Data Conversion

There is a tendency with reporting, and dashboards in particular, to cram as much information on the page as possible. One alternative is to shift the focus from the full data to changes in the most critical data points. By pulling out the important exceptions, you can make it easier for your audience to digest what matters and take action.

Stephen Colbert has mentioned that he’s having trouble getting guests during the writer’s stike. We find this puzzling, given the supposed benefits of the Colbert Bump. Does being on the Colbert Show really provide a bump—a critical leap that vaults a writer, or a politician to superstardom?

Like an overcooked steak, reporting can be dry, bland, and not particularly easy to digest. A typical example delivers the goods in a simple table and shows trends as a percentage change from the previous month or year. "Sparklines" to the rescue!

There may have been no one better at thinking rigorously and communicating his insights elegantly than Richard Feynman, the Nobel prize winning physicist. Daniel Hillis describes how Richard Feynman helped build the first massively parallel computer, The Connection Machine.

Insightful analysis of data is important whether you are in business or sports. However, the approaches used in these arenas couldn't be more different. Take the NFL, for example. Coaches and players spend hours analyzing

For our European readers, here's a company that does a better job articulating what we feel about business analytics than we do. It is like they are in my head. On the increasing amount of data... The amount of complex data is growing faster than our capabilities to analyze it. Large investments

I like the bumper sticker that goes: "Never forget that you are unique, like everyone else." Most of our clients believe they suffer from the ugliest pile of unmanageable numbers possible. Guess again; it's probably no worse than the next guy. In an attempt to ease your fears of being alone with your data troubles, we've put together a list of common data-related issues we see in our client

Sometimes success metrics can create unexpected, misguided, and counter-productive behaviors. I heard a great anecdote recently from a client, Celia. She is a former marketing head at an airline, so she knows of what she speaks: The other week Celia was rushing to catch a United Airlines flight in Pittsburgh. She arrived late to the gate and found the United employees were

Analytics truism: everyone wants a dashboard (a.k.a. key performance indicators (a.k.a KPIs), success metrics, scorecards). Managers want a barometer of performance, a hammer to use on their subordinates, and a straightforward quantification of their business. Below are a few of the guidelines we use when we take on this task: 1. Actionable metrics. Ask yourself:,

I confess to a lack of ambition. When Tom Davenport's article on "Competing on Analytics" came out in the Harvard Business Review in January. Zach and I critiqued Tom's list of 10 things that are "what it takes to be an analytics