Ask the Experts

Ask the Experts

• Data scientist vs. business analyst: What's the difference?

  Data science and business analyst roles differ in that data scientists must deep dive into data and come up with unique business solutions -- but the distinctions don't end there.  Continue Reading

• How do I get experience for a business intelligence job?

  IT professionals who want to move into business intelligence roles should take classes, advises careers expert Matt Mueller -- or accept an entry-level position.  Continue Reading

• Need for business intelligence analysts spans industry spectrum

  While technology, healthcare and retail companies are currently hiring more BI analysts than other types of organizations, careers expert Matt Mueller says jobs are available across the board.  Continue Reading

• Communication skills a must for business intelligence professionals

  Today's enterprises want business intelligence managers and staffers with good communication skills and a solid understanding of the business, advises careers expert Matt Mueller.  Continue Reading

• Big data means big demand for business intelligence analysts

  Business intelligence and analytics are booming in the big data era -- and so is demand for BI analysts, managers and developers, according to careers expert Matt Mueller.  Continue Reading

• Design a business intelligence system properly -- for business users

  Rick Sherman explains how to avoid common mistakes when planning and designing BI systems, saying that the varying needs of different business users must be front and center.  Continue Reading

• The justification for running multiple mobile analytics tools

  Finding a mobile analytics tool that will properly serve all end users is nearly impossible, eBay's BI manager says.  Continue Reading

• Do predictive analytics projects require data scientists?

  Expert Mark Whitehorn explains what skills are required for predictive modeling -- and whether business users can do the work of data scientists.  Continue Reading

• Social media analysis: Valuable tool or overhyped technology?

  Companies need to ask some basic questions to determine whether they'll gain business value from social media analytics, says expert Mark Whitehorn.  Continue Reading

• R language well-suited to analytical data sampling and manipulations

  Analytics expert Mark Whitehorn explains the strengths of R and how to determine if the open source programming language fits your analytics purposes.  Continue Reading

• Three common business intelligence training mistakes to avoid

  Expert Brian Jordan discusses three common mistakes that BI teams make when training business users and offers advice on how to avoid them.  Continue Reading

• How Hadoop and open source BI software affect BI architecture

  There’s been a lot of talk about Hadoop and open source BI software. Find out how the open source technologies affect business intelligence architecture and BI development.  Continue Reading

• Expanding your business intelligence architecture to mobile devices

  Get tips on expanding a business intelligence architecture to support mobile devices and mobile BI software. Find out about the BI capabilities, strengths and weaknesses of mobile devices.  Continue Reading

• The basics of improving BI performance

  Find some basic ways of improving BI performance at your company. Learn about in-memory analytics, columnar databases and how data aggregation affects BI performance.  Continue Reading

• Which users can benefit from BI dashboards and scorecards?

  Are businesses deploying business intelligence dashboards and scorecards to workers other than managers and senior executives? Learn about high-level dashboards and who gets use out of dashboards and scorecards.  Continue Reading