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February 19, 2006
Competing on Analytics
Thomas Davenport, a professor at Babson College and a Fellow with the Accenture Institute for High Performance Business, has made a lot of noise recently with this "Competing on Analytics" in Harvard Business Review.
A good overview at DM Review and get the Babson version here.
I generally agree with his overall premise, but believe that analytics is not limited to the application of sophisticated statistical routines by a group of propeller heads in the back office, which might be one interpretation of his work. I do not think that is his intent, but it would be easy to read it as such.
Posted by Peter Kim at February 19, 2006 4:30 PM
Comments
Peter,
Thanks for giving me the benefit of the doubt. You're correct in assuming that I do not believe that analytics are only the province of back-office propeller-heads. One, you need some front-office propeller-heads too. Two, there is a lot of analytical work that can be done by people without Ph.D.s in statistics--analytical amateurs, if you will. A company that's competing on analytics may need some serious propeller-heads, but they are far from the only necessary human resource.
Posted by: Tom Davenport at April 13, 2006 6:57 PM
