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Posted by on Aug 22, 2019

Data  Visualization 101

Data Visualization 101

One sure-fire way to lose your audience is to give a bland presentation about numbers. While the rise and fall of digits matter to all of us – GDP, interest rates, profit margins – something about it transports our minds to thoughts of sandy beaches in faraway places.

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Posted by on Jul 31, 2019

Data-Driven Decision Making at Federal Agencies

Data-Driven Decision Making at Federal Agencies

One of the chief Cross-Agency Priority (CAP) goals of the President’s Management Agenda (PMA) is: “Leverage data as a strategic asset to grow the economy, increase the effectiveness of the Federal Government, facilitate oversight, and promote transparency.”

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Posted by on Feb 16, 2018

Analytics is a Function, Not a Job Title

Analytics is a Function, Not a Job Title

I recently read an HBR article that reinforced much of what we’ve been seeing internally at Management Concepts for the last two years: Analytics is a function, not a job title, and regardless of job title, analytics should be a part of every team’s profile. As noted by the HRB authors, you don’t have to be a Data Scientist to work in analytics. Success with analytics requires a “big tent” approach: Everybody in, and everybody all in.

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Posted by on Jan 16, 2018

Adaptability: The Underestimated Skill

Adaptability: The Underestimated Skill

We all know the definition of insanity – doing the exact same thing over and over again, expecting different results each time.  But what happens when you’re trained to always run the same report, or write the same code, and something fundamentally changes?  Do you try to force-feed the existing process into the new system?  […]

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Posted by on Nov 30, 2017

Data, Data Everywhere…Albatross or Opportunity?

Data, Data Everywhere…Albatross or Opportunity?

Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s Rime of the Ancient Mariner tells the experience of a sailor returning from a long voyage. In the early parts of the poem, the mariner describes how an albatross leads the crew out an ice jam in the Antarctic, but the mariner then kills the bird. The crew vacillates between viewing the killing of the albatross as a good or a bad thing. However, they soon become surrounded by “water, water, everywhere, nor any drop to drink.” Eventually, the mariner encounters death, but survives after accepting his guilt – however as a penance for shooting the bird, the sailor must wander the earth telling his story to passersby.

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