by Teddy Craven | Jan 17, 2019 | General BI |
Artificial intelligence is a term that is as vague as it is powerful. The decision-making processes of today’s business leaders have moved heavily towards information technology and away from intuition, but the word that is driving this change sounds like it was ripped from a science fiction story.
Tweet: The evolution of artificial intelligence in analytics
Over the course of its history, AI has evolved from descriptive, to predictive, and finally to prescriptive analytics and each of these steps represents a different way that the computer is able to recreate human thought. Let’s take a look at how AI has evolved over the years. (more…)
by John Sucich | Jan 16, 2019 | Education |
If it seems like you’re constantly hearing about the expansion of institutes of higher education, it’s probably because you are. Expanding a campus isn’t just great for the college or university’s bottom line, but it can also help to revitalize the area where it is located.
Tweet: Venturing into new territory: How universities use analytics for real estate
This is true in small college towns or big cities alike – when a college or university expands it is often best to do so with an aim of helping out the surrounding neighborhood, in some cases creating more jobs, and often with an eye on integrating students more into the lives of the surrounding community through, for example, tutoring. None of the reasons for expanding are all that new… but some of the tools used and the approach with which colleges evaluate their real estate acquisitions are. Let’s take a look. (more…)
by Kathy Sucich | Jan 14, 2019 | Healthcare |
When an organization has been successful with analytics, how does it decide how to expand upon that success? How does it best use its resources? Which projects and departments receive priority?
Tweet: Customer spotlight: EvergreenHealth
While many organizations build out their analytics usage in a haphazard way, EvergreenHealth, based 15 miles outside of Seattle, uses a much more structured approach. The health system has an analytics steering committee that helps prioritize analytics projects and think about how they relate to the organization’s strategic goals. I learned about this and much more when I visited EvergreenHealth. Here’s a look. (more…)
by Kayla Chiara | Jan 10, 2019 | General BI |
Dimensional Insight was founded on the belief that if you take care of the customer and the employee, then the customer and the employee will take care of Dimensional Insight.
Tweet: Meet the Dimensional Insight team: Jeroen van Berk
As we kick off our 30th year in business this year, we are proud that our founding values are still practiced today and have even found their way to our international offices. Today in our employee spotlight we introduce you to Jeroen Van Berk, account and sales manager at our Leiden, Netherlands office. (more…)
by Kathy Sucich | Jan 9, 2019 | Healthcare |
It seems everyone is talking about artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning when it comes to the year ahead in healthcare. Indeed, it will be interesting to see how these technologies evolve in 2019 and whether healthcare is able to use them to move the needle on patient care and outcomes.
Tweet: 3 predictions for healthcare technology in 2019
But what else is on the horizon for healthcare? What issues will impact what CIOs and executive leaders need to consider when it comes to implementing technology? Here are 3 predictions for 2019 and how analytics plays a role in them. (more…)
by Kayla Chiara | Jan 8, 2019 | Beverage Alcohol, Education, Manufacturing & Supply Chain |
We live in a world of data. If you pay close attention, you will see everything around us is composed of numbers. Digits appear in their own patterns and sequences, creating something of a larger value. But how are we to know what it all means?
Tweet: Data analytics: One solution for many markets
A data analytics tool will make sense of the mystery. For some, integrating an analytics tool may sound intimidating, but it doesn’t have to be. Analytics is vital towards understanding why your organization behaves the way it does and where your future is headed. (more…)
by John Sucich | Jan 7, 2019 | Education |
While in the United States many higher education institutions struggle with exactly how best to use the data they collect, in some European countries there is an automatic financial incentive to organizing the data. In Sweden, education is publicly funded, and a university gets money from the government depending on the number of registered students.
Tweet: How Dalarna University uses analytics to turn data into insight
Such is the case at Dalarna University, which has campuses in two locations in Sweden. Dalarna had about 14,500 students in 2017, and about 60% of its students are internet-based. Dalarna uses Dimensional Insight’s Diver Platform to help organize the data that it needs to report to the government in order for the university to be successful. (more…)
by Kathy Sucich | Dec 27, 2018 | General BI |
It’s that time of year again when we take a retrospective look at the year gone by before we start looking ahead to 2019. We had a busy year here on the blog, where we wrote about a wealth of topics ranging from predictive analytics to blockchain to workplace culture to customer successes.
