Joe Stangarone, Author at mrc's Cup of Joe Blog

6 critical guidelines for Business Intelligence beginners

By Joe Stangarone / Business Intelligence

Business Intelligence (BI) consistently ranks as one of the top priorities in various CIO and IT surveys. A recent Gartner survey puts BI as the top CIO priority for the last two years running. Forrester comes to the same conclusion.

The fact is, many companies are (or are planning on) adopting a Business Intelligence solution for the very first time. With data growing by leaps and bounds, it’s no surprise that more businesses are looking for ways to capitalize on that data.

The only problem: Most BI implementations fail. It’s no secret. According to various surveys on the topic, anywhere from 60% – 80% of BI projects fail. Yikes.

This paints a grim picture. Implementing BI is the #1 CIO priority, and many businesses will start a BI project in the near future…but most BI projects fail.

Today, let’s explore a few ways to lower those numbers. What must companies who are new to BI do to ensure success? What critical tips should these companies follow? We posed those questions to a few experts in the field, and have compiled their advice (along with some of my own) below. Here are 6 critical tips for BI beginners:
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Weekly recap: 9 hottest mobile development skills, strategic tech trends for 2014, and more…

By Joe Stangarone

Every week, I share the most interesting and useful tech articles that I’ve found over the past week. This week’s top articles focus on the hottest mobile development skills, Gartner’s strategic tech for 2014, and more. I hope you find them useful:

Combatting the information deluge
Information is exploding at an unprecedented rate. The burden falls on companies to not only turn that data into actionable metrics (like this user-defined dashboard, for example), but also secure and store that data.
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5 new realities that developers must learn to accept

By Joe Stangarone / Web Development

Web application development has changed. Driven largely by the rise of mobile and the growth of cloud-based applications and services, modern web application development is much different than it was just five years ago.

What’s changed? I classify these changes into two categories: Trends and realities. What’s the difference between a trend and a reality? A trend is optional. A reality is not. For instance, flat design is a trend. You don’t have to use it, but many people do. The rise of mobile users is a reality. No matter how much you may tell yourself otherwise, you can’t ignore the very real fact that smartphone and tablets are here to stay.

Today, let’s focus on the realities. How has web application development changed, and what new realities must web application developers learn to accept? We posed those questions to a few experienced developers, and they provided some excellent advice–which you will find below. Here are 5 new realities that developers must learn to accept:
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The need for self-service reporting

By Joe Stangarone / web reporting

Did you know that a full 90% of the data in the world has been generated over the past two years? We’re creating more data than ever before, and this trend is only growing. The only problem: Many businesses still aren’t sure how to capitalize on all of this data.

Oftentimes, the data is inaccessible to the very people who need it most. Salespeople have no way of easily viewing their sales data. Marketing managers can’t easily create the reports they need to view prospect data. As a result, all of that data goes to waste.

The fact is, as businesses generate more data than ever before, self-service reporting becomes increasingly important. You must give your employees a way to pull that data out of your systems and turn it into meaningful management information–without going through the IT department.

Unfortunately, this is still a problem in many companies. They still force end users to go through the process of requesting reports from the IT department, and then waiting around until they’re delivered. While all too common, this process often causes 3 big problems:
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Weekly Recap: 5 mobile app questions to ask the CIO, IT’s failing reputation, and more…

By Joe Stangarone

Every week, I share the most interesting and useful tech articles that I’ve found over the past week. This week’s top articles focus on mobile questions to ask the CIO, why IT’s reputation is so poor, and more. I hope you find them useful:

Why everyone wants a private cloud
Concerns over security and control in the “public” could make the “private” cloud model tempting to many companies. But, is this a solid strategy? Perhaps a better question: Do your applications give you the flexibility to deploy anywhere–private or public?
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8 hidden costs of mobile application development

By Joe Stangarone / Mobile apps

Mobile apps are taking off in the business world. In fact, a recent survey found that most companies plan on building a mobile app this year, and believe that enterprise mobile app development will outpace desktop application development.

However, with every new field, there’s bound to be some surprises along the way. As more and more businesses jump into mobile app development for the first time, many make a crucial mistake: They go into the process with a limited understanding of the true costs of developing a mobile app. In fact, many falsely believe that development cost starts and ends with the developer.

