This feed provides updates on new pages added on Making-it-Happen and Functional Manangement Domain http://www.executionmih.com/rss_execution_mih.xml http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Mon, 4 Feb 2008 11:06:20 +0530 Mon, 4 Feb 2008 11:01:55 +0530 One of the biggest issues of data quality in this ever increasing world of inter-connected systems. Data exchange across the system needs controls at a record, file, application and database level." http://www.executionmih.com/data-quality/interface-exchange.php ABA Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Customer data can be enriched by using internal heuristics as well as by gathering field data. http://www.executionmih.com/customer-data/quality-augmentation-enrichment.php ACD Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 While the previous topic are at conceptual level, this topic dwells upon the practical tips on how to firm-up your plan and how to get it finalized with business stakeholders." http://www.executionmih.com/data-quality-program/approach-finalization.php AEF Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Data Warehouse initiative is more challenging as compared to a transactional system. You better read it to understand what you are in for.. http://www.executionmih.com/data-warehouse/challenge-issues.php DAD Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Dimensional model has to address some complex situations liked slowly changing dimensions. http://www.executionmih.com/data-warehouse/slowly-changing-dimension-SCD.php DDE Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Designing the transformation process including standardizing, integrating, cleansing, augmenting, aggregating and creating the data sets for loading into the repository." http://www.executionmih.com/data-warehouse/etl-transformation-design.php DFD Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Data Warehouse/ Data Mart form the sanitized repository of Data which can be accessed for various purposes. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/data-warehouse-vs-data-mart.php ZAC Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This scenario has a Data Warehouse supplying to Data Marts. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/staging-data-warehouse-datamart.php ZBD Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Each of the architectures has its own context and relevance. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/olap-architecture-choice.php ZCD Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This page provides various data management related issues related to Sales Compensation http://www.executionmih.com/sales/compensation-data-management.php ODH Mon, 3 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This page gives you the typical capability for a sales compensation management system http://www.executionmih.com/sales/compensation-system.php ODI Mon, 3 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Sales channel management can be fairly tricky in terms of data quality, because the systems keeping the sales channel data range from the core systems to field systems. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/channel-data-management.php OGG Mon, 3 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This page gives the list of measures, KPIs and Dimensions linked to Sales compensation. You can use this list to work on your dimensional models, and reports designs http://www.executionmih.com/sales/compensation-analysis.php ODG Mon, 3 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This topic provides a high level concept of OLAP and also on how it fits into BI frame-work. It provides different OLAP options and also shared that OLAP is a layer between Data Warehouse and BI end-user tools. http://www.executionmih.com/OLAP/olap-in-business-intelligence.php HAA Mon, 3 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 These are the methods of moving horizontally and vertically with in the dimensional structure of Data-warehouse and OLAP. This term is more used in context with OLAP, because typically various End-user Business Intelligence tools sit on top of OLAP, which in turn sits over Data-Warehouse. http://www.executionmih.com/data-analysis/drill-cross-navigation-analysis.php HCA Mon, 3 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Like other analysis types covered in the chapter, Filtration analysis essentially allows you to place filters for your queries. Applying filter can be seen both for "exclusion" or "selecting specific values for inclusion". In simplistic way, filtering can be equivalent to "where" clause of an SQL query. http://www.executionmih.com/data-analysis/filtration-analysis.php HCF Mon, 10 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Slicing means taking out the slice of a cube, given certain set of select dimension (product), and value (home furnishings..) and measures (sales value, sales units..). Dicing means viewing the slices from different angles. For example -Revenue for different products within a given state or revenue for different states for a given product. One form of Slicing and Dicing is called pivoting. http://www.executionmih.com/data-analysis/bi-slice-dice.php HCG Mon, 10 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 What-if analysis is essentially scenario building capability of OLAP. You can draw a straight parallel of what-if analysis in MS Excel, with more sophisticated capabilities in OLAP. http://www.executionmih.com/data-analysis/what-if.php HFA Mon, 10 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Allocation Engines is another differentiator for OLAP vs Data Warehouse. Simplistically-It allows the users to automatically allocate or in other words "split" the value into multiple values. http://www.executionmih.com/data-analysis/allocation-engine-analysis.php HFB Mon, 10 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Goal-Seek is What-if analysis in OLAP, but of a reverse order. In a typical What-if analysis, A Calculation model takes a set of input values, to give the set of out-put values. Each different set of these "input and output value combinations" is called a what-if analysis scenario. Depending upon your needs you can build different scenarios of input values, and you can apply those scenarios on the calculation model, and generate the output values. Here we are traveling from input values to output values. http://www.executionmih.com/data-analysis/goal-seek.php HFC Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 The subject of hierarchies is relevant to both OLAP and Data Warehousing/Marting. Modeling of data is done, both in DW and OLAP, keeping the hierarchies in mind. However, OLAP is the platform where the hierarchies are manifested in their final shape for the purpose of analysis. http://www.executionmih.com/OLAP/data-warehouse-olap-hierarchy.php HGA Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Simple or strict hierarchy is the simplest form of business Hierarchies. http://www.executionmih.com/OLAP/dimensional-simple-hierarchy.php HGB Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Non-Strict hierarchy has one similarity and one non-similarity with strict hierarchies. A non-strict hierarchy has one level in a hierarchy path to be having only one parent level. However an instance (or member or value) in a level could belong to multiple instances in the parent level. http://www.executionmih.com/OLAP/Business-non-strict-hierarchy.php HGC Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Multiple path hierarchies have a dimensional level belong to two different dimensional levels. However the criteria of analysis is same across the multiple paths. http://www.executionmih.com/OLAP/multiple-path-hierarchy.php HGD Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Parallel Hierarchies are most flexible hierarchy paths http://www.executionmih.com/OLAP/parallel-path-hierarchy.php HGE Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Additivity and correct aggregation methods application is fundamental to the success of Business Intelligence. The most common mistakes the modelers and designers make is on - Setting the Right Hierarchies AND Establishing Right Additivity and aggregation rules. You need to go through the chapter of business dimensional hierarchies, before you go through this chapter. Additivity of a measure is when you are able to apply the sum operator across all the dimensions. Other aggregations on measures-facts are when you use operators like Average, Maximum and Minimum. http://www.executionmih.com/OLAP/measure-facts-additivity.php HHA Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Non-Additivity is that when you cannot use a sum operator to generate the needed aggregation. http://www.executionmih.com/OLAP/non-additive-measures-facts.php HHB Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Semi-Additivity is when you can have a measure aggregated on a certain dimension, but not all the dimensions. Another phrase for semi-additivity is when you have the summarization with an index of in-accuracy. http://www.executionmih.com/OLAP/semi-additive-measures-facts.php HHC Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Business Intelligence Management covers the entire gamut of activities to enable end-to-end BI. This page lists the activities under BI management. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/BI-management.php ZDA WED, 2 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Business Intelligence has wide range of skills requirements, with uniform demands from Business, Process, Technology and HR. This page gives the list of typical roles, responsibilities and skills required. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/organization-roles.php ZDB WED, 2 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Building a business-case for stand-alone, departmental data-mart is relatively easy. However, to build a business case for enterprise level BI, including the investments in foundation elements like meta-data repository, does become challenging. This page provides few methods to build the business-case for enterprise level BI. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/business-case.php ZDC WED, 2 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A great OLTP vendor, may not be a successful BI vendor unless there are some significant shifts in capabilities and mind-set are made. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/vendor-evaluation.php ZDD WED, 2 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This page provides the building blocks of analytics and performance measurement for sales campaign management http://www.executionmih.com/sales/campaign-business-intelligence-Analysis.php OED Thu, 3 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This page provides various data quality issues which could arise in sales campaign management, and possible solutions. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/campaign-data-management.php OEE Thu, 3 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This page provides definition of metadata and tries to provide clarity on metadata management context. Metadata management is not only a BI subject, but an overall data management subject, serving whole of the organization. http://www.executionmih.com/metadata/definition-concept.php BAA Wed, 9 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Metadata has a wide range of benefit. It works on building productivity, enhancing data quality and cost saving on business activities and to reduce the redundancies. http://www.executionmih.com/metadata/objective-purpose.php BAB Wed, 9 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Technical metadata includes all the details on all layers of the systems both at physical and logical level. http://www.executionmih.com/metadata/technical.php BAC Wed, 9 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Business metadata is capturing details about an organization out of the boundaries of IT systems. It also has the details on the business specs which define the IT systems. http://www.executionmih.com/metadata/business.php BAD Wed, 9 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Metadata is recorded at different level of details and also from different perspectives. The level of detail ranges from the contextual level to implementation level. The type of metadata includes functional, timing, location, ownership etc.. http://www.executionmih.com/metadata/detail-levels.php BAE Wed, 9 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Both Metadata Management and Master-data management are data management initiatives. They have a close link with BI, but their sole purpose is not BI alone. They serve BI and also gain from BI. However, transactional systems have an equal stake on MDM and Metadata. http://www.executionmih.com/master-data-management/MDM-vs.-business-intelligence-vs.-metadata.php BAF Thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A true big-bang enterprise metadata is a failed dream. With advancement of technology world is moving towards multiple metadata repositories linked through a hub and spoke model. The hub and spoke model can work as a federated model or a true metadata warehouse. http://www.executionmih.com/metadata/metadata-architecture.php BAG thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Customer segmentation analysis has to manage the internal data on existing customers as well as the external data on prospects. The external data has a challenge of being dirty and in diverse formats. Most of the data management issues are linked to managing the external data. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/segmentation-data-management.php NAE thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Customer segmentation related analysis does not have an urgency of running a business. Therefore, it may be missed out in comparison to sales analysis or supply chain analysis. Once segmentation is done, it is done again after a gap of at least a year. A regular analysis, will help you to validate your assumptions and also throw some signals on how the customers are moving across the segments. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/segmentation-BI.php NAF thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Customer value and profitability data is not a production data in true sense, but it still needs to be well integrated with the production data related to the customers. This is needed so that we can track the progress on customer value, post our actions to enhance the same. We also need to keep on re-validating the linkage between the customer value and customer parameters. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/value-profitability-data.php NDC thu, 17 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 The key areas of analytics are to validate the co-relation between the customer parameters and customer value, building predictive analysis on impact of your actions on customer value and finally tracking the actual impact of your actions on customer value. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/value-profitability-BI.php NDD thu, 17 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Metadata standards encompass metadata models, naming conventions, data standards within Metadata, metadata exchange standards and semantic layer. The concept of metadata standards is similar to any business system. http://www.executionmih.com/metadata/standards.php BBB thu, 17 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Most of the ETL concepts of Metadata are same as that of a data warehouse. In this page, we will focus on providing examples and tips which are specific to Metadata. http://www.executionmih.com/metadata/extraction-transformation-loading.php BBC thu, 17 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A single all-enterprise physical metadata repository is found to be non-feasible. There are other architecture topologies which are more practical. Examples are Metadata warehouse, federated metadata and two way metadata. http://www.executionmih.com/metadata/architecture-scenarios.php BBD thu, 24 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Single customer view is key to doing any kind of analysis on CSR. Another challenge is the customer feedback and survey data which can be incomplete and also descriptive. Either way it is recommended to having frequent gathering of customer feedback. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/satisfaction-retention-data.php NBB thu, 24 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 You can do analysis to define the focus areas for Customer Satisfaction and Retention. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/satisfaction-retention-BI.php NBC thu, 24 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 MDM provides a single reference point for reliable and authoritative Master Data. It is a foundation data management capability which serves business applications and processes. BI is one among its linkages. Customer Data Integration, Product Information Management and Vendor Information Management are among many domains of MDM. http://www.executionmih.com/master-data-management/MDM-concept.php CAA Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 MDM objectives include Data Quality, Standardization, Single point of reference and high availability. MDM components are centered on integrating master data in MDM-Hub. http://www.executionmih.com/master-data-management/CDI-objectives-components.php CAB Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Architecture and modeling principles of MDM are based on achieving flexibility, extensibility, open computing framework, de-coupling the information flow, and highly secure environment. http://www.executionmih.com/master-data-management/CDI-architecture-modeling.php CAC Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This topic list all the distinct tool categories and provide clear differences across the categories and their interlinkageshttp://www.executionmih.com/vendor-evaluation/Business-Intelligence-tool.phpYAATue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Licensing regimes can be confusing and mis-leading. Take a complete long term view of the licensing cost, while protecting your intellectual property rights."http://www.executionmih.com/vendor-evaluation/commercial-licensing-IPR.phpYEATue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Pain of large investment in a tool, can be reduced by creative billing methods."http://www.executionmih.com/vendor-evaluation/commercial-billing-structure.phpYEBTue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Sponsorships to initiatives become easier if there is low upfront cost.http://www.executionmih.com/vendor-evaluation/commercial-pre-implementation.phpYECTue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Cost effective of post implementation can significantly impact the long term TCO (Total cost of ownership)http://www.executionmih.com/vendor-evaluation/commercial-post-implementation.phpYEDTue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This is a high level list of the architecture level features for Enterprise Reporting Toolshttp://www.executionmih.com/enterprise-reporting/multi-layer-architecture.phpY1AATue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 These are the server level administrative features on how an enterprise reporting tool manages the load, process logs and the cache."http://www.executionmih.com/enterprise-reporting/load-log-cache.phpY1ABTue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 These are the features related to development of enterprise report by report developers.http://www.executionmih.com/enterprise-reporting/explorer-design-development.phpY1ACTue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 These are the enterprise reporting server level features for publishing, scheduling and delivery of reports."http://www.executionmih.com/enterprise-reporting/delivery-management.phpY1ADTue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 The ability for an enterprise reporting tool to connect to other platforms and the methods of connectivity.http://www.executionmih.com/enterprise-reporting/server-connectivity.phpY1AETue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 These are the reporting objects used by developers, designers and super users."http://www.executionmih.com/enterprise-reporting/report-objects.phpY1BATue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 These are the end user features to be used by the super users or end-users.http://www.executionmih.com/enterprise-reporting/end-user-features.phpY1BBTue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 These are the various features to enables the end-users to view the reports.http://www.executionmih.com/enterprise-reporting/viewer-feature.phpY1BCTue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Cache management is a key differentiator to the response time to the queries demand on an OLAP server.It also has a bearing on RAM usage and network traffic load. http://www.executionmih.com/olap/server-architecture-cache.php Y2AA Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 There is an ever changing need environment around OLAP, which drives changes in the dimensions, levels, attributes and measures. An OLAP should be able to handle these changes in terms of speed and controls. http://www.executionmih.com/olap/tool-dimensional-model-change.php Y2AB Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 An OLAP tool should be able allow you navigate across the cubes, if the two cubes share a common dimension. http://www.executionmih.com/olap/multi-cube-architecture.php Y2AC Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "User write-back is a facility which helps users to perform what-if analysis and business modeling using OLAP server capabilities. This is done without impacting the real data lying in the Data-Warehouse. This feature is a unique differentiator between Data Warehouse and OLAP. http://www.executionmih.com/olap/server-write-backs.php Y2AD Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This pages talks about the scalability from user point of view. The scalability and performance is not only dependent upon the OLAP server tool, but also on the way it is designed and configured. http://www.executionmih.com/olap/server-scalability.php Y2BA Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A common problem with OLAP databases is data explosion- which essentially