Tweet: Top 10 blog posts of 2018
There was so much great content on the blog this year – and so much that you read and enjoyed! So without further ado, here are the Top 10 blog posts of this year for you to peruse again and share. (more…)
by Lieven Schellevis | Dec 20, 2018 | Beverage Alcohol |
The wine industry is continually changing and it’s important for wine suppliers to adapt in order to stay relevant to consumers. What are the trends they should be most aware of as we head into 2019?
Tweet: New trends for suppliers in the bulk wine industry
Dimensional Insight’s European team recently attended the World Bulk Wine Exhibition in Amsterdam. During the exhibition, we attended a round table of wine industry experts including Cyril Penn, Deborah Parker Wong, and Liza Zimmerman. At this event, these experts spoke about the latest trends in wine consumption in the United States and shared their insights for producers who are considering to export bulk to the U.S. (more…)
by John Sucich | Dec 18, 2018 | Education |
It’s the end of the calendar year, which means it’s time for holidays, bowl games, and lists. Lots of end-of-year lists.
Tweet: 3 ways technology will impact higher education in 2019
If it’s not the “Best of” one thing in the old year, then it’s the “Watch out for this” other thing in the new year. The world of technology is no exception, and there are certainly trends in technology as we head into the new year that everyone in higher education will be talking about in the coming months. Here are three of the big technology topics you’ll be hearing a lot about in 2019. (more…)
by Kayla Chiara | Dec 11, 2018 | Beverage Alcohol |
“The wine industry doesn’t like change. The wine industry doesn’t like innovation. The wine industry thinks that things should be the way it was, or the way they were.” For Robert Joseph, wine writer and connoisseur, this idea holds true. At this year’s World Bulk Wine Exhibition, an international event where wine industry professionals come together to celebrate a good bottle, Joseph challenged the attitudes that many hold towards the unorthodox approaches of doing business.
Tweet: The future of wine has changed … but in what direction?
Like many others, Joseph questions what it takes to sell a bottle of wine heading into 2019. In a landscape with ripe opportunities for innovation, it is becoming more apparent that risks need to be taken. So what is the future of wine beginning to look like? (more…)
by John Sucich | Dec 6, 2018 | Education |
One of the biggest complaints about analytics use in higher education is that schools have tons of data, but they just don’t know how to use it to make decisions to improve students’ experiences. That could be about to change.
Tweet: How a new study could revolutionize the use of data in higher education
The University of California at Irvine received a million-dollar grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to lead an effort that will track students’ behaviors in order to measure their success. Cal-Irvine will serve as the pilot site of the study, and the information gathered there will inform a national study of several colleges, managed by a consortium at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. Researchers are hoping to figure out what practices affect how students learn, grow, and enter the work force. Here’s what they’re doing in their study that sets them apart. (more…)
by George Dealy | Dec 4, 2018 | Healthcare |
In my recent series of posts, I’ve been exploring various approaches to value-based care (VBC). Here I’ll delve into Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) and their importance in the value-based landscape.
Tweet: Accountable care: The next frontier of value-based care
The ACO model represents what’s arguably the most progressive approach to delivering both care and value. It stands out in terms of its potential to significantly shift not just how care is provided, but how resources are allocated to assess and improve the well-being of a population. In effect, the emphasis is on “health” as opposed to “healthcare” in the traditional sense. (more…)
by Kayla Chiara | Nov 29, 2018 | General BI |
It seems like we’re always waiting. We wait for inspiration to move us, opportunities to come to us, and even the train ride home that is consistently late. When we want to make a change in our lives, we find ourselves repeating these familiar patterns. But what if you broke the habit?
Tweet: Dimensional Insight Book Club: The Motivation Myth
In The Motivation Myth: How High Achievers Really Set Themselves Up to Win, Jeff Haden shows us how to be proactive goal-setters, sharing what we can do today to reach our long-term goals of tomorrow. We recently read this book for the Dimensional Insight Book Club. Here are our thoughts. (more…)
by John Sucich | Nov 28, 2018 | Education |
There’s no perfect solution to hiring. Sometimes someone who looks great on paper is a disappointment in person, and it’s possible the ideal candidate can’t even get his or her foot in the door because of a lackluster resumé.
Tweet: How universities use analytics for hiring
In higher education, there are many factors that go into being a great university leader or a great professor. And there are a number of challenges to finding the right candidate in an industry that is highly competitive. Business intelligence can’t solve every problem with the hiring process, but it can help an organization get closer to finding the right person by focusing on analytics it can use. (more…)
by Kayla Chiara | Nov 27, 2018 | Beverage Alcohol |
You know what’s inside of your glass of wine. But do you know how it was made? Vineyards have been a part of human history since as early as 6000 BC. With this vintage, we should have been expected to master the art. But in 2018, we are still striving towards excellence.
