Month: February 2015

SWOT > Great Tool For Analysts To Know

One of the reasons I love working with students is often something that is old to me and to many analysts, is actually new to them. SO getting to explain SWOT to students, or in this case having a student share with me their understanding of SWOT is pretty cool.

SWOT can be very helpful in general consulting and also in process optimization projects that many analysts find themselves assigned to.

How the SWOT ANALYSIS helps the business

One of the best way of evaluating a business unit opportunities is conducting the SWOT Analysis. Using a SWOT Analysis in your business, you can provide a necessary tools and information to establish your goals and objectives. And it will measure the progress of the business. The Strengths’ and the Weakness and the Weaknesses will be the inside Factors; the Opportunities and Threats will serve as the exterior factors.

Evaluating the Strengths

Evaluating what does the company do well, does the company has strong sense of purpose and the culture to support that purpose and is the company strong in its market. It could be your marketing expertise, or your excellent customer service. It’s important to try to evaluate your strengths in terms of how they compare to those of your competitors.

Recognize the Weaknesses

Recognizing the weaknesses will aid the decision-making process designed to improve you’re company. Don’t just make a list of mistakes that have been made but instead learned from what happened. Be prepared to hear things you may not like, but which, ultimately, may be extremely helpful. Business weaknesses can include accessibility of product, higher prices than other competitors and poor quality of products and services. By this you can minimize your weaknesses.

Look for the Opportunities

In this section you can identify what are the new opportunities for your business and interesting trends which you can take advantage of.  Example of opportunities includes potential new uses of products or services, social factors and the use of marketing or promotional techniques to market the business.

Be ready for the Threats

Threats to your business can be also as weaknesses and can be adversely affect your business but it can be a short- term circumstances that can be resolved immediately. For external Threat it could be new legislation or a new competitor in your market and for internal threats could include the company’s skill or staff shortage.

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You Don’t Build A Business… You Build People

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It’s funny to me that I shared this on LinkedIn and someone had the thought to spin it into a negative thing. Someone sarcastically replied that this is false and that big bosses just use people to make money. I’m guessing he sees this as a way to get people to work harder, but it the end only the top people benefit. Or something like that.

When I saw this, I immediately thought about a training program we have just kicked off to address a significant challenge we have in both my business and in my industry. The call center industry in the Philippines is probably one of the most hyper competitive labor markets anywhere in the world today.

To be able to be successful you need to find people who are stick around. So looking at the best way to do that is to build them up. To train them, to empower them, to enchant them.

Being equal parts educator, analyst, entrepreneur… this concept is something I firmly believe in, I have the data to back it up and the success to prove it is working. So take that mister sarcasm… DMAIPH is a great example of this philosophy actually working.

Analytics Leadership – DMAIPH specializes in arming the Data-Driven Leader with the tools and techniques they need to build and empower an analytics centric organization. Analytics leadership requires a mastery of not just analytics skill, but also of nurturing an analytics culture. We have guided thousands of Filipino professionals to become better analytics leaders. Contact DMAIPH now at analytics@dmaiph.com or connect with me directly to discuss a uniquely tailored strategy to ensure you are the top of your game when it comes to Analytics Leadership.

The 3 V’s of Big Data: Volume, Velocity, & Variety

The value of big data isn’t in the amount of data it can process, but in the insight that big data analytics can yield. Big data has value because it can assimilate vast amounts of different types of data. The three V’s – volume, velocity, variety – are wbrainhat give big data its value, and what powers these three V’s is more and better data.

Source: im-techsolutions.com

Analytics is all about looking for patterns in data that give you actionable insights.

IBM’s SMART Approach to Analytics

Came across this 5 point methodology for applying analytics in a business… very similar to the 3 I’s that I use in my training. I’ll start using both going forward.

S=Start with Strategy
What problems do you need big data to help you solve? If you’re running a business you might think it’s as simple as “How do I increase my profits?” But a question like that is inevitably going to lead you to more questions.
How do you generate more sales? How do you increase visitors to your site or store? How do you make your customers happier?

In this first step you need to be clear about your strategic objectives as well as the key strategic questions you want to have an answer to. You need to have this nailed down before you worry about collecting your first kilobyte of data.

M = Measure metrics and data
Once you know what data you need to answer your most strategic business questions, you can work out how you are going to capture it. Everything we do, online and, increasingly, in the real world, is capable of being recorded and stored. If we visit a website, records are kept of how long we browse for and where we head off to next. GPS systems in our phones as well as CCTV surveillance keep track of our physical movements.

Of course much of it is (hopefully) anonymized. Big data collection isn’t about tracking individuals, it’s about tracking the masses, so patterns can be spotted giving clues to overall trends. This part of the process involves designing the actual systems that will collect what your strategy tells you is needed.