means that data size multiplies, when it is loaded from the source Data into OLAP.This is because of aggregations, indexes and sparse cubes. This page covers on the tricks an OLAP tool may use to manage data explosion. http://www.executionmih.com/olap/handling-data-explosion.php Y2BB Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 OLAP Database and Data model tuning are two different subjects. However, they are closely linked to deliver an adequate response time and performance, while maintaining an optimum database size. In this page, we are going to talk about the Database Tuning. http://www.executionmih.com/olap/server-database-tuning.php Y2CA Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 As mentioned in the previous topic page, there are two kinds of tuning you can do around OLAP Database. One is the database Tuning (as covered in the previous topic), and one is the Database Structure/model tuning. This tuning has to do with changes in the dimensions, attributes, levels (as in hierarchy paths), the level of aggregations, pre-calculated v/s stored vs on-line aggregations and the data-cut across OLAP and Data-warehouse (what we call Hybrid OLAP- the combination of MOLAP and ROLAP). http://www.executionmih.com/olap/dimensional-model-tuning.php Y2CB Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This page shared the fail-safe and recoverability of an OLAP server to ensure high availability. http://www.executionmih.com/olap/server-reliability.php Y2BC Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 OLAP performance management topic identifies the performance management areas, linked to maximizing the utilization and distribution across the resources. http://www.executionmih.com/olap/server-performance-management.php Y2BD Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 An OLAP server should be providing wide and friendly set of administrative capabilities in terms of Administrative console, integration with 3rd party resource administration tools etc. http://www.executionmih.com/olap/server-administration.php Y2CC Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 OLAP Server security encompasses various objects and data elements. This ranges from the cell level security to the task based security. http://www.executionmih.com/olap/server-security.php Y2CD Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Metadata tool should be able to support different Metadata architecture at logical and physical level. Having a web-enabled architecture (and not only a web front-end is must). Having technical partnership with various source system tools and other metadata repository tools helps. http://www.executionmih.com/metadata-tools/repository-architecture-features.php Y3AA Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Being able to exchange metadata and provide seamless access is the most important feature of a metadata repository tool. The biggest hurdle so far in evolution of metadata market is limitation of the diverse tools and technologies to link-up with each-other. http://www.executionmih.com/metadata-tools/repository-access-sharing.php Y3AB Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A good metadata tool has open framework, whereby it has plug-in which can be used to do administration and management. The administration and management includes change management, logical configuration, physical configuration, user authorization and security. http://www.executionmih.com/metadata-tools/administration-security.php Y3AC Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A Metadata tool should provide adequate support for metadata projects, change management, metadata models and ease of use. http://www.executionmih.com/metadata-tools/change-management.php Y3AD Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "This template is used across various stages of any business or technology initiative, to ensure that DQ considerations are part of the requirements as well as the solution." http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-quality-method-level-project-tracking.php " 207 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This is the tracking as well as a sign-off sheet for implementation of Data Warehouse initiative http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-warehouse-deployment-readiness.php " 217 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This is the questions checklist for the interview http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-warehouse-business-requirement-interview.php " 218 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This is matrix is used in dimensional modeling to map data marts against the fact table grain for the data mart. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-mart-fact-table-grain-matrix.php " 220 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This is used to validate if the dimensional modelling phase is completed http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/dimensional-model-completion.php " 221 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This template is used for producing the final report at the end of business requirement gathering phase in Data Warehouse initiative. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/source-system-mapping-matrix.php " 227 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This work-tool provides a single access and management point for mapping and tracking all Data Management related linkages and roles responsible for managing these entities. The linkages are defined across the functions, systems, processes and data-groups. This mapping inventory is must for driving any data-management (Data Quality, Metadata, Master Data Management, Data Integration, Data Conversion...) and Business Intelligence Initiatives. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-management-stakeholding-matrix.php 898 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This work-tool is used to track the data quality assurance at object level (Data Exchange Interfaces, Input forms, Batch-processes, Data Entities...), through the Analyze, Design and deployment phases of a project. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/detailed-data-quality-tracking-project-based.php 900 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Data Quality Assurance Checklist is used to ascertain the level of readiness and capabilities within a project, in terms of its adherence to Data Quality Assurance methods. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-quality-in-initiative-checklist.php 901 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This checklist enables a consistency and completeness of data monitoring activities. It contains the Data Monitoring imperatives for planning, design and execution. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-monitoring-checklist.php 906 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 The Data Correction Checklist enables a discipline, control and consistency in conducting 'back-end' data corrections. As the back-end data corrections are risky, they have to be well-planned and tested, before executing them in production environment. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-correction-checklist.php 907 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This work-tool enables you to maintain a centralized inventory for the state of Data Quality assurance in all 'Key' objects. The reason , we are saying key elements, is that sometimes it is not humanly possible to have inventory of all the input forms and data elements, and all the data entities. From a practical perspective, an organization may select top 500 odd objects with in each business domain. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/detailed-bau-data-quality-tracking.php 908 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This tool is a single point work tool, once you start getting the results out of your DMA exercise in the execution phase. It enables you to capture the results, expectations and quality standards, gap assessment, gap rating, potential root-causes, which finally leads to a universal DQ gap list. This tool helps you during the initiation phase to list out the rules and the validations you want to run http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-mapping-assessment-management.php 909 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This work-tool is used to provide you a structure, guidelines and examples of the text, to present a Data Quality Initiation Proposal. Data Quality initiation phase is relatively as elongated one, as you typically do a comprehensive data quality assessment, root-cause analysis and possible solution-set finding, during this initiation phase, so that you have a clarity on how much its going to take to fix DQ gaps. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-quality-program-initiation-proposal.php 913 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This work-tool enables you to capture the system DQ assessment results, gap analysis, gap prioritization, solution listing and assignment of the Gap to the centralized DQ gap management tool. This work tool is to manage a given scope of systems, which you want to assess for data quality. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-quality-assessment-management.php 915 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This work-tool gives you a template, guidelines and text example for creating a DQ program agreement, once Data Quality Initiation Phase completion report is reviewed and signed off by the stakeholders, and we have a clarity on the scope of DQ program, which is going to be funded. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-quality-program-proposal-agreement.php 916 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This work-tool provides the structure, guidelines and text examples for creating the DQ program initiation completion report. In the whole DQ program WBS, this is the most critical deliverable. It provides the overall results and analysis of the current state of data quality and DQ assurance of the systems and processes, within the scope of DQ program. It provides the solutions, recommendation and proposed game-plan, resources and funding needs. This deliverable is the final input the stakeholders need to take a decision on how much resources they want to deploy for the DQ program. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-quality-program-initiation-phase-completion-report.php 917 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Data Quality Program WBS provides a comprehensive list of activities, which build-up a DQ program. One can use this list of activities to crearte a DQ program plan. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-quality-program-wbs.php 918 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This work-tool provides the template, guidelines and the text examples to create a universal and central reference for all data related definitions and standards. For example having a universal standard data-model for 'customer entity' or a domain value standard set for locations etc...This reference document is the foundation to bring in the consistency on the way we store, interpret and define our data. An organization needs to provide the universal definition and standards to people building systems and processes. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-management-standards-entities.php 921 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Data quality policy can be like a clause in the constitution of the company, which help people take tough calls in the moments of Devil's alternative. The purpose of this work-tool is to provide you all the possible headings and example text for a data quality policy which suits your function. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-quality-policy.php 922 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Data Quality Assurance Management Guidelines, is the central reference point to understand the Data Quality Assurance mechanisms and controls. These are the mechanisms one needs to incorporate, while designing the IT systems and business processes. This document forms and annexure to the Data Quality Policy. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-quality-assurance-control-guidelines.php 923 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 While in a typical system landscape of an organization, there is documentation of individual data entities at a system level (for example data Model documentation for ERP system) available. Most of this documentation is of IT interest (though the logical data model should be owned and specified by the business). As you set of data quality frame-work, one needs to identify the business owners and business custodians of data-groups. This is from the DQ practice principle that business needs to own the data. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-group-master.php 924 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 DMA WBS provides you with the list of activities that you will do in a DMA exercise. You can use this list of activities to create a project plan for DMA. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-mapping-assessment-wbs.php 926 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This Checklist is used as a reference to assess the current state of enterprise level (or functional level for some components) Data Management and governance. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-governance-management-checklist.php 927 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "A lack of data quality does not always mean high risk. Similarly, less than perfect solution to address a data quality issue may still be acceptable given its cost-benefit. Risk assessment is driven by many factors. The core to success for ensuring data quality and getting the adequate funding is when we spend right money at the right place. One cannot be a perfectionist in DQ. This checklist enables the user to weight the risk of the DQ issue and its possible solutions on factors like- Volume and Value risk, Speed of deterioration, criticality of data, cascading of DQ gap to external stakeholders, probability of incidence etc... " http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-quality-risk-assessment-checklist.php 929 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This tool enables you to assess and quantify the business impact of a data quality gap, given its risk. While the Data Quality Risk Assessment checklist is more of a back-end review for the analysts, the output of this tool goes to the business owners and CIO, for final decision. A Data Quality gap may be felt by a single function, but its actual impact could be cross-functional. http://www.executionmih.com/tool-kit/data-quality-gap-impact-assessment-tool.php 930 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "Given the ever-growing need for Business Intelligence, organizations are moving towards establishing more permanent organizations to address this subject." http://www.executionmih.com/trends/bicc-competency-centre.php " 531 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "This text is a replica of the page at maxager.com/news/pressreleases/2007021307_SurveyPR.pdf, and is intellectual property of Maxager. For more information contact http://www.maxager.com. " http://www.executionmih.com/trends/metrics-not-optimize-profitability.php " 536 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "Knightsbridge is a consulting organization around the subject of Data and Information Management. They have been recently acquired by HP." http://www.executionmih.com/trends/business-intelligence-payoff.php " 537 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "For more information on EII, please see Ipedo's EII Zone or ebizQ's EII section. For more details on any aspect of the survey, please contact Peter Spielvogel, peter@ipedo.com." http://www.executionmih.com/trends/eii-survey.php " 540 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "During 2005 and early 2006, a survey was carried out by Harte-Hanks Trillium Software involving a sample consisting of 216 attendees from large companies at data quality and data management industry events around the world. The overall aim of this survey is to understand how data quality is managed in large organizations today, and how it might be in the future." http://www.executionmih.com/trends/data-quality-survey-results.php " 541 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "Gartner's survey of more than 350 global organizations in December 2006 showed the largest number of respondents (40 percent) stated that efforts were sponsored by specific executives; 25 percent said they were sponsored by an IT manager; and 25 percent indicated that they had no executive sponsor." http://www.executionmih.com/trends/bi-vision-strategy-disconnect.php " 542 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 With SAP acquiring Business-Objects, Oracle acquiring Hyperion and IBM acquiring Cognos in 2007, 2008 brings in a lot of anticipation.This gives a message that Business Intelligence has become an important component of end-to-end value chain for the corporate customers, and the big players are working fast to plug that gap. http://www.executionmih.com/tips/beware-of-data-federation.php 849 Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 SaaS in Business Intelligence is essentially providing a web based Business Intelligence solution, with " basic" functionality with fairly acceptable and core level of configuration capabilities. http://www.executionmih.com/trends/business-intelligence-saas.php 851 Mon, 3 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Enterprise Search in BI allows a user to search through the published reports, views and meta data. This has a great potential of making information more easily and widely available. http://www.executionmih.com/trends/business-intelligence-enterprise-search.php 852 Mon, 3 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 In-memory analytics is an emerging trend, which enables the analytics to be performed in RAM, therefore avoiding the need for time-consuming hard-disk i/o tasks. This has a trememndous potential of quantum jump in BI performance. http://www.executionmih.com/trends/in-memory-bi-analytics.php 853 Mon, 10 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Data Analytics has been a subject for Business Process Out-sourcing. This page looks at what and why of Data Analytics outsourcing, and a list of success factors. BPO for Data Analytics can be placed at the initial stage, where companies have started experimenting with this concept. http://www.executionmih.com/trends/data-analytics-out-sourcing.php 860 Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Embedded BI can be a fundamental quantum jump in the way BI is positioned in an organization. Embedded BI broadly means that business applications can have embedded BI components, which can be invoked as part of that business application. http://www.executionmih.com/trends/embedded-bi.php 868 Mon, 10 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Interactive Visualization is a key tool for improving the speed of implementation and user acceptability of BI initiatives. http://www.executionmih.com/trends/interactive-visualization.php 854 Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 The board definition of SOA is an architecture, where the business applications use a set of loosely coupled services, which are essentially set of small, encapsulated programs. These services can be shared across the computing environments and business applications within an organization. SOA in BI opens many opportunities,though it is yet in the nascent stage of adoption. http://www.executionmih.com/trends/bi-service-oriented-architecture.php 869 Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Customer Dimension and its attributes are used across most of the analysis. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=351 351 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 An organization product strategy is hinged around this dimension. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=355 355 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "If there are new business requirements which need a change in your current dimensional model, you may not have to build net set of schemas. " http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=469 " 469 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "Data-Marts as they start for a function or a department, can still be designed on a process or a theme. " http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=470 " 470 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "As business intelligence team grows in size and responsibility, it tends to become a department within itself, with a group heavy weight "know it all" business analysts, architects and data managers. Overtime they tend to loose touch with business." http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=471 " 471 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "There are various ways to have the aggregate queries on dimensional tables. However, one needs to have some other tricks for slowly changing dimensions. " http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=472 " 472 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "There is no data-integration system, which can fully self-document the data integration flow and process. " http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=473 " 473 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "Data Warehouse is one solution which can be implemented in million different ways. People have to maintain a right balance between analysis and time-bound decisions. " http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=474 " 474 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "Sometime due to specific query needs and for audit-ability of your information, you would need to maintain a link between sources to end information. " http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=475 " 475 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "If you want to have a good cross-drilling capability, its important to have conformed dimensions across multiple fact tables. " http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=476 " 476 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "The fact table (leading to a single schema ) should be based upon a business process and not by the source system or an entity. Most of the business questions and information needs are hinged around a process." http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=477 " 477 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "There are million ways to implement an information management solution. You can range from a big-bang traditional method or incremental-iterative-agile approach. " http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=478 " 478 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "If you have the conformed dimensions, you have to ensure that any change in the dimensions is implemented accordingly." http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=484 " 484 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "In case you have a dimensional tables where significant proportion of instances have majority of the fields as null data in the records, one should look at creating a snowflake to save disk-space, incase the database system is a fixed field records (where null fields also occupy disk space)." http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=485 " 485 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "This is a tip which is universally applicable on Data Quality, Data Warehouse and Performance Management Framework. Quick and successful implementation of a show-case project needs you to focus on items with high feasibility and high impact." http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=509 " 509 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "Data Monitoring routines may take-up fairly large system resource. One should create monitoring indicators which should first look at the broadest signs for good, bad or ugly." http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=510 " 510 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "Data monitoring is also as much a business issue as it is an IT issue. IT should review with business the data monitoring priorities, tolerance ranges, exceptions and also the business rules on what needs to be done on when an exception is identified." http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=511 " 511 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "Data is a business resource and therefore should be owned by business. IT is a strategic support function, but data has to be owned by business, like any other business asset." http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=512 " 512 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "Data quality program is a job of a missionary and not of an event manager." http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=513 " 513 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "A high-impact show-case Data Mart project should start from a single and a stable system requiring lesser level of transformation." http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=523 " 523 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "If you feel that you will take four weeks to complete ETL Design to testing, add another four weeks to it. Chances are that you will find lot of surprises. " http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=524 " 524 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "Avoid taking production reports from staging area, as there could be little tuning of data during subsequent stages of transformation, creation of data sets during loading. " http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=525 " 525 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 " Having a refresh window from the technology owners of the source system is one of the major issues." http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=526 " 526 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "If you are using an OLAP layer on your Data Warehouse, minimize aggregates in Data Warehouse as that can be addressed by OLAP multi-dimensional database. If you are using ROLAP, the same remains true. " http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=527 " 527 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "Most of the business themes, challenges, issues and information requirements are available in the PPTs, Minutes of the meetings, business plan submissions etc. " http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=528 " 528 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "One of the most common questions you will phase is that "why can't we do the same thing in excel? Just import the data and create the pivots and bingo..". Be ready with the arguments of Data Integrity, Historical Data and Integration across the system, common definitions etc.." http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=529 " 529 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "Pure MOLAP limits your view and reporting only to the level of aggregates. Today's business needs demand a drill down to the transaction level details. Unless you have a significantly cheap and short term option to purchase, avoid pure MOLAP. " http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=530 " 530 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Data Federation is essentially an ability to pick the data from various source systems and directly feed it into your OLAP and End-User tools. It means that one does not have to go through the painful process of Extraction, Transformation and Loading. Data federation also provides a "virtual" data-warehouse, where it can run a query across multiple systems as if it was coming from a singular source. However, it does not make Data Federation as your core integration solution. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=848 848 Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 Periodic Rationalization and Prioritization of Information has multiple benefits. This leads to information clutter and inefficiencies. A periodic clean-up will help, while you implement longer and more fundamental solution to this problem. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=861 861 Mon, 3 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Every organization has organically and chaotically evolved on Business Intelligence. This has led to plethora of IT platforms and business applications, with cost and inefficiency over-head. This page shares the issue of Data-Marts proliferation, solutions and practical scenario in implementation. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=863 863 Mon, 3 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Most of the large organizations have multiple contracts and licensing regimes for same platforms. For example, you may find multiple licenses for business objects in different markets for the same company. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=864 864 Mon, 10 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Governance and Standards essentially points to the consistency and robustness of managing change in the BI environment. The key issue behind high cost of BI is varied IT platform, standards and processes, which have additional over-head and also make BI inefficient and defective. As an organization we can undergo different types of changes, which have to dealt by effective governance and standards. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=866 866 Mon, 10 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 You can reduce your costs, by gradually testing and adopting Open-Source BI in a select set of areas. Open-source BI is gradually gaining attention. Open Source BI is essentially business intelligence software which is open-source. There is a difference within open source and commercial open source. In this page we are talking about commercial open source (don't even think of pure open source, if you are a medium level enterprise and above), which is not free of cost but of minimal cost, with adequate support and services infrastructure. Pentaho and Jasper are examples of commercial open source. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=867 867 Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 The Data Steward Role has a great significance and potential. Making is accountable, empowered and well-positioned will help. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=877 877 Thu, 3 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Master Data Management is 75% definition+discipline and 25% creational and automation. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=878 878 Thu, 3 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Organizations have failed in the past to have integrated physical metadata repository, due to the reasons of technology diversity, lack of standards and sheer lack of stamina. As independent and multiple metadata repositories get developed, the more realistic solution is to have integration of these repositories while allowing them to function independently. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=883 883 Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 We recommend to go for phased approach for BI environment integration against a big-bang method. The reasons are lack of business and IT stamina, testing our assumptions, maintain stability and to develop our expertise. The phased approach should first go for integrating the plumbing work like ETL, followed by more front-end integration. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=884 884 Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Business owned applications seem like an inevitable reality, where businesses are funding, developing and managing the applications on their own. This leads to data quality issues and chaos. Instead of fight or flight approach, a CIO can embrace this reality and manage it to minimize risk and disruption. Added benefit will be a reduction in these non IT-owned applications over time. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=887 887 Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 As an organization develops enterprise level data standards, it has to figure out the approach and plan for existing data and applications. One cannot have a big-bang conversion approach. Data Steward needs to drive a road-map, which focuses on the business case driven priorities, and also does a piggy-back on the mega IT initiatives. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=888 888 Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Unstructured content in an organization is typically the last phase of evolution of a metadata environment. Most of the unstructured content is linked to business metadata. You can use various tools for content management, collaboration management and business process management to enable automatic generation of Metadata. There are some more basic methods like using shared drives and encouraging standard templates. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=891 891 Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Typically there are multiple dates associated with a fact table. Place each data as a separate dimension. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=893 893 Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 One needs to store data in most granular form in the data warehouse. However, in certain situation, you may need to supplement the same with summary data to enhance the performance for predictable queries. One should have the detailed and aggregate data stored in separate fact tables. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=897 897 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This page provides the Tips on sequencing of DMA, setting realistic data quality expectations, offline vs. online and how to delibk DMA from a staging area of DW. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=899 899 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Data Management Standards for data entities involve setting up the universal and enterprise-wide domains, data models and business rules for data entities. This may create a challenge for some key entities like customer, vendor, product etc...The objective for setting-up universal standards is a combination of collaboration and executive decision. Skewing on either extreme could lead to lack of ownership and delays. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=935 935 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Data Management Standards for data entities involve setting up the universal and enterprise-wide domains, data models and business rules for data entities. Some examples are- Customer entity, product entitiy etc..Though the terminologies may sound techie, most of these will be defined by business and also used for running business and processes. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=936 936 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 In today's world, when organizations are focusing on their core competencies, the supply and sales chains have well-integrated distribution partners and suppliers. These partners are virtually part of your organization. In this spirit, it is important to cascade your data management standards to your business partners. This sharing has the advantage of achieving a better integration and engagement. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=937 937 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Publish Data Quality Control Guidelines is one of the simplest and easiest tasks you can do to kick-start your Data Quality Agenda. You can evolve these guidelines over time. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=938 938 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Should one wait for the operational systems to stabilize or having a minimum thresh-hold of data quality before starting on the data warehouse project? http://www.executionmih.com/q/entry-criteria-dw-project.php " 422 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "There are vendors who claim that they have the pre-build reports/views/metrics, which can meet good proportion of our need and can provide a quick implementation. Is it a valid claim?" http://www.executionmih.com/q/pre-configured-reports-do-they-work?.php " 429 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Who should own data quality initiative- Business or technology? http://www.executionmih.com/q/ownership-of-data-quality-initiative.php " 436 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 What is the difference between an Operational Data Store and Data Warehouse http://www.executionmih.com/q/ods-vs-data-warehouse.php " 437 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "I work in a large organization, and during one of the discussions, the CIO stated that we have an excellent level of data quality. This is because in last five years we had very few cases of customer complaints wrong billing statements to our customers. I" http://www.executionmih.com/q/data-quality-business-case.php " 448 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "If I have to start a data quality program, where should I start?" http://www.executionmih.com/q/starting-a-data-quality-program.php " 449 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "We are a consumer durables company. We were working aggressively on our Data Warehouse project. As we have just finished our design, we come to know that the logistics management system is getting re-written. What should we do, as this will lead to change in our data-warehouse?" http://www.executionmih.com/q/source-system-re-writing.php " 450 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "We are diversified financial services company. We have multiple systems for different services and we use data-warehouse route to enable a an operational data store of single customer view and Data Warehouse for analytics and reporting. The issue is that we have people making changes in the source systems without telling us, which is leading to many issues in generating information out of the data warehouse. What should we do?" http://www.executionmih.com/q/alignment-source-systems-data-warehouse.php " 451 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "We are a medium size company. We have developed two data-marts and we got it done in a cheap way by leveraging the existing licenses of SQL Server 2000? However, surprisingly we are unable to pull users to start utilizing these data marts to full potential. What could be the reasons?" http://www.executionmih.com/q/maximizing-usage-data-warehouse.php " 452 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 We are going to start the Data Quality Program. Should we go ahead and by a Data Profiling tool? http://www.executionmih.com/q/data-profiling-tool.php " 453 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 We are going to start a Data Quality Program and I am assigned to do an assessment of Data Quality. We have huge databases and I have been advised by one of the statistical analysis person within the company to start with establishing the sampling logic. However we are not comfortable as we may miss-out something. What should we do? http://www.executionmih.com/q/statistical-sampling-data-quality..php " 454 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "Logistics management is core to our business. We were in the process of getting the sponsorship for the Data warehouse project, when its decided to re-write one of our core systems. The management wants the Data Warehouse to be productionlized along with the new system. What will be your recommendation?" http://www.executionmih.com/q/launch-source-system-data-warehouse.php " 455 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "We are an insurance company, and we are implementing the Data Warehouse. We are trying to implement a security matrix, but both the sponsors and stakeholders are not in favor of a strict security, as they feel that this Data should be an enterprise resource. What should we do?" http://www.executionmih.com/q/data-warehouse-security-matrix.php " 456 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "We have started a data quality program in our company. When we approached the users to assess the level of data quality expectations, all of them said that they wanted 100% accurate data and also gave reasons on why the heavens will fall if the data quality is bad. We are at the dead end and we don't know how to prioritize and deliver. What should we do?" http://www.executionmih.com/q/data-quality-program-prioritization..php " 457 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 We started with a Data Warehouse initiative few months back. The Vendor providing the Data Warehouse suite committed that phase I of the project will be done within 6 months. However we suddenly are spending too much time in ETL phase. The argument given is that our data is in bad shape and it needs to cleansed and also the extraction and transformation design is taking more time than estimated. What should we do? http://www.executionmih.com/q/etl-phase-too-long.php " 458 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "We have got an OK for a Data Warehouse at the market level. However, there is an enterprise meta data project which is going on at a regional level. This project is expected to implement common standards for OLTP and Data Warehouse applications. There is a pressure on us to wait till the meta-data initiative is complete. What should we do?" http://www.executionmih.com/q/data-warehouse-wait-for-metadata.php " 459 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 We implemented a Data Mart on sales management in our company. However the problem is that reports from Data Warehouse are not matching with the reports from the operational source systems. This is happening because we cleansed and augmented some data during the one time migration of historical data. What should we do? http://www.executionmih.com/q/source-vs-data-warehouse-reporting.php " 460 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "What data is necessary to create, implement, and sustain a performance management system, and how is that data most effectively used?" http://www.executionmih.com/q/data-for-performance-management.php " 461 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "What is the difference between datawarehouse, datamart and datamining?" http://www.executionmih.com/q/data-warehouse-mart-mining.php " 462 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "We have Data quality assurance controls missing in our environment, and it seems to be a very high risk situation. If a data quality assurance control is missing, does it mean that risk rating will be high? " http://www.executionmih.com/q/data-quality-assurance-risk-assessment.php 931 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 We are a start-up, and we are going through rapid organization changes. Is it possible to assign the business owners for the data-group, because one does need some level of stability in that role? http://www.executionmih.com/q/data-quality-business-ownership.php 932 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Lot of our data in lying in the excel sheets and in the ad-hoc systems developed by business groups. How do we include these systems in our Data-Quality Frame-work? We don't have documentation on many of these systems. http://www.executionmih.com/q/informal-systems-data-quality-scope.php 933 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 We have small system initiative. Can we skip the use of object-level data quality tracking and straight-way use the method-level tracking? http://www.executionmih.com/q/detail-data-quality-tracking.php 934 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Project definition phase comes before the data warehouse project initiation phase. This is the hazy phase, where the idea of Data Warehouse takes shape http://www.executionmih.com/data-warehouse/project-definition-phase.php DJA Mon, 11 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Data warehouse project intiation is the stage, where the first level assessment of the Data Warehouse scope, cost and time estimate is done. This is mainly achieved by prioritizing the business themes for Data-Warehouse. http://www.executionmih.com/data-warehouse/project-initiation-phase-wbs.php DJB Mon, 11 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This is the stage of business requirements gathering at a detailed level. This includes interviews, detailed reporting and analytics requirements followed by assessment of current IS-IT environment. http://www.executionmih.com/data-warehouse/project-business-requirements-wbs.php DJC Mon, 11 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This is the stage where you translate the business requirements into detailed dimensional modeling. http://www.executionmih.com/data-warehouse/project-dimensional-modeling-wbs.php DJD Mon, 11 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Data Warehouse design phase is hinged around the extraction, transformation and loading phase. It is advisable to do a test run on a simple schema, before getting down to a full design of your enterprise data warehouse. http://www.executionmih.com/data-warehouse/design-phase-wbs.php DJE Mon, 18 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Data Warehouse can be considered incomplete without the OLAP server layer. This topic covers the design work needed around OLAP and for OLAP+DW combination. http://www.executionmih.com/data-warehouse/olap-design-phase-wbs.php DJF Mon, 18 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Core Business Intelligence Platform includes Data Warehouse Server, Metadata management tool, ETL tool and OLAP server. These are the foundation/plumbing/infrastructure elements of your business intelligence. We recommend for you to go for a single and financially robust vendor for as many of these elements as possible. http://www.executionmih.com/tips/single-business-intelligence-vendor.php 952 Mon, 18 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Business requirements around your BI initiative will be one of many other inputs and considerations, which will drive your BI model, design and architecture. Business information requirements keep on changing and by the time you deliver your Data Warehouse, chances are than a fair proportion of the information requirements might have changed. http://www.executionmih.com/tips/BI-business-requirements.php 953 Mon, 18 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Metadata is core to BI architecture. It provides a map, a catalogue and reference on data about the business, technical and operational elements of Business Intelligence Components. It spans across Business Metadata, BI technical metadata and Source Systems Metadata. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/bi-metadata-model.php ZAG Mon, 25 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Back-Room Metadata spans across the Data Source and BI Technical Metadata areas and hence occupies a large scope. It encompasses the ETL metadata, data model, security profiles and audit/usage details. http://www.executionmih.com/data-warehouse/dw-backroom-metadata.php DFK Mon, 25 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "Business Intelligence Metadata Architecture has essentially two scenarios- Centralized and Distributed. This page provides you the representation and comparison across these two scenarios. " http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/bi-metadata-architecture-scenarios.php ZBF Mon, 25 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Business Intelligence Metadata Management has the agenda of reduced BI efforts, data quality & integrity, flexibility, standardization and centralization of administration & usage of BI platform. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/bi-metadata-management-program.php ZDE Mon, 25 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Business Intelligence Competency Centre (BICC)is a kind of 'practice' unit, within an enterprise, which guides, governs and supports the efforts related to making an intelligence enterprise. The inherent assumption is that information is an enterprise level asset and it has to be managed accordingly. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/competency-centre-preface.php ZEA Mon, 25 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Business Intelligence as a subject touches all functions and processes in an organization. Therefore, a Business Intelligence Competency Centre will be having a broad-based and cross-functional skill-set. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/competency-centre-organization.php ZEB Mon, 25 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 The strategize phase will be reviewing the state of current processes and capabilities to finalize on the BICC road-map, effort estimation and benefit expectations. Business Intelligence Competency Centre is a foundation element of your business intelligence agenda. It will be requiring lot of finesse and details to get sponsorship for moving to establishment phase. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/competency-centre-strategy-roadmap.php ZEC Mon, 25 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This page provides a comprehensive work break-down structure for establishing a Business Intelligence Competency Centre. Many of the components will be similar to what you will do in creating an ERP (say) competency centre. The difference is in the details. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/competency-centre-establish.php ZED Mon, 25 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This page provides details of the management and tasks around keeping BICC running and continuously evolving. The work of the sponsors does not end with the establishment phase. There needs to be a continuous 'feedback and improvement' cycle. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/competency-centre-operate.php ZEE Mon, 25 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Business Intelligence Competency Centre provides services around people, process, technology and data domain. This page provides a high level list. A mix-n-match of these services can create a customized service mosaic. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/competency-centre-services.php ZEH Mon, 1 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Business Intelligence Competency Centre has three phases- Strategize, Establish and Operate. A BICC evolves over time and it needs to be customized as per the organization needs and readiness. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/competency-centre-setup.php ZEI Mon, 1 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Governance is core to Business Intelligence Competency Centre. Process Compliance, Technology Governance and Data Governance are closely inter-linked. They provide robust vehicle to BI initiatives in terms of process quality and reliability, infrastructure management, vendor management, and an end-to-end data management frame-work. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/competency-centre-process-data-technology-governance.php ZEF Mon, 1 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Business Intelligence competency centre has diverse components and requires diversity in terms of skills and their scale. One needs multi-skilled consultant base, supported by rigor of methodologies and IT centre of excellence. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/competency-centre-competencies.php ZEG Mon, 1 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Data Mining term is used interchangeably with KDD. In reality, it is one of the steps in the whole process of knowledge discovery in databases. Data Mining needs a well defined business case and a diligent data preparation and has to be followed with a detailed evaluation of the discovery results. http://www.executionmih.com/data-mining/what-is-kdd.php GAA Mon, 1 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 KDD - Data Mining program has two streams of requirements. Business/Functional requirements are centered around growth in revenue & profitability and business process optimization. Non-functional requirements like high response time, accuracy, visualization, metadata management and data quality ensure a continued sponsorship of a KDD program. http://www.executionmih.com/data-mining/kdd-program-requirements-goals-objectives.php GAB Mon, 1 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Knowledge Discovery in Databases comprises four key stages in an iterative flow- Business Case Definition, Data Preparation, Data Mining and Evaluation. Data Mining has no value on a stand-alone basis. Its success depends on how well you define the problem and on the level of diligence in data preparation. http://www.executionmih.com/data-mining/kdd-process-preparation-evaluation.php GAC Mon, 1 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Data Mining architecture has three layers- Database Layer with sub-layers of database & metadata, application layer performing data management & algorithms and front-end layer for administration, input parameter settings and results display/visualization. http://www.executionmih.com/data-mining/technology-architecture-application-frontend.php GAD Mon, 1 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Key issues around KDD-Data Mining are around limited information, noisy & missing data, level of uncertainty and dynamically & fast-changing data reference. http://www.executionmih.com/data-mining/kdd-challenge-issues.php GAE Mon, 1 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Knowledge Discovery in Databases (KDD) methodology comprises five phases- Definition (vision/ business case/tools), specification (requirements/techniques/data analysis), design (data preparation/business case model), build and deploy. http://www.executionmih.com/data-mining/kdd-methodology-framework-phases.php GAF Mon, 1 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Data Mining Propensity modeling works on discovering a natural inclination or tendency across the variables. This group of techniques includes Cluster Analysis, Association Analysis and Sequential/Temporal patterns http://www.executionmih.com/data-mining/propensity-cluster-association-patterns.php GAG Mon, 1 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Predictive modeling is used to create a model of future or expected behavior. This group of data mining techniques includes Induction, Classification, Regression and Neural Networks. http://www.executionmih.com/data-mining/predictive-regression-induction-classification-neural.php GAH Mon, 1 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 The physical data-warehouse database design and implementation includes setting naming standards, designing database tables and columns, setting aggregation plan and resource handling parameters. http://www.executionmih.com/data-warehouse/physical-database-design-implementation.php DJG Mon, 15 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Synonyms and Views create a user friendly layer for user access and querying. They also enable to make underlying database changes with minimum impact on user access interface. http://www.executionmih.com/tips/synonyms-views.php 961 Mon, 15 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 BI initiatives provide unique situations on decisioning. It is difficult to make a business customer to decide on which information he will and which he will not. This asks for better and clearer articulation to the business to enable faster decisioning. http://www.executionmih.com/tips/articulate-better-BI-decision.php 969 Tue, 16 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Pre-configured BI frame-works claim to be plug-and-play BI set-up with respect to a given industry and function. If it works for you, it can be a blessing, but if it does not, it can be much more pain, compared to doing it from scratch. http://www.executionmih.com/tips/pre-configured-designed-BI.php 970 Tue, 16 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 When it comes to developing an organizational brain around BI, one should build internal capability to become technology and vendor-independent, without giving away the benefits of these two enabling entities. http://www.executionmih.com/tips/building-bi-modeling-analysis-capabilities.php 971 Tue, 16 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 BI Performance Management includes various aspects like BI project management, BI information quality, platform quality, organizational impact, ease and extent of usage etc... This page sets the context, before you look at the details of individual performance aspects. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/performance-management-context.php ZFA Tue, 16 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Business Intelligence Project Management traverses all layers of BI and all different type of initiatives. There is no single type of BI project. The performance management factors are to be applicable on different kinds and sizes of BI initiatives. We also talk about some of the tricks one can apply to achieve project adherence to timelines, cost, scope and process-quality http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/project-performance-success-metrics.php ZFB Tue, 16 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Information and data quality is fundamental to BI. Most glitzy and sophisticated outputs of BI are worthless, if the data contained therein cannot be trusted. One cannot have any BI performance parameter to take precedence over the quality of information. The information quality includes data correctness, data completeness, data consistency and integrated view of data. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/performance-information-data-quality.php ZFC Tue, 16 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 The BI platform quality talks about the BI scalability, extensibility, flexibility and stability to handle increasing number of users, data, queries and applications. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/performance-platform-system-quality.php ZFD Tue, 16 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This page talks about the extent to which users are able to use the data warehouse and how much of the benefit it has brought to them, both in reality and perception. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/performance-usage-metrics.php ZFE Tue, 16 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This performance area goes beyond the individual and looks at how well BI has performed at an organization level. Most of the performance parameters here talk about the ultimate benefits realized from the BI. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/performance-metrics-organization-impact.php ZFF Tue, 16 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This BI operational performance aspect deals with the resource utilization, response time, and cost of operations, security, and administrative ease. http://www.executionmih.com/business-intelligence/performance-operational-success.php ZFG Tue, 16 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 BiPM Institute has created world's larget encyclopedia-cum-knowledgebase on the subjects of 'Execution- Make it Happen' and 'Information Management'. With 1800+ research-driven content, one million page downloads and 10000+ registered members and 15+ person-years of effort, this knowledge-base is now the most comprehensive vendor-independent reference. http://www.executionmih.com/template/professional_edition.php TTT Tue, 03 nov 2009 11:43:52 +0530 This KPI measures the cost incurred per sales lead done through telemarketing. This is a KPI-class. http://www.executionmih.com/sales-kpi/telemarketing-cost-per-lead.php 856 Mon, 10 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This KPI Class related to the amount of sales compensation (and its individual components) given per unit (or a piece) of sale or/ and per dollar of sale done http://www.executionmih.com/sales-kpi/compensation-per-unit-value.php 857 Mon, 10 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This KPI Class related to the amount of sales cost (and its individual components) given per unit (or a piece) of sale or/ and per dollar of sale done. This KPI should be studied in conjunction with sales compensation per unit and per value of sale. You will some content in this page similar to the KPI related to sales compensation. http://www.executionmih.com/sales-kpi/cost-per-unit-value.php 858 Mon, 10 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This KPI class assesses the performance on how fast are you able to close a sale, from initiation or a certain step within the sales process. http://www.executionmih.com/sales-kpi/sales-velocity-turn-around.php 859 Mon, 10 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Sales Value productivity measures the sales revenue generated by each sales person on an average. Sales value productivity KPI class is the mother KPI, which has a direct link to the business performance. http://www.executionmih.com/sales-kpi/sales-value-productivity.php 880 Tue, 8 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Sales Volume productivity measures the sales unit's volume generated by each sales person on an average. This is more of a supporting parameter to help build and manage your sales performance. Shareholder is more concerned about the sales value productivity. Sales volume productivity has to be carefully balanced, as both highs and lows have an undesirable impact. http://www.executionmih.com/sales-kpi/sales-volume-productivity.php 880 Tue, 8 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Sales Channel Density is the measure of our ability to reach the customer. It is equivalant to the ' Feet on the Street'. Sales channel density for a location is equivalant to the depth of business presence. Sales channel density demands investment and has to be carefully managed. A sparse sales density as well as an over-crowded sales force, can be detrimental. http://www.executionmih.com/sales-kpi/sales-channel-density.php 880 Tue, 8 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Sales Volume productivity measures the sales units volume generated by each sales person on an average. This is more of a supporting parameter to help build and manage your sales performance. Shareholder are more concerned about the sales value productitivty. Sales volume productivity has to be carefully balanced, as both highs and lows have an undesirable impact. http://www.executionmih.com/sales-kpi/sales-volume-productivity.php 881 Tue, 16 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Sales Channel Density is the measure of our ability to reach the customer. It is equivalent to the ' Feet on the Street'. Sales channel density for a location is equivalent to the depth of business presence. Sales channel density demands investment and has to be carefully managed. A sparse sales density as well as an over-crowded sales force can be detrimental. http://www.executionmih.com/sales-kpi/sales-channel-density.php 882 Tue, 16 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Lead Management the process of generating the list of potential customer prospects, prioritizing and classifying them, organizing sales effort around them and finally converting or tracking them to closure. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/leads-management-overview.php OAA Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 This page gives the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of sales leads management sub-function http://www.executionmih.com/sales/leads-management-SWOT.php OAB Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 Telemarketing gets its data from the databases provided from the third party source or could be calling existing customers for selling new or enhanced products. Telemarketing can be done internally within a unit or can be outsource to 3rd party telemarketers. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/telemarketing-lead-generation.php OAC Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 Point of sale is perhaps the most potent in terms of the generating leads as you are dealing with a prospect who has come to your outlet, and therefore is carrying a first level of interest about your product/services. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/Point-of-sale-POS-leads.php OAD Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 Starting from the rock shows organized by the car companies to local community events to seminars and conferences organized for higher level institutional products, the customer events are a good mechanics for lead generation. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/events-lead-generation.php OAE Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 Advertising is one mode by which you can generate "high volume and low information" leads. You can have a small cut-out form, which a person can fill-up and send to you or give a call-in number for people to call. At the moment, this topic covers the advertising aspects in publications and television and not on hoardings or outdoors. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/advertising-lead-generation.php OAF Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 Sales Leads database quality has an implication on sales productivity linked to the sales leads http://www.executionmih.com/sales/lead-marketing-database-quality.php OAG Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 You are at a stage whereby the leads generated by marketing or sales function through various channels are available. The next step is to prioritize and classify these leads http://www.executionmih.com/sales/leads-prioritization-classification.php OAH Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 After the prioritization and classification is done, the leads are to be forwarded to the appropriate staff for follow-up and closure. There various factors by which one can allocate the leads. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/leads-allocation-distribution.php OAI Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 Once you have done the leads distribution by marketing function or a central sales function, it is time to follow-up on the leads by the sales staff. Leads follow-up a closure is core to giving hard dollars to the company's top-line. Follow-up to closure can have any number of steps and interim stages depending upon the kind of product and category of lead. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/leads-follow-up-closure.php OAJ Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 Lead management system is not a business intelligence tool, and therefore we are not going to list it in the "Tools domain". However we are going to have topics dedicated to the source systems linked to a given functional domain. As the quality and capability of a source system plays an important part in a good Business Intelligence delivery, understanding the typical features of a source system will help you in your Business Intelligence objectives. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/leads-management-system.php OAK Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 This pages gives the overview of the Sales Revenue Management function. It provides a high level view of the business objectives, key business questions and success drivers. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/revenue-management.php OBA Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 This Page gives you the Strengths, Weaknesses, opportunities and Threats of Sales Revenue Management function. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/revenue-swot.php OBB Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 If you meet a traditional sales person, he may come up with a simple rule "Sales is a simple function of the number of sales people you have unleashed on the customer". This may look like at shotgun approach, but followed by most of the sales executives in different shades. The multiplicity of channels, 3rd party distributors etc are essentially in effort to increase the sales force density and geographical coverage. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/force-density.php OBC Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 Geographical spread is linked to the "width" of your presence. Sales managers define the target customers and business potential to get the sanction for expanding the presence to the new geographies. This is not a simple sales presence expansion. As you decide to expand your geographical presence in terms of distribution, you also have to expand your supply chain, delivery, and after-sales servicing capabilities to those geographic locations (this will be discussed in the supply chain management). http://www.executionmih.com/sales/geographic-expansion.php OBD Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 Sales force productivity along with sales force density completes the equation for sales revenue. Sales force productivity can be defined as the quantum of sales done by a sales person in a given period of time. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/productivity.php OBE Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 Typically the sales force productivity has a direct relationship with the sales velocity. However, it is technically possible to have a low sales velocity, but still having high sales productivity. This is because some product or market conditions inherently extend the time it takes to close a sale. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/sale-velocity-speed.php OBF Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 Sales strike rate is another fine component apart from sales velocity and sales productivity which defines the sales performance of a sales person. The reason we have placed it as a separate component is because, technically speaking you can have a good sales velocity (turnaround time from initiation to sales closure for every sale closed) or sale productivity (sales units and value per sales person per period of time) but still a low strike rate in terms of %age of sales leads which finally resulted in sales closure. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/sale-strike-rate.php OBG Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 Sales cost and profitability is the "bottom-line" part of sales function. A sale, which does not meet the expectation of returns for the share-holders is not termed as success. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/cost-profitability.php OCA Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 One has to define the measures for sales function, which layout the level of emphasis which needs to be placed on sales bottom line (sales profitability) vs Sales Revenue. Sales people generally have a grouse that they get different messages from the management in terms on "topline vs bottomline vs both". They also say that it's not possible to focus both on bottom-line and top-line at the same time. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/objectives-clarity.php OCB Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 Managing sales product mix helps to enhance the sales profitability, as sales people can aim at placing a greater focus on more profitable products. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/product-mix-profitability.php OCC Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 Typically a sales ticket size translated into the higher sales profitability per dollar of sale. Sales people are always encouraged and incentivized for having larger ticket size. While the ticket size has to do with the sales effort, here are the other factors which influence the ticket size http://www.executionmih.com/sales/ticket-size-mix.php OCD Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 This part is covered in more detail in sales channel management. There are many other factors which govern the decisions around sales channel mix. In this page, we will be covering the linkage of sales channel to sales cost and profitability (SCAP) in this page. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/channel-mix-profitability.php OCE Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 Sales functions are typically considered equivalent to P&L function where they are measured on the revenue generated by them minus the cost incurred. Variability of the sales cost is defined as the level to which the sales cost is function of the sales volume/value. Most closer is the linkage between the sales cost and sales volume, more is the variability http://www.executionmih.com/sales/variable-cost.php OCF Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 Sales facilities and infrastructure form a significant component of sales related costs. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/facility-infrastructure.php OCG Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 This topic provides an overview of sales compensation management, providing the scope of this chapter, along with the key success drivers. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/compensation-management.php ODA Mon, 3 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This topic provides various compensation elements which are the building blocks to your overall sales compensation structure http://www.executionmih.com/sales/compensation-components.php ODB Mon, 3 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 The most critical question for a sales manager is to fix the right compensation, by creating balance between the sales cost and sales performance. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/compensation-decision-structure.php ODC Mon, 3 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 We all know that core purpose of the sales compensation, is to drive sales productivity. Sales compensation can go further by driving consistency and improvement of different parameters related to sales performance over weeks, months, quarters and years. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/consistency.php ODD Mon, 3 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "Sales compensation administration is like payroll. Its a hygiene factor. No one notices if it is working well. Hell breaks loose if it does not. " http://www.executionmih.com/sales/compensation-administration.php ODE Mon, 3 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Sales performance is not only to get good sales numbers. It also has a part to play on the profitability and long-term sustainability as well as brand image of a business. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/sale-related-behavior.php ODF Mon, 3 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Sales Channel management is to maximize the performance of sales channels to achieve objectives around sales and distribution. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/channel-management.php OGA Mon, 3 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This pages provides the typical Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities and Threats. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/channel-swot.php OGB Mon, 10 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Sales Channel Acquisition is a longer term commitment (Direct and Indirect Channel) http://www.executionmih.com/sales/channel-partner-acquisition.php OGC Mon, 10 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This page lists out specific trainings which a sales person will go through. Training is a on-going process and typically a new sales person, will cover this portfolio of training over a period of time and thereafter will go through a refresher learning on frequent basis. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/force-training-development.php OGD Mon, 10 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Once you have acquired a sales channel/force/staff, and trained them, the question is on how to retain the high performing and high potential talent. Different companies have different views on sales staff retention. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/channel-retention.php OGE Mon, 10 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Maximizing Productivity in Sales Channel is a sure way to provide greater band-width to Sales Channel in pursuing their main purpose- to make and close sale. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/channel-productivity.php OGF Mon, 10 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A sales channel management system is considered being part of the core systems in a company. There are very few sales channel management systems which include all aspects of sales channel management, and it may be a combination of systems, http://www.executionmih.com/sales/channel-management-system.php OGH Mon, 10 Mar 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This page provides an overview of sales campaign, including business objective, key business questions, success drivers and KPIs for Sales campaign management. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/campaign-management.php OEA Thu, 3 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This page provides the list of strengths, Weaknesses, threats and opportunities linked with the sales campaign management. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/campaign-swot.php OEB Wed, Thu, 3 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A sales campaign ‘perhaps’ is among the tougher challenges, as it demands quick reaction to a time-bound project and opportunity.Instead of ad-hoc response to a sales campaign, an organization can create readiness future campaigns. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/campaign-infrastructure.php OEC Thu, 3 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This page provides the building blocks of analytics and performance measurement for sales campaign management http://www.executionmih.com/sales/campaign-business-intelligence-Analysis.php OED Thu, 3 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This pages provides various data quality issues which could arise in sales campaign management, and possible solutions. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/campaign-data-management.php OEE Thu, 3 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Sales process covers the effectiveness and efficiency of a sales process. Sales processes are the bedrock of a healthy sales performance. Sales processes provide support to the sales channel and also enforce a discipline within the sales channel to build strong sales organization. It is both a service provider as well as conscience keeper. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/process-management.php OFA Tue, 8 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A sales organization uses wide variety of sales material including sales kit, sales representation and sales promotion material. A sales operations function has to leverage upon the capability of other functions to provide efficiency and to stay focused on its core capabilities. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/material-distribution.php OFB Tue, 8 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Sales persons have the greatest level of touch-points, and their behavior make or break on the brand image and perception of a business. Given the compulsiveness to sell, the representation discipline is a big support as well as a challenge from a sales person's point of view. http://www.executionmih.com/sales/representation.php OFC Tue, 8 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Customer segmentation firstly has to define on what do we mean by the customers, and also what should be and should not be done in customer segmentation. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/segmentation-overview.php NAA thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Customer segmentation can be done on multitude of parameters, This is just an indicative list. The key is to make sure that you are focusing on the parameters which are important for your business. One should avoid the trap of making customer segmentation too complex an exercise. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/segmentation-parameters.php NAB thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A customer segment can drive actions across various functions like product development, sales approach and services management. However, one does not need to come with lot of independent actions. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/segmentation-actions.php NAC thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This is just a high level statement on the approach, and some cautions along with. In customer segmentation, one has to be prudent to maintain a balance on the level of segment. One also has to know early on the invalid or irrelevant segments. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/segmentation-approach.php NAD thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Customer segmentation analysis has to manage the internal data on existing customers as well as the external data on prospects. The external data has a challenge of being dirty and in diverse formats. Most of the data management issues are linked to managing the external data. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/segmentation-data-management.php NAE thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Customer segmentation related analysis does not have an urgency of running a business. Therefore, it may be missed out in comparison to sales analysis or supply chain analysis. Once segmentation is done, it is done again after a gap of at least a year. A regular analysis, will help you to validate your assumptions and also throw some signals on how the customers are moving across the segments. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/segmentation-BI.php NAF thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Customer Value and Profitability is the current or potential contribution to the shareholder value by a customer or customer segment. One needs to have robust modeling and cost/revenue monitoring systems to have a reliable information. The core challenge stays in terms of designing your actions to enhance the customer value and implementing them. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/value-profitability.php NDA thu, 17 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 As you design your actions to enhance customer value and profitability, you need to balance the extent to which you will stratify and differentiate your products and services. Too much differentiation can be counter-productive. One also needs to have end-to-end strategy spanning your products, delivery, sales, post-sales etc, instead of taking independent actions. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/value-profitability-actions.php NDB thu, 17 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Customer Satisfaction and Retention (CSR) are closely but not completely interlinked. CSR needs to be optimized for maximizing shareholder value. Sticking to fundamentals is key to CSR over and above the customer expectation and perception management. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/satisfaction-retention-overview.php NBA thu, 24 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A scorecard is a vehicle not only for reporting performance, but it is a vehicle for “Assessing performance", and “Driving performance". This topic dwells on what all a scorecard should have."http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/performance-scorecard-design.phpJEETue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 With design of scorecards in place, its time to start reviewing your performance and act on the findings"http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/performance-review-framework.phpJEGTue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Execution Management is essentially translating your strategy into reality. It is not just accomplishing a task or a goal, but also to achieve the underlying business objectives. It has to enable a constant review and fine-tuning of your strategy. A good execution management will focus on WHAT as well as HOW of an achievement. Execution management is linked to culture and people management, but is not their parent. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/definition-introduction.php KAA thu, 24 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Strategic Execution Management is an ignored subject, and most of the organization either loose steam or focus by the time they have to start implementing the lofty documents like Strategy Blue-print and Strategic Business Plan. Execution is generally not considered 'Strategic'. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/issues-challenges.php JEB thu, 24 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A good strategic execution needs management alignment at detailed level, tools to generate dashboards and scorecards, discipline, change management of your execution process and a clear communication of strategy to all levels within an organization. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/success-drivers.php KAC thu, 24 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 The sophistication of execution management process and your approach for implementation will depend a lot on the level of readiness of an organization. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/organization-readiness.php KAD thu, 24 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Setting right and balanced measures can go a long way in building good strategy and in its execution http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/performance-measures-drivers-indicators.php JEC thu, 24 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Scorecards and Dashboards are core to Execution Management Framework (EMF). Though used interchangeably, they have distinct functions and designing concepts http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/scorecard-vs-dashboard.php JED wed, 30 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A scorecard is a vehicle not only for reporting performance, but it is a vehicle for Assessing performance, and Driving performance. This topic dwells on what all a scorecard should have. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/performance-scorecard-design.php JEE wed, 30 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Dashboards designs are simpler compared to Scorecards, and typically should be designed with reference to scorecard. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/performance-dashboard-design.php JEF wed, 30 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This page gives a high level view of how a performance review session is conducted. We will soon expand this page into individual topics. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/performance-review-framework.php JEG wed, 30 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Scorecard generation is a complex process as it cannot be fully automated, involves fair degree of analysis, demands expected performance projections and an agreement by various stakeholders on the content. The challenge is not the process but its efficiency. Scorecard generation should not be considered an additional task but a way of life. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/scorecard-generation-process.php KBD wed, 30 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Dashboard generation is a simpler process compared to that of a scorecard. The generation of dashboard should avoid the trap of over scoping and over-analysis. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/dashboard-generation-process.php KBE wed, 30 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A performance review session needs to be time-bound, focused, having a common reference document and should be connected to the previous sessions. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/performance-review-session-imperatives.php KCB wed, 30 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A performance review session needs to come out with agreed set of Key Performance Points (the items which need to be on radar and need addressal), Actions, Assumptions and Decision points. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/performance-review-session-outcomes.php KCC wed, 30 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Facilitation is key to the performance review session, as it has many traps for getting distracted. It needs to maintain balance between discipline and flexibility. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/performance-review-session-facilitation.php KCD wed, 30 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 The strategic alignment includes alignment around the financials, processes, people, external partners and shareholders. Strategic alignment does not mean that your constituents are focused only on your strategic priorities. It looks for a right balance between your key strategies and the business as usual 'keeping lights on' agenda. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/alignment-concept.php KDA Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Financial alignment ensures that more resources are assigned to strategic priorities, while placing the business as usual agenda under the expense pressure. An organization needs to re-evaluate it's on going expense lines and WIP initiatives, to ensure that money is well-invested. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/financial-alignment.php KDB Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 People alignment is achieved at various levels. This includes Jobs and Skills, Goal-sheets, Learning and Development and Rewards. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/people-alignment.php KDC Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Business process alignment is driven by the top priority processes identified during planning phase, SLAs and Measures, skill alignment and business process management capability. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/process-alignment.php KDD Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 External partner (especially those having strategic and/or exclusive partnership with you) is an important link during your planning as well as execution phase. External partners are an asset and can provide you with many ideas and inputs. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/partner-alignment.php KDE Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 There are many opportunities around synergies and shared capabilities. One needs to evaluate the top priority opportunities, which will provide visible benefits and also not disrupt the business. One can have shared capabilities and synergies within an SBU as well. However, the real leverage happens when it is at enterprise level. http://www.executionmih.com/strategic-planning/synergies-shared-capabilities.php JFA Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Finance Function is essentially a shared and centrally managed function. There are many activities, which may or may not be fully and centrally managed by finance function. This includes investments and funding. http://www.executionmih.com/strategic-planning/financial-synergies.php JFB Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A customer should not be owned by an SBU. Customer is an enterprise level asset and all SBUs can work on maximizing the customer value and profitability. http://www.executionmih.com/strategic-planning/customer-synergies.php JFC Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Sales related synergies include sharing of sales channels, sales outlets and sales campaigns. http://www.executionmih.com/strategic-planning/sales-synergies.php JFD Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "Pick-up top quartile of metrics in your scorecard, where you want to take the potential or ideal goals of a scorecard to the next level." http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=501 " 501 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "A prudent business manager is share-holder driven and customer-focused. The way we measure our business should have a stake from these two entities at least. " http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=502 " 502 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "Scorecard should tell the whole story about your business, even if it is beyond pure numbers." http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=503 " 503 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "The basic qualification of Scorecard should be to have information integrity. The audience should take the information in the Scorecard as a given. " http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=504 " 504 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "Person responsible for creating a Scorecard has a significant responsibility. He or she should have an assertive & collaborative relationship with all stakeholders. " http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=505 " 505 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "A good Scorecard and an efficient process should lead to not more than 3-4 hours of time spent in performance review every month. If a team is spending more than this time, there is something amiss in the Scorecard or in the process of review." http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=506 " 506 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "A Performance Review Session is to understand & get more detailed perspective of statements on the Scorecard and take some key most decisions. " http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=507 " 507 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "One month is fair time people need to work on the takeaways of a performance review session. If you are having a scorecard review once every week, take a re-look on its effectiveness. It might as well be a dash-board or "current state" or operational review." http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=508 " 508 Tue, 5 Feb 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Sales campaigns are focused on maximizing sales, and sometimes they ignore the value they can create by generating leads for future sales efforts. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=844 844 Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 Typically the amount of data you want get on a lead is inversely proportional to the number of leads you can generate. A potential customer does not like to fill-up long forms, even if you give incentives. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=845 845 Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 When you are doing any kind of data acquisition, (for example- generating a lead from a prospect, admitting a patient through an admission form, getting a customer to fill-up application form for your product), always try to ask for dates instead of tenure. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=846 846 Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 The sales leads get generated all over the place in an organization. They get generated through a focused effort (like advertisements, events etc.) or at the level of each sales person, who has his own sales leads. It is a challenge to have the leads to be stored and tracked centrally so that an organization can have an understanding of how well the leads are being leveraged to boost sales. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=847 847 Mon, 12 Jul 2010 11:43:52 +0530 Creating Special Initiative Rewards, team incentives and higher reward pools for more critical roles can bring more focused effort to strategic priorities http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=879 879 Thu, 3 Apr 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A flexible, adaptive, systematic, and result oriented decision making process can make your decision making more efficient, consistent and responsive. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=885 885 Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 One need not wait for performance review session to know the status of key actions, which were agreed in the last review. A pro-active sharing of status will drive better execution and save crucial time of the review session. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=889 889 Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 One can take the team productivity to next level by building a culture of 'no follow-up'. This saves everyone's time and also builds greater leadership depth, accountability and empowerment. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=890 890 Mon, 2 Jun 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Empowering front-line employees save time and effort, builds greater maturity in frontline staff, and brings greater customer satisfaction. Empowering frontline staff is a question of management mind-set and needs to be supplemented with a support system. http://www.executionmih.com/template/content_desc.php?content_id=896 896 Fri, 4 Jul 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Customer Attrition cost is a nebulous measure, and is more calculated by the judgment, instead of a hard-coded formula. The components of the customer attrition cost are customer acquisition cost, customer value lost, customer set-up, training and exit cost. http://www.executionmih.com/analytics-reporting/customer-attrition-cost.php 950 Mon, 11 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Level of customer attrition is important KPI, as every attrited customer is a cost to the company (apart from the 'healthy' attrition, which sometimes companies work on). There are host of factors which can reduce customer attrition. This page talks about the nuances of how you measure this KPI, along with its interpretation and analysis. http://www.executionmih.com/customer-kpi/attrition-level-numbers.php 951 Mon, 11 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 The success drivers of Customer Satisfaction and Retention include Service and Support, customer trust relationship, meeting customer expectations, maintaining customer touch points, sales experience and exit barriers. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/retention-satisfaction-success-drivers.php NBD Mon, 11 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Customer retention can be enabled by ethical exit barriers, which not only helps retain the customer but also add to customer satisfaction. These include understanding customer domain, exit clauses in contracts, your terminal in customer's premises, providing value-added services etc. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/retention-exit-barriers.php NBE Mon, 11 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This page provides the business objectives, business questions, definition and success factors related to customer service and support. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/service-support-overview.php NCA Mon, 11 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Customer Service and Support can be used for non-operational and strategic roles. This includes cross-sell, up-sell, campaign introduction, feedback surveys, process improvement and product design improvements. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/service-support-strategic-tool.php NCB Mon, 11 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Customer service and support supply chain is of a different order. First is urgency- where a faulty product disrupts customer's life and needs to be attended to and secondly, you may not get any money to fix the issues. Smart organization understands that supply chain for customer service is as important as that for order fulfillment. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/service-support-supply-chain.php NCC Mon, 11 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 For a good customer service and support function, it is important that you know the relevant areas of your organization and also about customer profile along with the history of his transactions with you. http://www.executionmih.com/customer/service-support-knowledge.php NCD Mon, 11 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Leadership is like an ether, which fills-up the environment of an organization. Leadership is about people, sustainability, long-term perspective and doing more than what management can achieve. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership/definition-concept.php LAA Mon, 18 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Organizations can include leadership dimension in individual performance management processes, by defining leadership competencies and do a separate performance appraisal around leadership capabilities. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership/individual-performance-process.php LAB Mon, 18 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This competency is linked with how a leader guides his and other's work and approach in alignment with the business strategies and priorities. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership/competency-strategic-intent-alignment.php LBB Mon, 18 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Customer focus is demonstrated in the way we organize and guide our priorities, knowledge and work around the customer entity. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership/competency-customer-focus.php LBC Mon, 18 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 In today's world if you don't innovate fast enough, you will not survive. Building an environment, which not only encourages, but also drives innovation as a non-negotiable business objective, is one of the ways to keep the business going. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership/competency-foster-innovation.php LBD Mon, 18 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 There is a need for every level in the organization to understand and shape their work to make more revenue and profit for the enterprise. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership/competency-business-financial-acumen.php LBE Mon, 18 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Feedback is considered synonymous with the bad news and conflict-soaked discussion between manager and his employee. In reality, feedback can be both positive and developmental. A manager needs to give both kind of feedbacks with same level of intensity and sincerity. http://www.executionmih.com/tips/positive-negative-feedback.php 954 Mon, 18 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 As a suggested rule, an effective feedback has a shelf life of 48 hours from the point of observation http://www.executionmih.com/tips/performance-feedback-observation.php 955 Mon, 18 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A manager builds his trust capital in the long-term, if he maintains a straight-talking persona, even at the cost of being unpopular in the beginning. Over the time, people get used to this style and start respecting the same. http://www.executionmih.com/tips/feedback-straight-blunt-trust.php 956 Mon, 18 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A satisfied shareholder, leads to a loyal customer leads to an engaged employee http://www.executionmih.com/tips/shareholder-customer-employee.php 957 Mon, 18 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Expect more from the people (without setting them up for failure), and pamper their self-esteem and they will explore new limits of their potential. http://www.executionmih.com/tips/treating-people-for-performance.php 958 Mon, 18 Aug 2008 11:43:52 +0530 "A leader has seemingly conflicting objectives of putting best man for the job and developing people by giving assignments where an employee has low skill. This tip provides the tricks for managing this perceived conflict. " http://www.executionmih.com/tips/maximize-employee-output-potential.php 959 Mon, 15 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Development Plan is not Training plan. Training is one of the means to achieve a holistic development. Development plan has three constituents- Training, Self-learning and on-the-job development. A development plan should typically have 70-20-10 distribution in terms of effort across these three constituents, with maximum effort around on-the-job development. http://www.executionmih.com/tips/training-learning-development-plan.php 960 Mon, 15 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Communicates and shares the thoughts, ideas, issues, conflicts, agreements, dis-agreements openly and directly. Does not project any hidden agenda. Listens and understands the messages from others. Demonstrates openness and clarity in all forms of communications http://www.executionmih.com/leadership/competency-communicate-listen-openly.php LBF Mon, 15 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This leadership competency points to an ability to work in diverse cultures, contexts, organization structures and skill-levels. It also points to an ability to work with internal and external teams working across different locations, time zones and HR policies. This ability also makes a leader adaptive to changes in the working environment. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership/competencies-diverse-collaborative-teams.php LBG Mon, 15 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 There is a quote which says that 'leader does not do great things by himself, but he makes other people do great things'. Learning and development is a continuous process. A leader maintains this continuity for him and for his team. He leverages all possible channels to promote a holistic development. He knows that development is not training, but also on-the-job learning as well as self-learning. He also knows that the development can be through informal as well as formal channels. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership/competency-develop-self-others.php LBH Mon, 15 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Well clued onto the environment- both internal and external. Identify the change opportunities and works on them. Anticipates the waves of change, and stay prepared. Build competencies of change management and adaptability within the teams. Maintains the perseverance and tenacity to drive and sustain the change. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership/competencies-lead-change.php LBI Mon, 15 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Demonstration of leadership competencies of leading change, business acumen and setting strategic intent are based on sound decision making and judgment. This is perhaps the softest part of leadership competencies frame-work. Decision-making is science as well as an art. It is a combination of hard-core number crunching, quantified analysis, managing ambiguities and thinking from the gut. It talks about taking best possible decision, with inadequate information, having inadequate capabilities, in less than predictable future and overall within an imperfect world. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership/competency-act-with-decisiveness.php LBJ Mon, 15 sep 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A leader sets clear goals, timelines, plans, and measures of success. He tracks the progress and keeps on working to achieve the planned targets. He works on all aspects of performance- Cost, timelines and Quality. He works on consistency, accuracy and reliability of performance. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership/competency-manage-for-performance.php LBK Tue, 2 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This is an extension of Manage for Performance. This competency is related to the 'end-results' part of the performance. The reason we have not included this competency as part of the 'manage for performance' is because we wanted to place a separate emphasis on results part, which is relevant to the day to day accomplishments and running of business. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership/competency-deliver-results.php LBL Tue, 2 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Leaders are made as much as they are born. The inherent leadership DNA has to be shaped and molded to build leadership talent which can respond to the need of time and context. There are many case-studies, where organizations have nurtured leadership. Once an organization is able to set its eyes on what are their leadership development goals to achieve their business objectives, a diligent planning and execution makes it happen. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership/development-context-setting.php LCA Tue, 2 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 This pages covers the features of KPI-Metrics which lay the foundation of their sound management and application. Some of the imperatives of KPIs-Metrics are - Actionable, analyzable, balanced and aligned. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/good-kpi-metrics-features.php KEA Tue, 2 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 A KPI needs to be defined in fair degree of detail, so to ensure that there is a complete understanding and consistency on all possible aspects. This includes the categorization, calculation, exceptions, standards etc. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/kpi-metric-definition-specification.php KEB Tue, 2 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 One needs to limit the number of KPIs in a given view of a scorecard and dashboard. The simplicity and number of KPIs-metrics is driven by the frequency of performance review. Dashboards have simpler and lesser KPIs compared to a scorecard. http://www.executionmih.com/execution-management/prioritize-select-kpi-metric.php KEC Tue, 2 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Any KPI needs to have a single point of ownership. However, there are generally multiple stakeholders, who contribute to the success of a KPI. This tip provides the tricks to drive a single point ownership while ensuring a collective effort. http://www.executionmih.com/tips/kpi-single-point-ownership.php 968 Tue, 2 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Leadership traits and competencies can be defined and specified. However, the words and adjectives can vary. Everything which can be positive about a person in terms of character, conduct, approach and attitude, perhaps can be labeled as leadership trait. This page provides few glimpses of those leadership behaviors. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership/behavior-traits-development.php LCB Tue, 16 dec 2008 11:43:52 +0530 Long term and short term incentives need to be carefully balanced as the proportion between the two will have significant impact on the employee engagement. It is important that incentive payouts are consistent and based on accurate calculations. http://www.executionmih.com/employee-compensation/long-term-incentives.php HRKH Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Providing the hiring manager a sufficient playing field to decide the compensation of the new hire can be an effective hiring tactic. Empowering the recruiter in this manner can drive him/her to go the extra mile to get the right candidate. http://www.executionmih.com/employee-compensation/manager-flexibility.php HRKG Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Accelerated variable pay is an essential requirement in sustaining the culture of progressive performance. In fact, variable pay should dominate the cost-to-company at senior levels. http://www.executionmih.com/employee-compensation/accelerated-variable-pay.php HRKF Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Having a broad range of compensation at all levels provides the vital “running track” for the employee. It provides opportunity of growth in the near future for the employee and can be the driver for high performance in the short term. http://www.executionmih.com/employee-compensation/wide-salary-range.php HRKE Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 It is important to have a broad range in the variable pay component at all levels. It provides the earning potential as an immediate opportunity which drives the employee to meet or exceed his/her short term goals. It also creates a criteria for distinction based on performance. http://www.executionmih.com/employee-compensation/performance-based-differentiation.php HRKD Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 It is the leadership competencies which determine the vertical growth and increments. These are differentiated from increase in increase in incentive pay-outs which are primarily given for meeting or exceeding the achievement in short term goals. http://www.executionmih.com/employee-compensation/increment-linked-competencies.php HRKC Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Performance bonus is a lump sum amount which is paid for achieving a specified annual rating in the Performance Management System. It is paid for all such ratings falling in specified ranges and is not as variable as incentives are. http://www.executionmih.com/employee-compensation/variable-pay-goals.php HRKB Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 The organization can organize special training and development programs for the employees receiving annual ratings at the cusp of 2 and the cusp of 3. With a little push and grooming, these employees have a significant chance of improving their performance. http://www.executionmih.com/low-performance/road-map-cusp.php HRJB Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Employees who are continuous under-achievers since the last 2-3 annual performance cycles need to be exited in a planned manner. This will prevent further degradation of their unit’s performance since these employees are weak links who have not shown signs of improvement even after organization’s efforts and investment into them. http://www.executionmih.com/low-performance/planned-exit.php HRJA Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Leadership team health check is an exercise which assesses the back-up plan for attrition in the community of key senior positions. This is done in a structured and detailed manner together with the fall-back plans for “risky” positions. http://www.executionmih.com/talent-management/health-check.php HRIL Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Advertising a vacancy which has arisen or has been created to the community of existing employees is called Inside Job Posting. It is the preferred mode of recruitment for most of the positions. Existing employees must be given a chance at the position before an external search is made. http://www.executionmih.com/talent-management/inside-job-posting.php HRII Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Managers and team-leaders must have job-rotation of their team-members as goals. This is important to build talent width and a back-up pipeline for the unit as a whole. In fact, it supports team-work by sensitizing team-members to other job-roles. http://www.executionmih.com/talent-management/job-rotation-goals.php HRIJ Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 A mentoring program is essential to build the leadership pipeline in the organization. This generally is conducted in a mentor-mentee format and both benefit from this engagement. http://www.executionmih.com/talent-management/mentoring-program.php HRIF Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 The Talent Management System assesses, filters and provides the pool of candidates which can be considered for succession planning exercise. Succession planning is an application of the Talent Management System. http://www.executionmih.com/talent-management/succession-planning.php HRIE Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Period of readiness refers to the amount of time left for a candidate in the Talent Development Program to be fully ready for the role that he/she is being groomed for. This varies from individual to individual and the employee with the shortest period of readiness is the best candidate at any given moment. http://www.executionmih.com/talent-management/period-readiness.php HRID Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Candidates in the Talent Development Program can be classified into three categories based upon their status of readiness. These categories are called: Promotable, High-Potential and Close Watch. The promotables and high-potentials are the succession pipeline available to the organization at any given moment. http://www.executionmih.com/talent-management/promotable-potential-watch.php HRIC Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Skip Level meeting refers to face-to-face interaction between an employee and his/her level 2 manager. The immediate reporting manager is not present. This provides an opportunity to the level 2 manager to gain a vital insight into unaddressed issues and the reporting manager’s effectiveness. http://www.executionmih.com/performance-management/skip-level-Interaction.php HRHQ Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Post ranking session is a meeting between the appraiser and the appraisee where the latter is informed of the final rating that he/she has received. This provides a vital discussion opportunity for both and also drives accountability and ownership in the appraiser. http://www.executionmih.com/performance-management/post-ranking-session.php HRHP Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Periodic informal assessments can be made about the actual performance achieved and if the situation so warrants, and the appraiser so deems fit, the goals of the employee can be revised to be in alignment with the realistic capabilities of the employee. This can work for both negative as well as positive deviations. http://www.executionmih.com/performance-management/update-of-goal-sheet.php HRHO Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Bell Curve and relative ranking refer to the process of normalization which is applied to the pool of final ratings as awarded by the appraisers (including level 2 managers). This is done to eliminate the skew which inevitably arises in this collation of all rank values due to the human bias. http://www.executionmih.com/performance-management/bell-curve-ranking.php HRHN Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 The rating scale on which the rankings are awarded in the Performance Management System ranges from 1 to 5. 5 stands for ‘Clearly Exceeds Expectations’ while 1 stands for Does Not Meet Expectations’. http://www.executionmih.com/performance-management/1-5-ranking.php HRHM Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 The Performance Management System starts with the appraisee himself/herself. The appraisee assesses his/her own self first. Thus, he/she is an integral part of the assessment as well and it is his/her responsibility to start the process. http://www.executionmih.com/performance-management/employee-responsibility.php HRHL Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 As part of the assessment process in the Performance Management System, the appraiser can ask for support and list out help-items in the review and assessment sheet. This is a channel and an opportunity for the appraisee to ask for help which he/she requires in order to deliver on his/her goals. http://www.executionmih.com/performance-management/help-manager-organization.php HRHK Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 The appraiser needs to spend a focused session with the appraisee discussing his/her level of development in leadership competencies. This is crucial to imbibe the importance of these competencies in the appraisee. http://www.executionmih.com/performance-management/feedback-competencies.php HRHI Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Goals form the major bulk of the expectations from the employee. Hence in the performance assessment process, it is paramount that the appraiser provides a focused feedback to the appraisee about this main deliverable of the appraisee. http://www.executionmih.com/performance-management/feedback-goals.php HRHH Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Feedback is essential not just from the reporting manager or his/her superior. It needs to be solicited and understood from all other stakeholders as well which can include direct reports, vendors, internal customers, business associates etc. This truly provides a 360 degree perspective to the appraisee about where he/she stands. http://www.executionmih.com/performance-management/360-degree-feedback.php HRHG Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Goals and Leadership competencies are separate sections in the Goal sheet. They are different expectations from the employee and hence must be assessed differently too. This is done by awarding separate rankings for goals and leadership competencies. http://www.executionmih.com/performance-management/Separate-ranking.php HRHF Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Even though goals and leadership competencies are assessed and ranked separately, from an organizational perspective, the employee must be given one single rating as a measure of his/her overall performance during the last performance cycle. http://www.executionmih.com/performance-management/combined-ranking.php HRHE Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Year end ranking is the final ranking which is awarded to the employee which is an assessment of his/her performance in the last performance cycle. This is the final normalized rating based on which increments and bonus are decided. http://www.executionmih.com/performance-management/year-end-ranking.php HRHC Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Mid-term appraisal is the performance assessment done in the middle of the year to check whether the appraisee is going as per the planned performance schedule or not. This is an important interim checkpoint which can provide the appraisee an opportunity for course correction or a realistic revision in the targets. http://www.executionmih.com/performance-management/mid-term-appraisal.php HRHB Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 It is important to periodically assess and provide feedback to the employee regarding his/her performance and whether he/she is off-course. This frequency is generally quarterly. The consistency is essential to maintain the impact of the entire Performance Management System. http://www.executionmih.com/performance-management/quarterly-feedback-cycle.php HRHA Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Effective learning requires coaching on the job as well. This is because on-the-job learning is where the training is truly internalized. Hence, it is important for the trainer to train not only in classroom session but on the job as well. http://www.executionmih.com/learning-training-development/mentoring-coaching.php HRGN Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 The ultimate test of learning and development initiatives is a substantial increase in the performance level of the employee. Learning and Developmentactivities are not done just for the sake of it. Increased productivity and development of leadership competency is the end-objective of them and hence their success should be measured accordingly. http://www.executionmih.com/learning-training-development/performance-success.php HRGL Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Food taken in small bites can be chewed easily and digested quickly. This same philosophy is applied in training as well. Instead of marathon classroom sessions, it is better to give the employees small bite-sized pieces of training information which they can process easily. http://www.executionmih.com/learning-training-development/small-bytes.php HRGJ Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 A minimum number of training days must be mandatory for all employees. And these have to be attended no matter what. If the organization places the right amount of emphasis on Learning and Developmentactivities, performance can be significantly increased. http://www.executionmih.com/learning-training-development/number-of-days.php HRGK Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Learning and Development activities and assessment must be an inherent part of the Performance Management System. They should not be conducted and assessed in parallel to the same. They are crucial precursors to the performance excellence drive in the organization and have to be part of the mainstream performance assessment. http://www.executionmih.com/learning-training-development/performance-assessment.php HRGI Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Each job-role has to have a detailed description of what it constitutes. What is equally important is that it must be accompanied by a detailed write-up on the required skills and competency needs too. They are the building blocks of the desired performance. http://www.executionmih.com/learning-training-development/skill-competency-needs.php HRGH Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Effective learning and development activities require the same amount of rigor and diligence as the mainstream goals do. Accordingly, Learning and Developmentactivities need to have completion criteria, time-lines, check-points and pre-defined assessment methods. This is apart from them being included in the Goal Sheet in the first place. http://www.executionmih.com/learning-training-development/completion-criteria.php HRGE Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 True learning and development cannot take place unless the training material has been truly internalized and has been effectively enhanced the performance execution of the employee. Classroom session is only the beginning of this story with 70% of the actual learning taking place on the job. http://www.executionmih.com/learning-training-development/10-20-70-on-Job.php HRGD Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Learning and Development is for the long term career as well. It is not merely a means to improve short or medium term performance. It is part of the career strategy of the employee. An employee must decide what Learning and Developmentactivities he/she must undertake in order to develop his/her career in the desired domain. http://www.executionmih.com/learning-training-development/potential-career.php HRGC Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Competency sheet can be the key contributor to the Learning and Development plan of the employee. Especially so since the competency sheet depicts the learning gaps in acquiring leadership competencies which are crucial for long term growth. http://www.executionmih.com/learning-training-development/competency-sheet.php HRGB Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Learning and Development is both for long term as well as for the short term. In fact the goal sheet can provide immediate inputs as to the Learning and Developmentrequirements since the goals are the short term deliverables of the employee. http://www.executionmih.com/learning-training-development/goal-sheet.php HRGA Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Some competencies are so basic that all employees need to imbibe and exhibit them, for e.g.. Integrity. Apart from these, there could be role-specific or level-specific competencies which an employee may need to demonstrate once he/she is in those circles. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership-competencies/level-role-specific.php HRFH Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 The organizational focus on the Leadership Competencies will not be fruitful unless and until the picture is completed by explaining to the employee how can he/she apply the assigned competencies to achieve his/her goals. This is the “how-to” part of the process. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership-competencies/applying for goals.php HRFG Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Defining what constitutes “Above Expectations” and “Below Expectations” is very crucial for a successful performance management system. This in turn is linked to the definition of “Meets Expectations”. Detailed description of these are especially important where the goals are not quantifiable. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership-competencies/above below expectations.php HRFE Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 All competencies need not be demonstrated all the time. Depending upon the role the employee has, he/she may be expected to demonstrate only some of them. Indeed, those may be the only ones he/she is assessed upon, but never the less, basic competencies do need to be demonstrated always. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership-competencies/level-mapping.php HRFD Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Leadership competencies have various grades and different roles can be mapped to these various grades of expected behavior. Senior employees need to exhibit higher grade of the competency while the junior employee may be expected to show only the lower grade. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership-competencies/role-based mapping.php HRFC Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Every leadership competency can be further sub-classified into various grades based on the proficiency level. A competency is not uniform or standard in terms of internalizing. Depending upon the experience and maturity level, different levels of the competency may be expected. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership-competencies/graded expectations.php HRFB Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Every organization needs to define for itself as to what are the key leadership competencies which are essential in it’s line of business. They need to be defined and officially adopted as the mandated set of such competencies. This set is the Competency Repository. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership-competencies/competency repository.php HRFA Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 The executive team needs to be a cohesive unit since each member has his/her own downline to manage. Hence, the top 3 organizational goals are kept as common goals in the goal-sheet of all the members of the executive team. http://www.executionmih.com/goals-kra/leadership-team-sharing.php HRER Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Raising the threshold target every year for the employee not only keeps pace with the increased effectiveness of the employee, but also keeps him/her engaged. It motivates the employee to constantly seek learning and development and hone his/her skills continuously. http://www.executionmih.com/goals-kra/raising-the-bar.php HREO Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 All stakeholders and internal customers must have a say in the finalization of the goal-sheet of the employee. This is important since the achievement of the defined goals will then form inputs for the said internal customers. http://www.executionmih.com/goals-kra/customers-in-goal-sheet.php HREN Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Performance score-card must mirror the goal-sheet and for obvious reasons. It is an assessment tool for measuring performance to achieve the goals as defined in the goal sheet. Both reinforce the buy-in of each other. http://www.executionmih.com/goals-kra/performance-scorecard-alignment.php HREM Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Just like the organizational achievement will have an impact on the performance assessment score of the individual employee, so will the functional vertical’s achievement. This is the alignment of individual, departmental and organizational goals and achievements. http://www.executionmih.com/goals-kra/weightages-functional-Goals.php HREL Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 It is important to align the organizational achievement with that of the employee. Whether an individual employee does very well or poorly, the overall organizational achievement has to have a bearing on his/her final rating in the performance management system. This is alignment in form and spirit. http://www.executionmih.com/goals-kra/weightages-Individual-goals.php HREK Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 It is important to adopt a systematic approach towards the leading indicators. In fact, a quarterly and monthly schedule is a must to have. This will ensure that the requisite check points are in place. The employee can further break it down into week wise pieces as well. http://www.executionmih.com/goals-kra/leading-indicators.php HREJ Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Besides defining an annual target, it is important to devise and define quarterly and monthly targets which are in turn derived from the annual targets. This is a systematic approach which allows for constant assessment and an advance warning system. http://www.executionmih.com/goals-kra/break-down-lagging-indicators.php HREI Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Weights represent the relative importance of various goals in the overall portfolio of the employee. Depending upon the relative importance, different weights can be assigned to different goals and the overall performance is assessed in a weighted average model. http://www.executionmih.com/goals-kra/weightages-goals.php HREH Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 http://www.executionmih.com/goals-kra/above-below-expectations.php HREG Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Even though the unit may be totally number driven, the quality aspect is inherent in all activities and cannot be ignored. Thus, goals are defined in a manner that the qualitative aspects are incorporated already into the overall scheme. http://www.executionmih.com/goals-kra/quantitative-qualitative-success-criteria.php HREF Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 After every planning exercise, there emerge few actions steps which are of the top most priority. These are called the Key Actions and they must be executed first. Although they are the logical outcome of the exercise, the