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San Francisco cab driver’s dashboard

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I asked a San Francisco taxi driver I happened to sit next to about indicators he sees. I didn’t mean “low oil,” I meant big things. Whether the economy is still falling or not, for one.

Figure out how to collect tip data from cabbies and waiters and you’ve have a good early indicator of economic trends, I’ve always thought. But the cab driver, Richard Roe — also producer of a website on verbal defense tactics and a retired programmer — says no. Tips have been the same. Moods, too.

However, he has noticed one thing. People used to forget their cell phones all the time.… Read the rest “San Francisco cab driver’s dashboard”

Recession reactions: hunkerers and builders

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There are the hunkerers and the builders. Those are the two basic reactions to the recession that Jill Dychè observes. She’s a principal down at Baseline Consulting, and she reports seeing more builders.

The hunkerers “are using the economy as an excuse for a fair bit of inertia,” she emails. But the builders are using “the temporary lull” to ready themselves for the recovery. “Strategy” comes up a lot more these days.

One type of builder is revisiting infrastructure. For example, some want to re-platform their data warehouses, and others want to acquire master data management hubs. “When things get really busy again, they’re positioned to be out in front.”… Read the rest “Recession reactions: hunkerers and builders”

Recession: value of alert messaging resonates

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KnowledgeSync automates the kind of routine tasks that skilled staff disdain: issuing simple invoices, inquiry followups, low-inventory alerts, etc. It’s a BI specialty that cuts cost fast. VP of sales and marketing Don Farber says that, considering the economy, he’s pleased with just a five- to seven-percent dip in sales this year.

The benefits are resonating well this year, he reports. Where companies might have had 50 leads in the pipeline during good times, they might have just 15 now. “You might have been able to miss one before,” he says, “but you can’t afford to miss any now.”

This is one in a series of posts on the recession and BI.… Read the rest “Recession: value of alert messaging resonates”