SmartAnalytics

In the Aesopian fable of the one-eyed stag, the deer overcomes his visual handicap by grazing on a cliff near the sea with his good eye facing the land. This works well for a very long time – until he is killed by a hunter in a boat. Monitoring some metrics and ignoring others are choice we make based on our business insights. Failing to update your KPIs can make or break our business.

“By 2014, 30% of analytic applications will use proactive, predictive and forecasting capabilities”  Gartner Forecast, 2011

Analytics Challenge — California physicians group Heritage Provider Network Inc. is offering $3 million to any person or firm who develops the best model to predict how many days a patient is likely to spend in the hospital in a year’s time. Contestants will receive “anonymized” insurance-claims data to create their models. The goal is to reduce the number of hospital visits, by identifying patients who could benefit from services such as home nurse visits.

Data Rich, Information Poor

Data overload is becoming a huge challenge for businesses and a headache for decision makers.  Public and private sector corporations are drowning in data — from sales, transactions, pricing, supply chains, discounts, product, customer process, projects, RFID smart tags, tracking of shipments, as well as e-mail, Web traffic and social media.

A good decision,  made in the absence of knowledge,  is merely a lucky one. The biggest change facing corporations is the explosion of data and tools. The opportunity is in helping different business units  and functions capture, analyze and manage all that data and disparate technology tools/platforms.