Tweet: How wine producers are solving production challenges with technology
A recent survey from Wine Business Monthly asked multiple growers from different regions about the top challenges they experienced in 2018. Among them, production challenges such as labor shortages, wine quality, and sustainability were the most prominent. So how are we able to improve production with modern technology? (more…)
by Teddy Craven | Nov 26, 2018 | Healthcare |
A doctor’s daily workload has changed completely in the last 20 years. The digitization of patient data has shifted the majority of a doctor’s time away from patients and towards EHRs. In fact, a recent study in Family Medicine concluded that providers are spending, on average, 18.6 minutes in front of an EHR and only 16.5 minutes with a patient during each visit.
Tweet: Medical schools in the digital age: The teachingEHR
For physicians to be most effective and efficient with their time, they now need to be technically capable along with being clinically capable. This change in workplace norms must be reflected in the education of those entering the healthcare field. So how are medical schools preparing new doctors for the technology onslaught? Let’s take a look. (more…)
by Kathy Sucich | Nov 21, 2018 | Culture, General BI |
Thanksgiving is a time of year when many of us eat too much food, watch too much football (though my husband would say that’s not possible), and spend too much money on Black Friday sales. The busyness of the holiday makes it easy to forget what the purpose of the day is all about: gratitude.
Tweet: Giving thanks: Gratitude in the workplace
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the past year at work: the customers I’ve visited, the projects I’ve worked on, and the co-workers I’ve collaborated with. And if you’ll allow me a moment, in the spirit of the holiday, I’d like to share some of the things I’m most thankful for. (more…)
by Mike Brockway | Nov 20, 2018 | Beverage Alcohol, Manufacturing & Supply Chain |
The ever-increasing digitization of the distribution business is generating ever-increasing amounts of data – and making it harder to discern which metrics are the most important for profitability and growth. For distributors, inventory is one of the most important drivers of success, thus underlining the need for insightful and actionable inventory analytics.
Tweet: Inventory analytics: Four key sales-related metrics to watch
In my last blog, I presented key metrics that track inventory alone and the interplay of inventory and employees. Today I will focus on inventory and sales numbers. Here are four metrics related to inventory and sales that will help distributors up their game. (more…)
by George Dealy | Nov 19, 2018 | Healthcare |
Healthcare organizations are making significant investments in data analytics – an estimated $11 billion last year, forecast to surpass $30 billion by 2022. But spending does not necessarily bring success. Healthcare organizations need to put thoughtful, collaborative work into laying the foundation for analytics success.
There are three crucial areas to address before any healthcare analytics project starts rolling down the tracks:
- User community perspectives, opportunities, and imperatives
- Data governance
- Business rules
Let’s take a closer look at each one.
Tweet: 3 Steps Toward Success in Healthcare Analytics
(more…)
by Kathy Sucich | Nov 15, 2018 | General BI |
Implementing an analytics solution can be a game changer for your organization. It allows you to turn your data into information that employees in all areas can take advantage of.
Tweet: How to motivate your team to get analytics results
However, despite all the promise of analytics, in practicality, implementation is often met with mixed results (a lot of failures) and a loss of momentum. How can you get your team motivated to get the results you’re looking for? Let’s examine. (more…)
by John Sucich | Nov 14, 2018 | Education |
In a previous blog post, we talked about the Top 10 issues in IT, the list put out each year by EDUCAUSE at its annual conference. Another interesting panel discussion took place at the conference, tying together many of the issues on the list.
Tweet: Recommendations on how to measure student success in universities
The EDUCAUSE Center for Analysis and Research teamed up with the Association for Institutional Research and NASPA-Student Affairs Administrators in Higher Education to study how colleges and universities use data and analytics to help students succeed. “Student success” itself was ranked number two on the EDUCAUSE Top 10 list, but much of what was written about in the study and talked about on the panel also addresses almost every other issue on the list. (more…)
by George Dealy | Nov 13, 2018 | Healthcare |
Lately, I have been thinking about the transition to value-based care in terms of a journey and envisioning an automobile dashboard as a means for presenting the most relevant information from perspectives that change throughout the trip. For example, a vehicle dashboard equipped with GPS can give “turn-by-turn” navigation while also measuring overall progress toward the destination. It can also provide the driver with visibility into different collections of helpful measures at a glance, and assist the driver in optimizing the trip plan based on priorities such as taking a scenic route versus the fastest one.
