Category Archives: Analytics

Discussions about business analytics and intelligence, from the science and math to the applications.

Some questions to ask yourself if you want to be a data scientist

Last October, the Harvard Business Review published an article called “Data Scientist: The Sexiest Job of the 21st Century.” I could virtually hear the rejoicing in the work hallways of analysts, mathematicians, statisticians, and computer scientists everywhere. At last, recognition! … Continue reading

Posted in Analytics | Tagged , , | Comments Off

Math and Analytics at IBM Research: 50+ Years

Soon after I arrived back in IBM Research last July after 13 years away in the Software Group and Corporate, I was shown a 2003 edition of the IBM Journal of Research and Development that was dedicated to the Mathematical … Continue reading

Posted in Analytics | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

Simple introduction to analytics

This came up today in a discussion today, so I thought it would be useful to clarify some terminology related to analytics. Reporting and dashboards are not predictive analytics. More generally, Descriptive analytics is where you describe what is or has … Continue reading

Posted in Analytics | Comments Off

New year, newish job

As of the end of December, I’ve been with IBM for 30 years. That seems like a lot, but I think you just sort of wake up one day and discover that time has gone by, you’ve been working, your … Continue reading

Posted in Analytics | Comments Off

Analytics: Interacting systems make things tricky

Every year around holiday times, millions of people take to the roads, the skies, and the rails to visit friends and families. Sometimes everything works perfectly: the traffic isn’t too heavy, there are no accidents, schedules are met, lines are … Continue reading

Posted in Analytics | Comments Off

Where I’ve been

It’s been quite some time since I’ve posted an entry here. It’s been a very busy summer both in my personal life as well as my business one. I changed jobs within IBM effective August 1: I went from the … Continue reading

Posted in Analytics | Comments Off