Analytics | Enterprise Architecture in Higher Education

Business Analytics Anyone?

enterprise architecture, higher education, strategic planning No Responses »

Jan 112012

Today, I participated in a focus group to help start up the BCIT School of Business Business Analytics Centre of Excellence. The room was full of Business Intelligence/Analytics/Insight leaders from around Vancouver. We were brought together by Ed Bosman and Karen Plesner both instructors in the BCIT School of Business. Karen facilitated a two hour discussion on a series of topics. The group provided advice on the skills expected of graduates in the various business analytic roles – consumers, artisans/analysts and systems technicians. The other major focus was on what a “centre of excellence” for business analytics should provide and deliver to industry.

We were provided with a definition of Business Analytics as the seed for the discussion:

Business Analytics: the skills, technologies, applications and practices for continuous iterative exploration and investigation of past business performance to gain insight and drive business planning (Davenport and Harris, 2007)

This definition generated a very good discussion and the consensus was that this definition was too narrow. It failed to address real-time analytics for operational performance management and web analytics for customer behaviour management.

We had a good discussion about master data management and data standards. One of the great quotes of the day came from an panel member. He was referring to a discussion about how confident and accurate your numbers need to be. I really like this pragmatic approach.

Business Analytics augments your gut

The another panel member introduced the group to a model used by Davenport and Harris. Here is what it looks like:

Davenport and Harris Model	Information	Insight
Past
Present
Future

The model is a measure of where business analytics efforts are focused. This would be a good model for us to look at the maturity of our Business Intelligence/Analytics practices.

This table contains the lists of topics and themes I noted during our focus group. There are many topics and themes below that will warrant future blog posts.

Trends	Tools	BI/BA Type	Audience
Web Analytics	Excel	Operational “Real time”	Consumers
Mobile	Access	Tactical “Just in Time”	Artisans
Bring Your Own Device	Qlikview	Strategic “Points in Time”	Analysts
Security	Tableau	Compliance	Authors
Privacy	SAP	Predictive	Systems Technicians
Predictive	IBM Cognos
MDM	MS Analysis Services
Big Data	SAS
Information Overload	SPSS

I am looking forward to the next steps in the process and hope to contribute to the effort.

Davenport, Thomas H.; Harris, Jeanne G. (2007). Competing on Analytics: The New Science of Winning. Harvard Business School Press

Managing Customer Service Expectations with Information

itsm 6 Responses »

Jun 202010

Do your customers understand how to get service from your organization?

Do your customers understand what to expect from the services you deliver?

Are your customers frustrated and upset when they interact with your Service Desk?

Recently, I was on the customer end of service delivery. It got me thinking about what we could do better in order to deliver quality customer service. Here is my tale:

My doctor wrote an order for me to get some x-rays. I arrived at the radiology lab and took a number and waited to be called. After a short period, the receptionist called my number, took my details and asked me wait for my x-ray. There were about 20 people in the waiting area. As time went by, all the people in the waiting area who were there when I arrived were called in as well as a group of people who arrived after me. I waited patiently for 30 minutes, then 45 minutes getting more and more agitated. I felt like I was not being treated fairly and that made me angry. Finally, when someone arrived 50 minutes after me and was called in for their procedure, I approached the receptionist and asked if they forgot me. The answer I got blew me away …

No sir, we did not forget you. There are 4 queues and the order that people arrive in is not the order they are served in.

Well, I could have avoided a good half hour of annoyance had someone told me that!! Never in the process (verbally or written) was I informed that once I was registered, that there were multiple queues. All I had to was the information I could see … everyone but me was getting service! So I happened to be in the slowest queue but what blew me away was how my frustration was reduced once I knew that I was being treated fairly (very slowly but fairly). I went back to reading my book and my name was called and I got my x-ray.

My experience at the radiology laboratory highlighted the power of information and communication with our customers. This is exactly what we should provide our clients/customers in service organizations. While we may have implemented service management systems that show a person the status of their request, we almost never show them where they are in the queue (or queues!). Imagine the impact on our clients if we could show them not only the status of their request AND where they were in relation to all the other requests in the queue or queues. This does pose a challenge for service delivery organizations because we would have to become more open and transparent about how we do our business. Our ability (or inability) would be exposed for all to see! Read more...