I was initially intrigued by Super Crunchers because my company, Offermatica, is featured in it. So be on guard: I have reason to like this book. That said — this glowing review is firmly rooted in my love of the data-based decision paradigm — not my pride in working at Offermatica.

Written by econometrician and lawyer Ian Ayres, Super Crunchers is an exploration of how statistics practitioners continue to reshape our world. Using randomized testing and regression analysis, the Super Crunchers create mathematical models to solve real world problems. Prof. Ayres details how crunching the numbers is changing online marketing, entertainment, education and medicine. Virtually every aspect of society can benefit.

One of the central themes of the book is that these models consistently outperform humans with expertise. Ayres submits that humans (even world-renowned experts) are plagued by overconfidence, egos and emotions. Mathematical models don’t get it right 100% of the time but the models consistently outperform the experts. Gatekeepers relying purely on experience and instinct are a dying breed. This fact warms my heart.

The downside is that Super Crunchers demand as much relevant data as possible. Your actions are being recorded like never before. Database aggregators link disparate sources of information together. Privacy lovin’ individuals (i.e. most of us) are bound to be a tad uncomfortable. But maybe, just maybe, there’s a greater good somewhere in all this supercrunching.

My biggest complaint about the book is that Ayres’s suggested readings don’t contain anything on Applied Super Crunching. I’ve taken some statistics courses but would love to know more about Super Crunching methodology. Then again, maybe that’s subject matter of his next book.

Technorati Tags: Offermatica, Super Crunchers, Ian Ayres

As an Entrepreneur, I’m fascinated with the concepts that have come to be known as Business Intelligence. Fundamentally business intelligence refers to a data-warehouse filled with information from all areas of the company. The data can then be presented in reports tying previously disparate information together. Take it a step further and you can mine the data looking for relationships not yet uncovered. Pretty awesome.

The Analytic in me thinks this is a dream come true. After all, one should be able to focus clearly in on what metrics drive performance then monitor, manage and reward based on them. It takes the complex process of managing a company and simplifies it. It removes the messiness of human folly. What you’re left with is clean, gorgeous graphs, delicious drill-downs and sublime dashboards. It’s every executive’s dream come true, isn’t it?

Here’s the thing: Before you can develop any meaningful B.I. implementation, you have to know where you want to go. So start by developing a strategy. Then you’ve got to work on determining what really is going to drive that strategy. So one must work with one’s management team to determine the core measures that will determine success. Then comes the daunting task of getting everybody on board. One has to manage internal politics, expectations, fear and misunderstanding. All of a sudden, this B.I. implementation has turned rather messy.

My point is that, as hard as you try, there’s no simple way to run a company. The technology is only a tool to help you stay on track and support you in your decision making. It’s your job to get the right people headed in the right direction, quickly. Don’t look to B.I. to do that for you.

Technorati Tags: business intelligence, KPIs, dashboards

Companies are desperately trying to get your attention. I’m sure you’ve heard or read that you are bombarded with somewhere between 300 and 3000 advertising messages per day. So marketers are faced with the problem of creating a message that resonates with you so you’ll remember and hopefully purchase their product.

The thought du jour is to create communities around your brand. Ideally a brand community creates loyal customers who feel that they are part of something special. They’ll evangelize for you and interact with your brand more frequently if they feel part of a community of say… something like Mac enthusiasts.

Ford Motor Company has a banner ad running on Allmusic with the tagline:

“The American people love the truth, and they love an underdog.”

This is how potential community members are introduced to the Ford Bold Moves community. Here’s Ford trying to build an online community around their big comeback. I applaud the attempt but remain skeptical as to its effectiveness. First of all, the headline today is (rss feed from Yahoo): “Ford reportedly plans more job cuts” — job cuts don’t make me feel warm or fuzzy.

I watched the current vlog episode and was pretty disappointed. It plays more like a rough-around-the-edges commercial for the new Shelby super fast car than an actual glimpse into this troubled company. Enough commercials guys, show me what the top brass is going to do to fix the mess you’re in. Show me the fights in the boardroom. Give me drama. I think that will increase your chances of making this Bold Moves thing work.

Technorati Tags: Ford, BoldMoves, marketing, community

If there’s anyone out there in the GTA who has a business plan and is looking for funding, please post a comment on this entry and I’ll get back to you with the details. There’s a unique opportunity to present to a group of VCs — but you’ve got to act quickly because you’ll have to present tomorrow June 6th or Thursday June 8th.

Technorati Tags: VC, Toronto, entrepreneur, venturecapital

Here are some random thoughts about execution from the past week of the life of your host, Brian Ivanovick:

• You or your company will make mistakes — and that is okay — don’t let the fear of mistakes get in your way. (Source: Coach Kara)
• You will hear “no” or just screw up sometimes — and that too is okay — everyone who does something fails some of the time. (Source: Coach Kara)
• Successful people try things more often than unsuccessful people do. If you want to succeed, you have to fail more. (Source: Business partner Reg found somewhere on the Internet)
• Try new things just to try them. You don’t have to try to become the best at everything you do. Sometimes being just okay (or even bad) is perfectly acceptable. (Source: Prof. David M. Lank)
• You’re allowed to be a beginner. (Source: Emmet Conor O’Reilly)
• Seeking perfection can get in the way of moving forward. Seek out what is good enough. You always have time to fix it later. (Source: Paul Carr and The Paradox of Choice by Schwartz)

Enjoy the rest of your weekend.

