supply chains of the major retailers, there is buggar all locally owned manufacturing left.
It may be seen by some to be a bit jingoistic to want to have control over the supply chain that feeds us, but I see it as common sense. Australia is an efficient, technically advanced supplier of commodities, from grains to meat, wool, and minerals, but the further processing and value adding is very limited.
Realistically, there is little the Government can do beyond developing robust industry policy, then applying that policy with apolitical consistency, something neither side of politics seems able to do. Policy consistency seems to be trumped by short term political expediency every time, and in the long term, we are all the poorer for it.
It is up to Australian management to see the opportunities and invest for the long term, and they have largely failed to measure up. In addition, it seems persuading the suppliers of capital that returns sometimes take longer than the next quarterly period to emerge is a large barrier. The pool of genuine risk and venture capital in this country is very shallow indeed.
Jan 20, 2014 | Change, Governance, Marketing
We all know instinctively that with exercise, we get better. Running, jumping, swimming, all that stuff makes us fitter, healthier, but it takes time and effort, and we are all busy.
Busy doing what? Besides, running is boring, sweaty, and bad for the knees.
We also know that going to school is supposed to teach us stuff that is useable in life, like how to solve a quadratic equation. Last time I did that was 5 minutes before I forgot how to do it, 45 years ago, so perhaps not such a great life skill, for me at least.
However, exercising our brain, our idea muscle if you like seems pretty important however, you think about it.
A friend of mine is stricken by a form of muscular dystrophy, debilitating and dehumanising physically, but rather than becoming despondent and reclusive, she has sought places where she can exercise the only muscle unaffected by the physical depreciation, her brain.
Creative, interesting, engaging, hugely knowledgeable, and with a couple of extra languages over the last decade, she has exercised her idea muscle in a way that would not have happened, she assures me, without the affliction.
In a world that is changing before our eyes at a rate unprecedented in history, where jobs for life are no longer, ambiguity and uncertainty are increasing exponentially, surely we need to consider what exercises we should be taking and teaching that make our idea muscles fitter.
Most certainly, we should be teaching our kids how to exercise this muscle, they will need it more than we ever did.