A = Apply analytics
Increasingly, we are finding that the sort of data which contains really valuable insights is very messy. The slightly more technical term we use for this is that it is unstructured data. The sort of neat and tidy data you get when, for example, you ask someone to fill in a form giving you their age, height, weight and data of birth, is structured. The sort of messy, disjoined data you get when you analyze the contents of an email exchange or CCTV recording is unstructured.

The hidden value in this unstructured data is where most big data divers are finding the real sunken treasures. If you’re a business, being able to spot trends affecting your industry before your competitors is what will give you your edge. In order to implement this part of the process you will need to get to grips with the ever-growing range of tools and methods becoming available for making sense of messy, complex data sets.

R = Report results
The most insightful insight ever is useless if you can’t explain what it means to the key decision-makers in your business. Presenting the information necessary to drive change in a clear and digestible format is as vital as any other step of the operation. This part of the process has analogies to storytelling. There will be a beginning, a middle and an end, detailing why you need the insights, what you did to find them, and how they will result in everyone living happily ever after.

If you use data visualization and narratives to tell that story in a focused and interesting way, it’s far more likely people will understand what you are trying to do, and be as motivated as you are yourself about implementing data-driven change.

T = Transform your business
Change—specifically positive change—is the ultimate aim. Transformations you make to your products, service, marketing strategies or internal processes, guided by insights from your Smart Big Data analysis, is the catalyst which will drive that change.

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Act Like a Recruiter, Think Like a Candidate!

I just saw this blog post title on LinkedIn and was really intrigued because one of the central points I made in a Recruitment Analytics training class recently and it was just that. It is a candidate driven job market right now in the BPO/Call Center industry here in the Philippines.

SO, I was hoping to glean some additional insights that I could blog about. However, it was just a link to a whitepaper. Which of course to get the white paper you have to sign up. And once you do that you get 2 pages and you have to then pay a fee to get the full whitepaper. I absolutely HATE this!

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Im all for finding creative ways to monetize social media and digital marketing. I’m of with paying for something if it seems to be of legitimate value, but when the call to action hides the whole story it is one of the biggest marketing turn offs ever.

I’d love to see some data to back up the lost opportunity here. How many people don’t subscribe because they are turned off as well. And then is that loss made up for in the ones who do hit purchase? For a recruiting white paper? I seriously doubt it.

Call me crazy, but the best way to make money off of people online is to be transparent and upfront with costs.  Because that builds trust, which builds relationships. Going after money right away just builds a transactional relationship that easily slips away.

Back to my original point… we have entered an era of candidate driven recruiting, meaning we have to go to them not wait for them to come to us. We have to make things personal and have to meet them on their turf if we want to be successful.

So find ways to attract candidates that attract candidates to other things. What’s trending? What’s selling? What’s the big item everyone wants for Christmas? Use that to attract attention.

Once you have their attention then think like they think. They have many choices on where to work. What makes your place special? Why should they pick you? Use that to convert their interest into action.

That’s how I do it in my companies. We are always look for the best and the brightest across our consulting, training and outsourcing lines of business.

HR & Recruitment Analytics – The recruitment and retention of top talent is the biggest challenge facing just about every organization. DMAIPH is a leading expert in empowering HR & Recruitment teams with analytics techniques to optimize their talent acquisition and management processes. Contact DMAIPH now at analytics@dmaiph.com or connect with me directly to learn how to get more analytics in your HR & Recruitment process so you can rise to the top in the ever quickening demand for top talent.

The Secrets of Money Ball Recruiting

http://youtu.be/6MStL5QIyCw

“There are rich call centers, with big budgets and huge recruitment teams. There are poor call centers with small budgets and just a few people. Then there is 50 feet of crap. And there is us.”

I conducted a Recruitment Analytics Training yesterday and shared one of my methodologies. Based on the movie (and book) Moneyball, I talked about how to be successful you need to find undervalued candidates who other call centers have passed on.

“If we try and play like Convergys in here (with our recruitment efforts), we will lose to Convergys out there (on the streets looking for talent)”.

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So we need to boil down the recruitment process to the one thing most important for our business in every single employee.

Some of my points:

  1. We spend too much time looking for trainable skills like Good English, Good Communicators and Good Interview Takers.
  2. We need to stop hiring job hoppers and people looking to move up without having paid their dues.
  3. The one skill set we cannot teach, that we need to start making our top priority… is dependability.
  4. Will they show up on time every day for work is the single biggest need we have.

So that’s the one personality trait we are placing at the top of our recruitment process. We need to probe and dig and research, to find out will they be someone who will show up for their shift everyday.

That’s our “get’s on base” metric like in MoneyBall.  We can’t help the customer if we are not at work ready to help the customer.

HR & Recruitment Analytics – The recruitment and retention of top talent is the biggest challenge facing just about every organization. DMAIPH is a leading expert in empowering HR & Recruitment teams with analytics techniques to optimize their talent acquisition and management processes. Contact DMAIPH now at analytics@dmaiph.com or connect with me directly to learn how to get more analytics in your HR & Recruitment process so you can rise to the top in the ever quickening demand for top talent.

