Delivering Business Analytics: Practical Guidelines for Best Practice
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English

AVOID THE MISTAKES THAT OTHERS MAKE – LEARN WHAT LEADS TO BEST PRACTICE AND KICKSTART SUCCESS

This groundbreaking resource provides comprehensive coverage across all aspects of business analytics, presenting proven management guidelines to drive sustainable differentiation. Through a rich set of case studies, author Evan Stubbs reviews solutions and examples to over twenty common problems spanning managing analytics assets and information, leveraging technology, nurturing skills, and defining processes.

Delivering Business Analytics also outlines the Data Scientist’s Code, fifteen principles that when followed ensure constant movement towards effective practice. Practical advice is offered for addressing various analytics issues; the advantages and disadvantages of each issue’s solution; and how these solutions can optimally create organizational value.

With an emphasis on real-world examples and pragmatic advice throughout, Delivering Business Analytics provides a reference guide on:

  • The economic principles behind how business analytics leads to competitive differentiation
  • The elements which define best practice
  • The Data Scientist’s Code, fifteen management principles that when followed help teams move towards best practice
  • Practical solutions and frequent missteps to twenty-four common problems across people and process, systems and assets, and data and decision-making

Drawing on the successes and failures of countless organizations, author Evan Stubbs provides a densely packed practical reference on how to increase the odds of success in designing business analytics systems and managing teams of data scientists.

Uncover what constitutes best practice in business analytics and start achieving it with Delivering Business Analytics.

English

EVAN STUBBS is the Chief Analytics Officer for SAS Australia / New Zealand and sits on the board of the Institute of Analytics Professionals of Australia. He is a prolific speaker and evangelist for the power of analytics, having written The Value of Business Analytics, a book explaining why some teams succeed while others fail. Over the years, he has developed human-machine interfaces for concept cars and models that predict criminal behavior, and has helped organizations establish analytical centers of excellence.

English

Preface xi

Acknowledgments xix

Part One Business Analytics Best Practices 1

Chapter 1 Business Analytics: A Definition 5

What Is Business Analytics? 5

Core Concepts and Definitions 7

Chapter 2 The Competitive Advantage of Business Analytics 11

Advantages of Business Analytics 14

Challenges of Business Analytics 23

Establishing Best Practices 27

Part Two The Data Scientist’s Code 29

Chapter 3 Designing the Approach31

Think about Competencies, Not Functions 31

Drive Outcomes, Not Insight 36

Automate Everything Non-Value-Added 38

Start Flexible, Become Structured 40

Eliminate Bottlenecks 43

Chapter 4 Creating Assets 47

Design Your Platform for Use, Not Purity 47

Always Have a Plan B 52

Know What You Are Worth 54

Own Your Intellectual Property 57

Minimize Custom Development 60

Chapter 5 Managing Information and Making Decisions 65

Understand Your Data 65

It’s Better to Have Too Much Data Than Too Little 69

Keep Things Simple 74

Function Should Dictate Form 77

Watch the Dynamic, Not Just the Static 79

Part Three Practical Solutions: People and Process 85

Chapter 6 Driving Operational Outcomes 87

Augmenting Operational Systems 88

Breaking Bottlenecks 98

Optimizing Monitoring Processes 106

Encouraging Innovation 113

Chapter 7 Analytical Process Management 127

Coping with Information Overload 128

Keeping Everyone Aligned 137

Allocating Responsibilities 144

Opening the Platform 151

Part Four Practical Solutions: Systems and Assets 159

Chapter 8 Computational Architectures 161

Moving Beyond the Spreadsheet 162

Scaling Past the PC 173

Staying Mobile and Connected 180

Smoothing Growth with the Cloud 183

Chapter 9 Asset Management 191

Moving to Operational Analytics 192

Measuring Value 202

Measuring Performance 210

Measuring Effort 220

Part Five Practical Solutions: Data and Decision Making 231

Chapter 10 Information Management 233

Creating the Data Architecture 234

Understanding the Data Value Chain 242

Creating Data-Management Processes 249

Capturing the Right Data 256

Chapter 11 Decision-Making Structures 263

Linking Analytics to Value 264

Reducing Time to Recommendation 269

Enabling Real-Time Scoring 277

Blending Rules with Models 284

Appendix The Cheat Sheets 291

Glossary 313

Further Reading 331

About the Author 333

Index 335

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PRAISE FOR DELIVERING BUSINESS ANALYTICS

"A stellar collection of real-life experiences of a business analytics expert and a bible for every leader of a business analytics function."—Kerem Tomak, VP of Marketing Analytics, Macys.com

"(This) book is densely packed with the Zen of business analytics from his wealth of experience and expertise … this is not ten steps to success for mindless management. It richly rewards re-reads and reflection."—James Mansell, Director of Innovation and Strategic Design, Ministry of Social Development New Zealand

"In this book, Evan Stubbs addresses the many obstacles to delivering solid business results from analytics … an analytics group that cannot demonstrate return on investment will soon lose funding. This book shows how to pick projects with good revenue potential and how to measure the value those projects create. I would recommend this to anyone who manages an analytics group."—Michael J.A. Berry, Analytics Director, TripAdvisory for Business, co-author of Mastering Data Mining and Data Mining Techniques

"In this new book, Evan clearly outlines how an organization can get more value from business analytics. His descriptions of common problems and challenges, his identification of false solutions and his clarity in describing best practices make for a readable book that practitioners should be able to put together at once."—James Taylor, CEO, Decision Management Solutions, co-author of Smart Enough Systems and author of Decision Management Systems

“For organizations to capitalize on analytics they have to not only do analysis of data, but they have to convert the results of analytics into products and services that users can use. This is where Evan’s latest book helps. It covers the issues that bear directly on how analytics should be operationalized. This is essentially about embedding analytical solutions in the business of an organization. This process sounds simple in theory but is far from simple in practice. Evan covers the relevant issues such as people, infrastructure, data and processes. If there is a single statement that summarizes what Evan’s book is about it is that the creation of value is more important than insight. Evan’s book is about how to do this.”—Warwick Graco, Senior Director of Operational Analytics, Australian Taxation Office

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