Is Analysis an art or a science?

Question: Is Analysis an Art or a Science?

Answer:

Part - I
Analysis is an art of keeping it strictly scientific,
until it starts defying itself against the known 'rules',
and that's when to push it towards the realms of 'Strategy'.

Part - II
Analysis is essentially an Art
{lavish, spendthrift and something to marvel about}
that needs to be enclosed within certain boundaries
{make it budgeted and time-bound}
that's when it becomes a Science.
{a tool to extract tangibility out of subtlety}

Part - III
Neither and Both.
The problem with this question is that it is holistic, which it should not be.
The answer would largely depends on the field and domain where the 'expertise' is required.
If the field is predominant with numbers, scientific approach should lead artistry;
Otherwise, let science and data support artistry.

What would be your answer?

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The genius of Jeff Dunham

(Statutory warning: Contents of this post are Highly Addictive!)

The versatile, genius, immensely talented and intelligent, life-time achievement award winner, and winner of stand-up comedian of the year 1998, Jeff Dunham who made me roll over the floor laughing...

Simply brilliant.. Your overtaxed mind needs a 10 minute break.. Go for it!

To meet with Peanut, the one above: go here.

For a list of the gang on YouTube: go here.

If you are wondering what ventriloquist and puppetry or a stand-up comic is, go here.

If you would want to learn how to (legitimately) download YouTube videos to your desktop, don't go anywhere, just email me... :-)

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Best of a Business Analyst

SOMEONE RECENTLY POSTED A QUESTION to the BA community at large to the effect of identifying 'universal skill-set' for a Business Analyst.

A variety of responses were received in the public forum, some of which (including mine) were chosen under the 'good answer' category.


At the outset, the field of business analysis is far too wide, spread-out and pan-industry to have a single set-of-skills. However, in terms of 'universal' skill-set for analysis in business, a certain personality traits could contribute to the arsenal of an effective Business Analyst.

A Business Analyst is a management consultant in the making, and IMHO, basically you need a balanced personality between the ears and having:

• common-sense
• ability of seeing the Big (macro) picture in smaller (micro) details
• neutrality of judgement (having the effect of 'being' external)
  
• poly-point-of-views, with negotiation skills
  
• stakeholder management with the ability to provide (respective) 'views' to each party, with appropriate statistics
  
• domain knowledge (up to the required depth and degree)
• the skill of identifying and collating the correct data-set; separating facts from fictions
  
• ability to grasp the correct context/structure/'currents' surrounding the problem-at-hand
• accurate understanding of the criticality of time-management w.r.t. the problem-at-hand
  
• ability to anchor responsibility
• effective communication (especially astute listening skills)
• ability of blending intuition and insight with analytical abilities
• ability of quickly getting in sync with the 'economics' surrounding the problem-at-hand
  
• the idea of when and how to stop, and say 'No'
  

Other attributes, such as ability to break down the problem into manageable/logical categories; fluency with a given technology, tool-set or methodology; are likely to be important attributes, but are rather not 'universal'.

You are welcome to add to/comment upon the list above.

An effective Business Analyst would execute most of the attributes given above. An experienced consultant, however, would execute only the required attributes from this list - for his/her main skill is to accurately identify what is required the most among the skill-set for a given assignment.

The ultimate aim is to bring about 'customer delight' that may or may not include/depend upon the success of the given project.

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Happy Women's Day

A loving girl friend led the charge on me by saying something like this:

"You all men are like that... Hello! this is not Victorian age any longer..! Wake up.. else we would just march over your dumb head and pot-belly..."

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The Future of Business - $0.00 enterprises

A really interesting article by the Editor in Chief at Wired magazine, Chris Anderson titled "Free! Why $0.00 Is the Future of Business" was the subject of much debate recently.

Accordingly to Chris, the economy of the brave new world is mainly driven by "scarcity" and "wastage" (as against to the old world concept of demand vs. supply). Out side of online business it may take a rather detailed and elaborate study to apply this new economy driver phenomenon to the world at large, such as manufacturing or airline industry.

Chris talks about six business models with examples that are used in the web2.0 economy, and goes on the indicate that all of them revolves around the concept of "Free!".

At the same time, he argues that less successful (or failed) ventures have not appreciated the psychological bearer called "penny gap" which separates the cheap from the free.

Talking about "Freeconomics", he says that what makes 'free' economically possible is known as externalities, a concept that holds that money is not the only scarcity in the world. Chief among the others are your time and respect, two factors that we've always known about but have only recently been able to measure properly. The "attention economy" and "reputation economy" are too fuzzy to merit an academic department, but there's something real at the heart of both.

