That Planning Guy

Who’s ready for #NRF2018?? It’s a New Year, and a brave New world, #DataNerds

#Incisiv

#Revionics

#Mainsail

#ThatPlanningGuy

What will the new year bring? Does the universe know the calendar has changed? What is different today than yesterday? Expectations and promise of a new day is what changes.

The worst day off the year is tomorrow morning at the gym- all the people resolving to make change arriving early and working hard. But within a week, dwindling, and a month, status quo.

Success is perseverance, and commitment- without following an arbitrary date to start. 

Bring it every day, and do your honest best, and good things come. Patience is NOT really a virtue, perseverance is. 

I said in a previous post, goals are achieved by effort X time. Send like a good time to start.

What WILL the new year bring? CHANGE.  (The only constant) 2018 will be a pivotal year in a lot of ways. 

Don’t be in the sidelines- lead the change. Be the change. DRIVE. Transform. OWN the experience. 

More to come—

That Planning Guy

After Prometheus brought Fire To The Mortals, do you think a few weeks later they said ” so now what?”

In business you’re only as good as your last quarter. Go big or go home. Two weeks left in the quarter #datanerds –finish strong. 

Mele Kalikimaka,

That Planning Guy

My prescriptive analytics last night told me to take the Dolphins over the Patriots. Sadly the outcome was exactly that. However my heart wouldn’t let me place that bet.

Fatal flaw letting your gut instincts get in the way of your analytic mind. 

My old golf partner used to ask  “Who are going to believe me or Your Lying Eyes?” 

Follow the numbers -they never lie.

4 and a half weeks till NRF. See a lot of you in New York I hope.

Until then – if not sooner- I am still,

That Planning Guy

May 26, AD 17…Germanicus returns to Rome as a conquering hero, he celebrates a triumph for his victories over Cherusci, Chattiand other Germanic tribes.

(2000 year throwback. Sorry, Favorite Canadian, no Greek reference this time.)

That’s what I feel like returning to Constellation Connected Enterprise conference #CCE2017.  

This is where my journey really began: Aptos nominating me for a Supernova award, winning it, meeting a lot of new people and learning a lot of be perspectives. 

After this, connection with the RIS team, the EKN group, presenting in Chicago, writing a published article on analytics, writing 2000 words on use of analytics (also published), speaking in Chicago 2 more times, honor of speaking at Retail Orpan Initiative, twice at DSE events, launching this website, and many other amazing turns my life has taken since arriving in Half Moon Bay exactly 3 yesterday ago. 

Thank you Diane C & Aptos (though then still Epicor), and HUGE thanks to Erin Lutz, the amazing PR wizard. You started so much of this.

What will the next three years look like?

-That Planning Guy

What’s the difference between transformation, metamorphosis, and Evolution

Time? Scope? Scale?

Talk amongst yourselves.

– That Planning Guy

The legendary story that never really happened…

“This human behavior of not challenging assumptions reminds me of an experiment psychologists performed years ago. They started with a cage containing five monkeys. Inside the cage, they hung a banana on a string with a set of stairs placed under it. Before long, a monkey went to the stairs and started to climb towards the banana. As soon as he started up the stairs, the psychologists sprayed all of the other monkeys with ice cold water. After a while, another monkey made an attempt to obtain the banana.  As soon as his foot touched the stairs, all of the other monkeys were sprayed with ice cold water. It’s wasn’t long before all of the other monkeys would physically prevent any monkey from climbing the stairs. Now, the psychologists shut off the cold water, removed one monkey from the cage and replaced it with a new one. The new monkey saw the banana and started to climb the stairs. To his surprise and horror, all of the other monkeys attacked him.  After another attempt and attack, he discovered that if he tried to climb the stairs, he would be assaulted. Next they removed another of the original five monkeys and replaced it with a new one. The newcomer went to the stairs and was attacked. The previous newcomer took part in the punishment with enthusiasm! Likewise, they replaced a third original monkey with a new one, then a fourth, then the fifth. Every time the newest monkey tried to climb the stairs, he was attacked. The monkeys had no idea why they were not permitted to climb the stairs or why they were beating any monkey that tried. After replacing all the original monkeys, none of the remaining monkeys had ever been sprayed with cold water. Nevertheless, no monkey ever again approached the stairs to try for the banana. Why not? Because as far as they know that’s the way it’s always been around here.
“People sometimes do the same in the workplace. How many times have you heard “It has always been done this way. Don’t mess with what works.” Instead of challenging these assumptions, many of us, like the monkeys, simply keep reproducing what has been done before. It’s the easiest thing to do

Life should be orchestrated with a large decision tree: simple if/then boolean logic. 

Imagine if every day followed like the interactive children’s books where the choice you make leads down the path, then the next decision jumps to another fork. Ad finitum.

Can you predict the next outcome without deciding the current one? No, that’s just not possible. Even if you can get a few steps ahead, the A/B logic makes the tree have too many branches to be certain of the outcome. Every step expands the possibilities, and the unknowns, geometricly.

“When you reach a fork in the road, you should take it. ” -Yogi. 

The road not traveled, vs greener grass.  Only time answers the questions, but only if the questions are in fact asked.

Choose Wisely, fellow #datanerds

A little meandering tonight, but hopefully came back to center by the end.

That Planning Guy

I recently commented that if a conference happened and I didn’t attend, did it really count ?Did it really even happen? This was not a commentary on if people attended or not it was a conversation about relevance.

The tree falling in the forest and no one hearing it is not a metaphor on the sound it makes. It’s a commentary on if it matters. If the tree fell and no one heard it —who cares? 

Just clarifying for all you folks out there  who have conferences. And a little Tuesday afternoon entertainment for myself. I do bring the party with me.

 If anyone is looking for me next weekend I will be at Austin attending Insights, by Revionics, a great event every year. 

Amused, 

That Planning Guy