AI-Enabled Analytics for Business

We are entering the era of digital transformation where human and artificial intelligence (AI) work hand in hand to achieve data driven performance.

Today, more than ever, businesses are expected to possess the talent, tools, processes, and capabilities to enable their organizations to implement and utilize continuous analysis of past business performance and events to gain forward-looking insight to drive business decisions and actions. AI-Enabled Analytics in Business is your Roadmap to meet this essential business capability. To ensure we can plan for the future vs react to the future when it arrives, we need to develop and deploy a toolbox of tools, techniques, and effective processes to reveal forward-looking unbiased insights that help us understand significant patterns, relationships, and trends. This book promotes clarity to enable you to make better decisions from insights about the future.

• Learn how advanced analytics ensures that your people have the right information at the right time to gain critical insights and performance opportunities
• Empower better, smarter decision making by implementing AI-enabled analytics decision support tools
• Uncover patterns and insights in data, and discover facts about your business that will unlock greater performance
• Gain inspiration from practical examples and use cases showing how to move your business toward AI-Enabled decision making

AI-Enabled Analytics in Business is a must-have practical resource for directors, officers, and executives across various functional disciplines who seek increased business performance and valuation.

Acknowledgments ix

Introduction XI

Part I Fundamentals 1

Chapter 1 A Primer on AI-Enabled Analytics for Business 3

Chapter 2 Why AI-Enabled Analytics Is Essential for Business 17

Chapter 3 Myths and Misconceptions About Analytics 27

Chapter 4 Applications of AI-Enabled Analytics 39

Part II Roadmap 57

Chapter 5 Roadmap for How to Implement AI-Enabled Analytics in Business 59

Chapter 6 Executive Responsibilities to Implement Analytics 87

Chapter 7 Implementing Analytics 97

Chapter 8 The Role of Analytics in Strategic Decisions 109

Part III Use Cases 121

Chapter 9 Cases of Analytics Failures from Deviation to the Roadmap 123

Chapter 10 Use Case: Grabbing Defeat from the Jaws of Victory 133

Chapter 11 Use Case: Incremental Improvements to Gain Insights 143

Chapter 12 Use Case: Analytics Are for Everyone 151

Epilogue 157

Appendix – Analytics Champion Framework 159

About the Authors 209

About the Website 215

Index 217

LAWRENCE S. MAISEL is President of DecisionVu, a management consultancy specializing in Performance Management, Data Analytics, and Operations Improvements. He is an experienced executive with proven leadership to drive efficiency and control through planning and analysis, AI-enabled analytics, and operating process redesign. Maisel is a CPA, MBA, and CGMA and received AICPA’s Thought Leader award for creating its Center for Excellence in Financial Management. He authored Predictive Business Analytics, co-created with Drs. Kaplan and Norton, the Balanced Scorecard Approach, and co-authored with Drs. Kaplan and Cooper Implementing Activity-Based Cost Management. He is a former Senior KPMG Partner and an Adjunct Professor, Columbia University’s Graduate School of Business.

ROBERT J. ZWERLING is a high-tech entrepreneur founding and growing software companies across telecom, manufacturing, distribution, high data availability, analytics, and AI. He is a noted speaker, thought leader, and author on AI and analytics, and has co-authored with Jesper H. Sorensen dozens of papers and the groundbreaking book, Implementing an Analytics Culture for Data Driven Decisions. Zwerling holds two degrees in engineering and is a registered Professional Engineer. He is Managing Director at Aurora Predictions, providing AI-enabled analytics with an intuitive/no-code interface to automatically reveal insights that moves the business’s needle. He is co-founder of the Finance Analytics Institute, which teaches how to implement analytics through papers, surveys, benchmarks, and the Analytics Academy.

JESPER H. SORENSEN is a Finance Executive with a proven track record of advancing the analytics agenda. He is currently a Vice President of Finance at Oracle, leading a large global finance team for a multi-billion-dollar business. Prior to Oracle he held leading positions with DuPont and IBM. He holds several advisory positions including advisory board member for Aurora Predictions. He co-authored with Robert J. Zwerling many articles and papers on analytics and the book Implementing an Analytics Culture for Data Driven Decisions. Sorensen is also the co-founder of the Finance Analytics Institute. He holds a Master in Economics and Management from the University of Aarhus, Denmark, and is certified in Risk Management and Strategic Decision Making from Stanford University

More than ever, businesses seek better processes, tools, and strategies to ensure that the right people are enabled to make smarter decisions. AI and analytics combine to deliver insights and foresight that can move the business’s needle. The technology applies mathematics and algorithms on data for unbiased predictions for fact-based input for truly informed human decision-making.

AI-Enabled Analytics for Business, delivers a roadmap to equip your organization to engage AI and analytics to proactively plan for the future, rather than just reacting to the future when it arrives. You’ll learn the strategies and techniques to reveal forward-looking, unbiased insights to help you uncover invaluable patterns, relationships, and trends.

The authors offer clear and specific advice to show you how to deploy advanced analytics and use it to deliver crucial insights to decision makers right when they need it. You’ll also learn to implement AI-enabled analytics decision support tools and discover new facts about your business that will unlock greater performance.

In AI-Enabled Analytics for Business, you’ll find practical examples and use cases from a spectrum of industries that explore successes and failures in implementing advanced analytics. You’ll be able to use them to draw inspiration, avoid pitfalls, and initiate and sustain a culture for data driven decisions.

Perfect for executives, managers, and business leaders, AI-Enabled Analytics for Business is also an indispensable resource for analytics professionals, business intelligence professionals, and anyone else who wishes to better understand the potential of AI and predictive analytics and how to implement it in their organization.

Praise for AI-ENABLED ANALYTICS FOR BUSINESS

“Like artificial intelligence, this book promises a lot—and it delivers! By clearly explaining AI’s fundamentals and identifying the keys to its successful implementation, the book is essential reading for corporate executives, small business operators, and individuals running non-profit organizations.”

—John F. Cogan, Senior Fellow, Stanford University Hoover Institution

“Maisel, Zwerling, and Sorensen have created a brilliant primer for understanding and implementing AI programs. Rich with successful business case studies, their insights are essential to the success of any executive hoping to build a performance-based culture using data driven decisions.”

—Steven S. Myers, Serial Entrepreneur, CEO coach, author, and speaker

“Maisel, Zwerling, and Sorensen make a powerful case that ‘The executive who does not realize the value from analytics or fails to adopt will be replaced by an executive who can deliver insights for data driven decisions.’ We are fortunate they also provide remedies for those in the former category. In simple terms, they define analytics, clearly outline why analytics is critical for business success, and provide a roadmap to implementing a Data Driven Decision making culture at our companies.”

—Steve Rosvold, Founder and CEO, CFO.University

“AI-enabled analytics is the next enabler of sustainable growth in today’s volatile, uncertain, and hyper-competitive world. This guide lays out a practical approach to harnessing the power of data and analytics supported by relevant and insightful use cases. Whether deep into creating an analytics powerhouse or ready to embark upon the journey, there are lessons that can help ensure implementation success and ongoing strategic value.”

—David A.J. Axson, The CFO Whisperer

“AI-Enabled Analytics for Business raises the bar on what it takes to become an ‘Analytics Powerhouse.’ The combined approach of chapter narratives, a ‘How To’ implementation playbook, and real-world use cases provide rich context that every executive and aspiring leader needs to understand. Readers will distinguish what it takes to be capable for the digital world that every business will be compelled to implement and sustain.”

—David Sullivan, COO, Unqork