Some other interesting 'observations' include:

• Forty years ago, the principal nutritional problem in America was hunger; now it's obesity, for which we have the Green Revolution to thank.
• Going from tens of dollars in the 1960s the cost of a transistor is approximately 0.000001 cent today for each of the transistors in Intel's latest quad-core. This meant that we should start to "waste" transistors.
• If the unitary cost of technology is halving every 18 months, when does it come close enough to zero to say that you've arrived and can safely round down to nothing? The answer: almost always sooner than you think.
• In the Greek philosopher Zeno's dichotomy paradox, you run toward a wall. As you run, you halve the distance to the wall, then halve it again, and so on. But if you continue to subdivide space forever, how can you ever actually reach the wall?
• Not too cheap to meter, as Atomic Energy Commission chief Lewis Strauss said in a different context, but too cheap to matter.

It would be interesting to look forward to his forthcoming book - "Free!".

Here is the link to the whole article.

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Blog, Book and a Paper

What is the reason for someone to create and maintain a Weblog?

Blog is a tool to put ideas, reactions and observations into public. A personal diary in public.

In the process, one creates content, expresses likes and dislikes (and gives opportunities to Web2.0 apps to sell you a relevant product!), have the contentment of speaking it out (and, in some cases, being 'heard' also), and it creates a possibility for an interaction for you where someone might respond to your views.

As to the frequency of blogging, I do not suppose there could be any rules as such. I think if you get one good idea per week to talk about in your blog, and you keep that practice for an year, effectively you would end up having about 50 good ideas. I would say, that makes a really productive year: 50 good ideas! Not bad...



This also goes on speaking about the new Social dynamics that the technology has infused among us.

On the downside, the chief one, as I see it, is that there is a real threat to a prospective book that one may write... All the ideas that one found worth talking about, are already in one's blog in the public... What would one write a book about?

[Well, being conscious about this, I am keeping the topic and ideas about my book private :-) At the same time, I do wish to marshal certain skills for a more effective book by writing a blog.]

Having said that, if a blog manages to bring reputed and like-minded folks together and becomes interactive where people could review and audit ideas, concepts, observations of the peers', it could surely lead towards a paper. And a paper that is peer-reviewed always carries higher credibility and authority compared to a book which practically anybody could write and publish.

Essentially, if you are reading this, and if you do maintain a blog as well, go ahead, drop in a comment and I would have a look at your 'stuff' also...

• See also:
• Go here to read the story of Mark Jen and how he got fired by Google for Blogging.

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Mind, the Gap - addendum II - Ecomonics

While reading "Mind, the Gap" again, I felt the need of explaining the usage of term 'economics'. The classical definition of the terms goes somewhat like the following:

economics (ĕk'ə-nŏm'ĭks, ē'kə-)
n.
1. (used with a sing. verb) The social science that deals with the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services and with the theory and management of economies or economic systems.

In other words, it is classical trade but in a much advanced and re-defined form. All throughout 1900's, economics remained the force of forces, surfacing in clear sight in forms of capitalism, especially towards the last couple of decades of the century (whilst communism was being defeated by its own self).

In the current century, however, the term has to expand event more that "production, distribution and consumption" to encompass the new dimensions of technological proliferations of the society - namely, Web 2., et al.

In the sense that I would like to use the term economics whilst talking about 'the Gap' should also include not just monetary-economy (though it remains the flagship), but also the "attention economy" (how Google makes money by having you to give attention to all those sponsored contents and ads), and "reputation economy" (how Google 'pressurises' you to improve you hit-count of your online presence - your website, blog, social-networking profile - that should feature among top 20 Google hits when someone fires a relevant query. That, and also Google PageRank.)

Technology is raw. Net is the medium by which technology would interact and interchange information with society. Whilst technology has to prove itself (by turning profitable) economically, it could only do so if (and perhaps the only if) it would get the tune of the psychology of the society.

When the inventors start to really master the tune of psychology of the society their technology is serving, you find that the society is 'hooked' to the given technology. People are so wound up into it that almost no questions are asked. The hook is attached to a line, and the sinker is usually heavy (with right marketing). The spin of the spindle wounding up the line is actually the economy making profit.