What Is Strategy?

http://bakerstreetpublishing.com/decisioncoaching/2015/02/12/what-are-the-strategic-decisions-we-face/

I came across this perfectly timed blog post on LinkedIn. Tomorrow we will be having our first real leadership planning session in a while and we have a lot of topics on the agenda.

However, before we get into the nitty gritty, I will spend the first part of the meeting talking about strategy. And these concepts will form the core of that conversation.

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“Every business must have three things to be successful: good leadership, good strategic decision making, and the ability to execute. “

  • Good Leadership: To me this means inspiring and empowering team members to take the initiative, to be bold in problem solving and being able to balance client, customer, business and team member needs.
  • Strategic Decision-Making: Taking a logical and data-driven approach to decision-making is the best way to map out your business plan.
  • The Ability to Execute: Good leaders know how to implement decisions quickly and efficiently because they work in a sound framework of empowerment and intelligence.

Looking at closely at the data is key part of this. Good leaders do much more than just manage, and it’s important to constantly remind ourselves of this.

Analytics Leadership – DMAIPH specializes in arming the Data-Driven Leader with the tools and techniques they need to build and empower an analytics centric organization. Analytics leadership requires a mastery of not just analytics skill, but also of nurturing an analytics culture. We have guided thousands of Filipino professionals to become better analytics leaders. Contact DMAIPH now at analytics@dmaiph.com or connect with me directly to discuss a uniquely tailored strategy to ensure you are the top of your game when it comes to Analytics Leadership.

Five LinkedIn Tips To Grab Attention From A LinkedIn All-Star

By now its clear that LinkedIn is the best way to network for job openings, new clients and professional partnerships. There really is nothing else like it when it comes to linking you to new opportunities.

As I’ll be speaking to a half dozen audiences in the next few weeks on a range of analytics topics, the one point of advice I will give every attendee is to get the maximum out of LinkedIn.

Here are 5 tips that guide me in being a LinkedIn All-Star:

  1. Have a professional AND engaging profile picture. You can go a little casual here with dress, but you definitely need to maintain a professional appeal to people. Make sure you smile and look engaging. It’s a biased and unfair world, but looks really do matter. I’ll be honest, my blue eyes are a selling point so I make sure they standout. We all have our own eye catching features… don’t waste them.
  2. You need a catchy headline. Use the space at the top of your profile wisely. I use my tagline, making data-driven decisions. It needs to stick. Think of catchy logos, mottos and taglines and use something that is personal to you and shows your passion.
  3. Use the summary wisely. This is like your cover letter or professional objective. What you write here greatly impacts how much further a recruiter will read. Like the headline it has to speak to your passions and show a real person not just another job seeker. Keep it short and simple. 2-3 sentences that engage and enchant. I talk about training and analytics the merger of my passion and my top skill set.
  4. Get some great recommendations. Focus on finding advocates who will sell you based on solutions you have provided, problems you fixed or business that you generated. These recommendations are the only thing that’s proof you are good at what you say you are good at. Maximize their effectiveness like I did by asking people who can talk about what I did to make their lives better.
  5. Join lots of relevant groups. Groups are the best way to expand your network and connect with people who are doing the same things you want to do and/or can influence hiring decisions. LinkedIn is all about networking and posting and sharing on groups is the key to being noticed. Get and stay active.

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Here is the original article I based my five tips on. They are pretty universal, but you can always take the extra 10 seconds to share your source and give credit: http://www.ion-search.com/news/5-ways-to-ensure-that-your-linkedin-profile-grabs-a-recruiters-attention-social-hire/

Seven Tips For Marketing Graduates

Next week I will be speaking at a couple of different schools about marketing careers. As always I will focus on marketing analytics and how the most successful marketing efforts are data-driven.

With that in mind , here are my Seven Tips:

  1. Align Your Passions – Find ways to do what you love and all the hard or boring stuff will be much easier to deal with. Build on your passion and everything else will follow.
  2. Show Up Every Day – Can’t see it enough. The business needs you, the customers need you and your team mates need you.
  3. Build Your Network – Always be in a networking mindset. Think how this next person can help you achieve something.
  4. Offer Solutions – Come to meeting with some ideas. Take time to write things down. Do your homework.
  5. Tell Stories – Being able to engage a group of people to take action is the single most important skill that no one really teachers marketers.
  6. Always Have Data – Never, ever, ever base your plan on gut. The data is out there, and if its not then you need to create it.
  7. It’s All About Making Money – In the end, marketing is all about increasing revenue. You need to make the company more money with you and your plan then without it. Its really that simple.

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So obviously, there is a whole lot more to it. But each of these tips are things that marketing professionals need to be thinking about every day.

And one more thing… if you don’t already have a network started on LinkedIn, you are already falling behind the pack.