The truth is, the cost of developing an enterprise mobile app reaches far beyond the actual development. The big question: What unexpected costs should businesses plan for when building mobile apps? What expenses might surprise you during the mobile app development process?

photo credit: William Hook via photopin cc

Today, I’d like to outline the mobile app development costs that businesses may not anticipate. Hopefully, this will better prepare your company for mobile app development, and reduce some of the surprises along the way.

However, before we get into these unexpected costs, I want to differentiate between mobile app types. People tend to associate the term “mobile app” with “native app,” but that’s not entirely accurate. It’s important to note that there are three types of mobile apps:

Native app: An app that’s installed on the device itself and distributed via the platform’s app store/market.
Mobile web app: Commonly referred to as an “HTML5 app”, these are cross-platform apps that are accessed through the device’s web browser.
Hybrid app: Built with web technologies and wrapped in a native shell, these apps are a combination of the two previous apps. They look and feel like a native app, but are actually web apps inside of a native wrapper.

I explain the difference between each app type because the following “hidden costs” don’t necessarily apply to each one. To help differentiate, I’ve listed which costs apply to each application type at the end of each point. Sound good? Okay, let’s get started. Here are 8 of the unexpected/hidden costs to watch out for when building mobile apps for your business:
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New graphs and charts (with demo)!

By Joe Stangarone / web reporting

I’m excited to announce that we’re bringing improved graphs and charts to m-Power! They’ll be available to m-Power users in the coming weeks, but if you’d like to get a glimpse of what’s in store, head on over to Crazybikes.

While you’ll find the new graphs and charts across many of the applications over on Crazybikes, you’ll see the widest variety on the User-Defined Dashboard demo. Try adding a few different charts, graphs, or gauges to the dashboard to get a glimpse of what the new m-Power charting will look like.

How will this help you? Here are a few ways:
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Weekly Recap: Stupid security mistakes developers keep making, mobile BI strategies, and more…

By Joe Stangarone

Every week, I share the most interesting and useful tech articles that I’ve found over the past week. This week’s top articles focus on stupid security mistakes developers keep making, the new age of real-time architecture, and more. I hope you find them useful:

Data, Legacy Systems, and the New Age of Real-Time Architecture
In a world of instant data–where we can access data from across the world at any given moment–why do businesses have so much trouble with data access? Why are reports so difficult to access in many companies? Why do we still have disparate systems in companies that still can’t communicate with each other? The fact is, these legacy applications were never designed for the world we live in now. They weren’t built for integration. If you’re in this situation, how can you bring flexibility and integration to these legacy systems? My advice: Explore your modernization options.
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8 big challenges facing CIOs and IT leaders in 2014

By Joe Stangarone / CIO Challenges

What’s the biggest tech trend facing businesses right now? Is it the rise of mobile? BYOD? Cloud computing? Consumerization?

The fact is, you could make a case for any one of them…which highlights the most important point: We’re currently going through a fundamental shift in technology. We’re seeing a number of disruptive technologies converging on businesses at the same time. When combined, these changes create a unique set of challenges for CIOs and IT leaders going into 2014.

So, what are the biggest challenges facing CIOs and IT leaders in the coming year? Perhaps a better question: How can they address these challenges? We asked these questions to other CIOs and IT leaders, and have listed these responses below. I’ve also included a brief tip on how to address each challenge. So, without further ado, here are the biggest challenges facing CIOs and IT leaders in the coming year:
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Pre-registration is now open for a new consulting program

By Joe Stangarone / Consulting

I’m happy to say that we’ve just opened up pre-registration for a brand new consultant program! This new program gives consultants access to a low-cost, cloud-based version of our enterprise web application development platform, m-Power.

If you’re a consultant, you’re familiar with the struggle of finding new projects. Completing the project is the fun part. It’s the lull between projects that makes consulting difficult.

Small, and one-man consulting operations have an especially difficult job. After all, they can’t afford to hire a marketing and sales to team to bring in business for them. They handle all aspects of their business themselves. The majority of their time is spent either working on projects or looking for new projects.

The problem with this arrangement: In between working on projects and finding new projects, there’s little time to keep your skills current. How can you keep up with the ever-changing technology trends if you spend all of your time working on, or looking for, projects? Why is this such a problem? Because consultants who fall behind the rapidly changing technology curve risk losing out on valuable new business in the future.

Now, larger consultant shops often address these problems with development platforms (like m-Power). This offers a number of benefits, such as:
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Author name: Joe Stangarone