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Mind, the Gap - addendum I - Psychology

In an interesting parallel with the 'Mind Gap' concept, here is a quote from the strategy by a marketing guru to the modern successful IT enterprises, advising the CEO's of the interplay between psychology and economy in making of an effective marketing strategy and selling their systems:

"... the strategy is to focus market development efforts on the end-user community [who you want to use your system], not on the technical community. Specifically you want to enlist the support of the economic buyer, the line executive or manager in the end-user organization who has the profit-and-loss responsibility for the given function your product serves... [Psychologically] you should not expect to secure primary sponsorship from the IT professionals... [A new product and a paradigm shift] is not in the interest of the IT department. It means extra work for them, and it exposes their mission-critical systems to additional risks... [Psychologically] it would not have been in the interest of the end users who report to the economic buyer. From their point of view, the old paradigm is more familiar and secure. In the short term, with the learning curve required to come up to speed on the new one, they are actually going to be less effective. So they may resist you as well. It is only the economic buyer, who has to pay the ongoing cost of the status quo but can no longer afford to do so, who can be counted on to be unequivocally supportive of the change..."

As it happens elsewhere, so is in this example, that the strategy has the psychology and economy components in a direct interplay. Towards the end of the quote it also gives the hint that it is not simply restricted to marketing strategy, but is equally found in change management as well.

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Mind, the Gap

An ancient Sanskrit saying has it:

तुंडे तुंडे मतीः भिन्ना।

(tunde tunde mateehi bhinna)

Which literally means that every head has a differing mind. Less subtly, everyone has a different opinion.

It may remain unsubstantiated at this hour, but I would argue that this difference and diversity is stemming from the ‘Genetic diversity’ as found prevalent as a principle under Biodiversity as a hole. Biodiversity, in a sense, is a science of studying all the various species and their interdependence that gives the significance to the ecology and bio-ecosystem of the Earth. Taken a few logical steps further on the same line, this would translate into the social phenomenon classified as Cultural diversity, and so forth.

It is the Mind, the psychology, that divides and at the same time units all individual aspects under the single ecology of the cultural fabric.

In other words, things are as they are in the world, good or bad, because of this Diversity principle - what may be considered good for one may not be good for someone else... If one applies this theory to the state of one's living, saying that the solution to your given prevailing unfavourable personal condition lies is a certain product or service, one becomes a party to the economy. For this very principle is also an integral part of world economy. (Look around and you would find examples are aplenty.),

It is that Gap, disparity, demand vs. supply, the fundamental logic behind any economy, that gives goals and 'purposes' to individual lives in the contemporary world.

And, as we just argued, that gap, the economy, stems from Mind, the psychology.

Having said that, one may approach psychology through economy and argue that - economy also contributes into framing of an individual psychology. Which is absolutely true as well - for economy is largely responsible for the socio-political environment one lives in. This environment influences one's thought process all the way from childhood - which the psychoanalysts know as conditioning of the 'mind'.

Now, here we have Mind (the psychology) stemming from the gap (the economy).

So, I suppose it is safe to say that both of these are like best buddies, going hand-in-hand, none leading the other, nor one following the another. They are like the two aspects of the duality that is so omnipresent in the world at large.

These two, always co-joined, create what I would want to call a Mind Gap, which is perhaps more significant than all other gaps – generation gap, cultural gap, socio-political gap, et al. And it is this combination of psychology and economy that rather 'rule' and 'runs' the world.

Mind, the Gap.

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"Mind The Gap"

"Mind The Gap"

THE TRADEMARK PHRASE ASSOCIATED with London Underground.
Like many things British, a tourist would rather bear this in mind after a visit to London and its Underground.
It's written on the edges of the platform.
It's spoken over on the loudspeakers on the stations during rush hours.
It's heard even inside the train during the announcements for next station.

Other than that, there is a coffee mug given to me as a present by a dear friend in London that proudly proclaims "Mind the Gap". And then there is this lovely black T-shirt that imprints so on your chest. And there are certain other garments also but which I prefer not to use..

As if, the 'gap' is everywhere.

Well, this blog that I (hope to) beat around with is not about London, Underground, travel, or anything so related.
The title should rather read: Mind, the Gap.
But I purposefully dropped the comma in hopes of riding on the popularity that I saw standing there on the platform in the form of "Mind the Gap".
So, essentially, what I am saying is that there is a 'gap' between the title phrase, and the intent of this blog., but which you would NOT mind.

In 2002 (incidentally, the year I first visited London), some nuthead created a blog with URL http://mindthegap.blogspot.com and never posted a single legible word. Ditto for mind-thegap. Unfortunately, I could not contact either of the users.

And so, here we are, with a weird URL, but a very sensible title: Mind, the Gap.

Welcome
And hope you enjoy your stay whilst here.

Merry Christmas.

Edit: Ms. Emma Clarke, who became known as "voice of the tube", by lending her voice to various announcements inside the tube and at stations, including her famous "mind the gap", was recently sacked! More details on her website: www.emmaclarke.com

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