real challenge lies in making every employee go through the process. http://www.executionmih.com/goals-kra/key-actions.php HREE Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 In order to be truly effective and relevant in the performance delivery, the employee must take into account the needs and desires expressed by the key business partners. The whole organization is inter-connected in it’s operations, and in order to avoid to-and-fro later on, it is important to align the goals with the partners’ expectations. http://www.executionmih.com/goals-kra/expectations-business-partners.php HRED Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Initiatives are, at the end of the day, a kind of goal themselves and hence must be treated so in their execution too. When it comes to setting up interim milestones in assessing the progress, initiatives should be treated at par with goals. This is a planned and systematic approach towards initiatives which is very much required in order to increase the chances of successful delivery. http://www.executionmih.com/goals-kra/initiatives-interim-milestones.php HREC Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Although core responsibilities may be the means to the ends, they need to have a measuring yard-stick too. It is important to have internal success criteria to define when a core responsibility stands successfully completed as per the defined expectations in the goals sheet. http://www.executionmih.com/goals-kra/core-job-responsibilities.php HREB Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 In today’s competitive scenario and the dire need for effective execution within a defined time-frame, the criticality of quantifiability cannot be underscored enough. In other words, it is crucial that the defined goals are mathematically measurable as far as possible. Attaching numbers to define the goals can do wonders to the execution at the ground level. http://www.executionmih.com/goals-kra/quantified-targets.php HREA Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Entrepreneurship is about a different mind-set altogether. It is another dimension which can transform the execution horsepower of the employee and quickly transport him/her from where he/she stands today to another pedestal where he/she thinks and acts like a true leader. http://www.executionmih.com/organization-enterprise-culture/entraprenureship.php HRCG Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Accountability can also be called ownership. Whether be it of a project or day-to-day responsibilities, accountability is a double edged sword. As a leadership competency, it calls upon the employee to take onus, whether of success or of failure. Thus, it forces the employee to be emotionally neutral, since along with the glory and the accolades which success brings it also teaches him/her a lesson in humility in times of failure. http://www.executionmih.com/organization-enterprise-culture/accountability-ownership.php HRCF Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 A healthy employee coupled with a healthy, safe and conducive working environment is an absolute must for long term sustained performance excellence. Research in management studies has already shown that the immediate work-surroundings can have a profound impact on the productivity. Thus, a healthy employee and a healthy environment leads to healthy results as well. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-ethical-practices/employee-health-safety.php HRDH Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 In order to maintain the required discipline, all organizations must define a detailed code of conduct which is applicable to all employees. This is an absolute necessity as it provides an underlying skeletal structure to the process of performance. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-ethical-practices/employee-code-of-conduct.php HRDG Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 An employee listening post can do wonders to the perception that the employees hold of the organization. It also provides a crucial inroad into the underlying employee issues and acts as a lead provider in dispelling rumors spread through grapevine. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-ethical-practices/employee-listening-post.php HRDF Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 A company ombudsperson is a must-have to ensure that the employee work-force remains disciplined and focused on the company’s business objectives. It is designed to allow reporting of any violation or breach in company’s policies by employees at all levels and to ensure that the reporting employee is not victimized subsequently. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-ethical-practices/company-ombudsman.php HRDE Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Whistle blowing is a process or an institution which encourages employees to report any untoward incident which may be a breach of company’s norms and policies. It is a separate channel designed and set up especially for confidential reporting. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-ethical-practices/whistle-blowing.php HRDD Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Having a diverse work-force is good for the corporate environment. It creates a conducive atmosphere for setting up merit as the only factor for growth. Supported by the organizational policy, it fosters tolerance and allows new vistas of thinking. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-ethical-practices/respecting-promoting-diversity.php HRDB Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 An organization must not discriminate against any employee whether current or potential, on the grounds of religion, race, sex, color, ethnic background etc. All policies and procedures must be neutral to these factors. Not following this policy will prevent the organization in scaling up. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-ethical-practices/equal-opportunity-employer.php HRDA Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 An organization must decide as a matter of policy the kind of pay-master it will be. Depending upon it’s own individual circumstances, it may decide to pay above-market, below-market or at par. In any case, it is important that the organization is aware of this aspect and has a conscious policy towards it. http://www.executionmih.com/employee-compensation/job-wise-benchmarking.php HRKA Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 All employees with good potential as identified by the Talent Management System are put through special learning and development programs to hone and develop themselves for eventual succession to identified positions. This series of programs is called the Talent Development Track. http://www.executionmih.com/talent-management/development track.php HRIK Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 It is important for any organization to be in knowledge of the actual number and kinds of skills and competencies it has in it’s employees at any given point of time. It is an assessment exercise that must happen periodically so that the organization can chart out it’s long term strategy. http://www.executionmih.com/talent-management/skill inventory.php HRIG Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Good performance generally indicates the presence of good potential as well. Good potential is important for internal development of talent. All organizations must develop talent internally to supplement the existing leadership talent pool. http://www.executionmih.com/talent-management/potential performance.php HRIB Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Training should not be limited to classroom type sessions. They are just the seeds of the entire learning and development process. It must end with a permanent change which in turn leads to a substantial increase in the employee-output. There is an intermediate stage where the trainer must demonstrate to the employee how to apply the training on the job as well. http://www.executionmih.com/learning-training-development/awareness-application-results.php HRGM Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 An employee must take single-handed responsibility of his/her learning and development agenda. The initiative must come from him/her only. This is an essential requirement to create the necessary buy-in from the employee. The organization must be the facilitator, but the employee must start on his/her own. http://www.executionmih.com/learning-training-development/employee-responsibility.php HRGG Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Any organizational focus on learning and development must be backed by a host of tools enabling the same. This is crucial enablement of the Learning and Development agenda of the organization and must be planned and executed well. http://www.executionmih.com/learning-training-development/wide-range-options.php HRGF Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 A senior leader is an individual contributor, a team leader and a key member of the organizational steering committee as well. He/she must deliver in all the three roles concurrently. For all the three different capacities, he/she must exhibit a different set of leadership competencies. http://www.executionmih.com/leadership-competencies/expectations all levels.php HRFF Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 It is the manager’s responsibility to play a leading role in setting up of the goals of the employee whom he/she is going to assess later on. Apart from keeping the current capabilities of the employee in mind, the manager must also ensure that the number of goals is optimum in number while leaving enough challenge for the employee at the same time. http://www.executionmih.com/goals-kra/number-category-goals.php HREQ Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Execution is the name of the game and this in turn depends upon the ability of the employee to stick to the pre-defined plan with sheer determination and consistence. This quality is the one which needs to be developed in the employees if the organization needs to grow big in the long run. http://www.executionmih.com/organization-enterprise-culture/persistent-consistent-execution.php HRCK Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 The employee who truly believes in execution will always have a low-voice signature. He/she is likely to talk less and do more. He/she is quick to arrive at a decision and the execution of it starts immediately. They are also quick to adapt to a change in the situation as well and do it effectively too. http://www.executionmih.com/organization-enterprise-culture/low-voice-achievement.php HRCJ Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Successful execution-practitioners are stable in their thought. This means that once they decide upon something they stick to it and do not meander around. Besides, they maintain the consistency of the planned schedule with diligence and discipline. This is critical to effective execution. http://www.executionmih.com/organization-enterprise-culture/stability-thought-discipline-action.php HRCE Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Ethical business is good business; period. If an organization wants to grow big and remain big, then ethical conduct is paramount. Sure, it may be not realize the possible gains which it may see in the short run. However, by sacrificing these short term gains, it ensures that there is a long run for it in the first place. http://www.executionmih.com/organization-enterprise-culture/ethical-profitability.php HRCD Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Working in a team-formation is an absolute necessity. In the world of business, there are no heroes. No one can be Superman. All good and successful organizations always have teams behind them carrying on the assigned tasks in a planned and scheduled manner. A team can outdo any specialist or super-effective individual who is working alone. http://www.executionmih.com/organization-enterprise-culture/team-work.php HRCB Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 The employee must remember that one needs to give respect in order to be respected back. This is essential to maintain the cohesiveness of the entire team and the organization as well. http://www.executionmih.com/organization-enterprise-culture/treating-with-respect.php HRCA Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Presence of harassment of any kind, whether real or perceived, is likely to hit the productivity very badly besides leading to attrition and other employee-issues. This is for obvious reasons. What is not so obvious is the fact that such matters cause loss in productivity and consume precious time and resources in sorting the matter out. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-ethical-practices/sexual-harrassment.php HRDC Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 No amount of writing can underscore the importance of having operational excellence enough. It can make or break the business. It is akin to having a superb engine under the car’s hood. Now the driver can gun the engine and race to the finishing line to come first. It is the crucial foundation based on which the organization can think of executing aggressive plans. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-core-values/operational-excellence.php HRBF Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 A sustainable business is also a socially responsible business. An organization must ensure that it’s activities and contributions towards it’s social responsibility are truly affecting the targeted audience and not merely a demonstration without any real intention. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-core-values/social-responsibility.php HRBD Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 To have customer focus, is to have basic business orientation. It is unfortunate that generally not all employees have it from the beginning. This is especially true for non customer-facing departments. To over-generalize things, the various departments of an organization are either doing sales or supporting sales. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-core-values/customer-focus.php HRBC Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Innovation and creativity must be inherent in the very DNA of the organizational work-culture. In fact these two qualities are essential to maintain a competitive edge in the market. The execution challenge is to make every employee imbibe this as part of the way he/she works. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-core-values/innovation-creativity.php HRBB Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Trust and integrity are the most core values that any organization operates on. There has to be trust internally in order for the organization to survive. There must be trust externally in order for the organization to thrive. If any unit or organization flounders on trust and integrity, it is not in it for the long term. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-core-values/trust-integrity.php HRBA Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 The organizational policy on compensation can be structured down to the level of a job-family as well. An organization may decide whether it wants to pay above market, below market or at par for a particular job family. http://www.executionmih.com/employee-compensation/job-wise-percentile.php HRKM Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Performance indicators are the elements which are measured when assessing the performance of an employee. They are the “what” of the Performance assessment process. They are the language in which the organization talks about the expectations from the employee. http://www.executionmih.com/role-job-description/performance-indicators.php HRRE Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Competencies are what is required to perform in a given job-role. They are the basis on which the goals are assigned. They are the traits, abilities and attitudes which enable an employee meet his/her expectations. http://www.executionmih.com/role-job-description/competency-requirements.php HRRF Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 The assessment process for selecting a suitable candidate for a position starts with reviewing resumes. This is akin to a prospectus which details out the career path and educational and professional qualification of the candidate. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-recruitment-selection/resume-review.php HRLA Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 A telephone screening review is the first personal interface between the recruiter and the candidate. This is an important second level filter since it is here that the first impressions are made and a conclusive idea about the communication skills of the candidate is developed. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-recruitment-selection/tel-screeing-review.php HRLB Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Job fit assessment is a very crucial and sensitive matter and one which requires considerable expertise and experience. It is easy to filter out absolute misfits, but care should be taken that following only the job-description and not using individual judgment may also lead to omitting genuine and authentic talent in the process. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-recruitment-selection/job-fit-assessment.php HRLC Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 One of the ways a candidate can be assessed for a particular situation is to simulate an actual job-situation and check how he/she fares in it. This is an immediate and relevant test which can lay bare the actual delivering capability of the candidate at the given moment. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-recruitment-selection/job-simulation-assessment.php HRLD Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Just like domain-specific expertise can be tested in an interview, so can the leadership competencies. The interviewing manager can put the candidate in a tricky situation and check the presence of leadership in him/her. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-recruitment-selection/competency-situation-assessment.php HRLF Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 An employee is assessed in the Performance Management System at two levels – one is his/her reporting manager and the other is his/her manager’s manager. The manager’s manager has the last word and say in the final rating awarded to the employee. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-recruitment-selection/manager-reviewer.php HRLG Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 It is important to include internal customers in the interview panel. If they have a say in the final selection of a candidate, they are much more likely to support him/her in coming up the curve as well. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-recruitment-selection/interview-panel-customers.php HRLH Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 All vacancies must be posted as an Inside Job Post and offered first to the existing employees. This has to be done even in scenarios where a strong internal candidate already exists. This is important to maintain integrity and to give a fair evaluation and chance to all applying candidates. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-recruitment-selection/internal-job-post.php HRLI Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 The intranet can be a very powerful and effective tool in managing information logistics in the organization. It is a critical enabler of many functions and processes in the organization. No organization can scale up without setting up an effective intranet first. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-capabilities-platform/employee-intranet.php HROA Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Employee help-desk is a dedicated channel for helping the employees out with their HR related queries and issues. These are crucial in medium to large organizations with elaborate and complex policies. Having an effective employee help-desk can pre-empt the seeding of rumors and discontentment as well. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-capabilities-platform/employee-help-desk.php HROB Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Setting up of an employee grievance secure line can be crucial in ensuring that the company ombudsperson and the whistle-blowing programs are effective. In fact the objective of such a line goes beyond that as well. There are many matters which can be solved at the HR’s end it self. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-capabilities-platform/employee-grievance-secure-line.php HROC Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Learning Management System can be effective tool in driving the Learning and Developmentfunction amongst employees. In some ways, it decouples the trainer from the learning providing the employees with an automated tool which serves the training material at the job-site itself in the manner the employee is most comfortable with. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-capabilities-platform/learning-management-system.php HROF Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 Internal job posting is advertising the arisen vacancy in the community of existing employees first before making an external search. It has it’s inherent strategic as well as cost advantages. http://www.executionmih.com/hr-capabilities-platform/inside-job-track.php HROG Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 In order to achieve performance excellence and develop effective leadership skills, it is important to focus first on being trustworthy. This takes priority even over respect. If the team trusts you then you can lead them where you want. http://www.executionmih.com/organization-enterprise-culture/trusted-respected-loved.php HRCC Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530 As an employee moves up the organizational hierarchy the level of intensity and the expected maturity in the demonstrated behavior of the leadership competency also rises. In other words, there are various grades in the competencies themselves. http://www.executionmih.com/employee-compensation/level-progression.php HRKI Tue, 08 Aug 2011 11:43:52 +0530