Publications

July 19, 2007. James Taylor, who is part of our ebizQ community, just co-authored a book (with Neil Raden) entitled "Smart (Enough) Systems", which is a great work on systematizing and managing the decision support process. I had the honor of contributing a testimonial to the work, which I'm reprinting here:

While growing up, the big rhetorical question I often heard asked was, "If we can send people all the way to the Moon and back, why can't we..." . ? (Fill in the blank with a frustration -- predict tomorrow's weather, design a car that runs on something besides oil, make a good omelet...)

The same kind of question might be asked of today's businesses: With all the vast amounts of information technology and data that is abundant in today's corporations, why can't companies still comprehend want their customers want, what their employees know, and what the future directions they should take?

In Smart Enough Systems, James Taylor and Neil Raden -- who have been leading the charge for more engaging business intelligence for a number of years now -- attempt to finally answer this question, by looking at the current state of technology and how it is employed -- or underemployed -- within today's organizations.

In fact, James and Neil point out that most organizations already have the technology in place from which they can make better decisions. It's not technology that's holding things back, it's the way that decision making is managed and measured -- which, in many cases, is no management or measurement at all.

Read more.