Tweet: Using data to navigate the value-based care journey
Similarly, analytics – done well – can give healthcare organizations visibility into their incremental (“turn-by-turn”) steps toward value-based care, exposing opportunities for course corrections while also showing how each step fits into the broader context of the entire journey. Here’s how. (more…)
by Mike Brockway | Nov 12, 2018 | Beverage Alcohol, Manufacturing & Supply Chain |
Distribution is an intensely competitive business and inventory is key to determining profitability. Applying advanced analytics to inventory management is a savvy way for distributors to track their performance and gain insights that can fuel profitability and growth.
Tweet: Inventory analytics: Two sets of metrics that really matter
There now are more than 30 metrics distributors can use to gauge their performance. I like to group inventory metrics into three sets: those concerned with inventory only, those that focus on the interplay of inventory and people, and those that track inventory with sales. Let’s take a closer look at the first two categories and how they can improve distributors’ performance. (more…)
by Laura Remington | Nov 8, 2018 | Healthcare |
What is the state of trust in data within healthcare organizations? And how much data is easily accessible to decision-makers? Dimensional Insight recently set out to answer these and other questions by surveying healthcare chief information officers and other senior healthcare IT leaders.
Tweet: Survey says: Healthcare CIOs don’t fully trust their data
The survey probed three realms within healthcare organizations: clinical, financial, and operational. Overall, it found few organizations have very strong trust in their data while levels of self-service vary across the enterprise. The survey also revealed that most healthcare organizations plan to invest money toward improving both data trust and self-service. Here is a closer look at the results. (more…)
by John Sucich | Nov 7, 2018 | Education |
The EDUCAUSE Annual Conference is one of the country’s largest gatherings in higher education IT, drawing more than 8,000 people from 46 different countries. The conference addresses the future of IT, and as always, one of the highlights is the announcement of EDUCAUSE’s Top 10 list of issues in IT.
Tweet: Data is at the heart of the 2019 EDUCAUSE Top 10 IT issues
The 2019 list features many of the same issues as were featured in 2018, albeit prioritized differently. More than half of the list relates to data, a reflection of the data initiatives many higher education institutions are working to implement. (more…)
by Kathy Sucich | Nov 6, 2018 | Healthcare |
It’s one thing to implement technology in an organization and to see positive results from that. But the impact of those results can be multiplied when you can connect the technology implementation to a greater mission.
Tweet: Takeaways from the CHIME Fall CIO Forum
This sentiment was front and center at the CHIME Fall CIO Forum, held Oct. 30 – Nov. 2 in San Diego, California. The various sessions and keynotes emphasized how an inspiring goal and a smart approach to technology can yield powerful results. (more…)
by Kathy Sucich | Nov 1, 2018 | General BI |
There are some quirks of timing that we can’t control. We hear stories of serendipity in which a chance occurrence leads to love, success, eternal happiness! Or stories where the difference of one second is a matter of life or death. Timing seems so uncontrollable. But what if it’s not? What if there are some aspects of timing we can control? And what if this could help us do better in our jobs?
Tweet: How the right timing can improve analytical insights
Author Daniel Pink takes on timing in his book, “When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing.” Pink argues there is an optimal time to do certain types of work… and non-optimal times when you should avoid other types of work. Interestingly, when it comes to analytics, there are certain periods of the day that are better than others to gain insights. Let’s take a look. (more…)
by John Sucich | Oct 31, 2018 | Education |
It sounds like an idea any university’s leadership can get behind: Using data to make a positive difference in the lives of students. But it can also be overwhelming. What’s the right kind of data to collect? How can it be used to make improve a student’s experience? The problem seems complex. The solution doesn’t have to be.
Tweet: Identifying data that can make a difference for students
Many universities are finding success in analytics by keeping things simple and building from there. Here are some lessons learned from their successes, and how you can go about using data to make a difference for students at your university as well. (more…)
by Kayla Chiara | Oct 30, 2018 | Beverage Alcohol |
Tasting rooms are the first handshake that many prospective consumers have with a brand. Wineries look to tasting rooms as an opportunity towards a more hospitable approach at making their next sale. For many, tasting rooms prove to be successful. With an inviting atmosphere, engaging ambassadors, and a great product portfolio, it is easy to get right.
Tweet: How analytics can help wineries improve the tasting room experience
However, many brands still struggle with fine-tuning their approach. Does this mean that prospecting clients is a game they’ve already lost? Here’s how wineries are using analytics to help them with their efforts. (more…)