Technorati Tags: perfection, fail, execution, mistakes

The good folks at Hyperion are giving out a free article from the Harvard Business Review concerning evidence-based management. Evidence-based management is creating a culture of decision making that is data-driven rather than gut or instinct driven. I think this movement is going to be big for the next few years. Then I think that people are going to take it too far and then I think that instinct-based management will come back… but I digress…

One of the most interesting concepts the authors talk about is the psychology behind the resistance to using data in decision making. They contend that people resist evidence-based decision making because:

1. Anecdotal evidence feels richer than do numbers on a report or print out.
2. People pass on old habits without examining whether new best practices have emerged.
3. People want to use their expertise — they want to feel important.
4. Marketing/advertising create a fog around what is, in fact, best practice.
5. Ideology/dogma exist in companies and are powerful agents resisting change.
6. Facts and evidence are great levellers of hierarchy.

Fascinating stuff.

My favourite feature of evidence-based management is that, if used properly, it can be tightly integrated with goal-setting and goal-achievement. A company can decide what metrics define its progress. Initiatives can be judged based on their impact on these metrics. In an ideal implementation, management can always have a sense of how they’re performing by looking at the metrics.

That said, those reasons why people are likely to be resistant to this movement shouldn’t be discounted. I don’t have much interest in building a big, cold business on data autopilot. I want people to feel that their expertise and past experience count — for the simple reason that they’ll likely be happier if they know that their feelings, not just their data, are valued.

Technorati Tags: data, evidence, management, hardfacts

For those of you who still aren’t convinced of the impending doom, I highly recommend you read Time’s Cover Story – Polar Ice Caps Are Melting Faster Than Ever… More And More Land Is Being Devastated By Drought… Rising Waters Are Drowning Low-Lying Communities… By Any Measure, Earth Is At … The Tipping Point

Here, my friends, are a few choice quotes:

“What few people reckoned on was that global climate systems are booby-trapped with tipping points and feedback loops, thresholds past which the slow creep of environmental decay gives way to sudden and self-perpetuating collapse.”

“Polar ice is so reflective that 90% of the sunlight that strikes it simply bounces back into space, taking much of its energy with it. Ocean water does just the opposite, absorbing 90% of the energy it receives. The more energy it retains, the warmer it gets, with the result that each mile of ice that melts vanishes faster than the mile that preceded it.”

“There will be no polar ice by 2060,” says Larry Schweiger, president of the National Wildlife Federation. “Somewhere along that path, the polar bear drops out.”

“We did not so much march toward the environmental precipice as drunkenly reel there, snapping at the scientific scolds who told us we had a problem.”

Good grief.

I was at Del.icio.us today and happened upon Todoque. After reading the site once, I frantically looked around for links. I even pulled up the ol “View Source” to find some. Then I reread the site more closely:

• “Todoque is just a life, work and business attitude.
• Todoque is just a convention.
• The power comes in accepting the convention.
• There is nothing to learn.”

That last point is a bit misleading. I had to learn was that Todoque was one page and is not connected to any community, software or tools. In that way it is unlike almost every other site on the Internet. I also had to learn that it’s just an effort to create a convention. That’s all.

I don’t know about you, but I find this social experiment fascinating. Is this how conventions are created? Are people going to start using Todoquian language to communicate? What is it’s advantage? Why Todoque, why?

Technorati Tags: todoque, todoquian, usability, del.icio.us, convention

“Fewer and fewer people will want to be employees of corporations, because corporations don’t have anything to offer. Corporations don’t provide security and provide fewer and fewer benefits. People may find new ways to sell their skills. I can imagine eBay or the equivalent of eBay being in the business of letting people bid on work all day long. Office buildings may turn into housing, or maybe individuals will rent office space as you would rent a hotel room.” – Avram Miller at Fast Company

Perhaps I’m too much of an idealist, but I don’t think companies have to go down this road. My personal philosophy is that a company has to be a place that offers a chance for people to engage in shared meaning – to unite people and help them learn from one another. It should be providing products or services that its employees believe in and act as a support mechanism for your professional development, family and your other interests.

When corporations fail to provide security, community and support for people – they cease doing anything worthwhile.

Technorati Tags: corporation, meaning, purpose, values

“Mathematics, like English is also a language. It is constructed of symbols… symbols do not follow the same rules as experience. They follow rules of their own. In short, the problem is not in the language, the problem is the language” (emphasis in the original) – Gary Zukav, The Dancing Wu Li Masters p. 290

If you think that building your company is going to follow neatly from your business plan, you’re dead wrong. Business plans are based on a reality separate from experience. In creating a business plan, you are basically setting out to predict the future. And as some have suggested predicting the future is beyond the capabilities of most every entrepreneur.

So what’s an entrepreneur to do? The solution is to go out and build the future you want to see. If you think you need some more of anything to do just that, then read this post and listen to Jason Fried and Jim Coudal’s Opening Remarks at this year’s SXSW festival on this podcast.

Business plans are useful to get you thinking about some of the issues that you’ll face – but don’t think they’re going to get you very far. One of my old profs who started a VC fund said (and I’m paraphrasing here) that the business plan was just there to show them that the people had done some homework. He invested in people, not business plans.

Everyone knows the numbers and projections are BS. Don’t keep that in mind when you’re doing them. If you’re looking to start something – if you can – start small and learn as you go. There’s really no substitute for experience.

Technorati Tags: businessplan, experience, entrepreneur