Hiked the Walter Sisulu Botanical Gardens Geological Trail

Date was 7th August, 2021. A group of us, three friends, kept our promises to each other to hike the trail – the Walter Sisulu Botanical Garden’s Geological Trail. It was fun – as walking up a mountain can be. A steep climb at first – hearts racing, knees trembling, the thought of turning back ever prevalent. But we leaned in. We looked each other in the eye and each time saw the possibility of completing. At every point when turning back was an option, there was at least one person ready to continue and urging on the rest of the party (even though there was one person who did most of the urging and encouragement, we each took turn when our strength permits). We shared stories. Stopped to take pictures. Stopped to take in the scene. Stopped to be thankful – thankful that we could do this, thankful we lived in a free society, thankful the beauty that is the geological trail existed. And more importantly, we finished. We did not turn back. And guess what, we made more promises. Promises to do this more often. That is the beauty of not going it alone. Whenever possible, take people with. You’d learn from their character. You will give of yours as well. And together you will create beautiful memories, products, experiences or whatever else you are passionate about.  

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There are two sides to a coin, six to a cube…

Indeed, it won’t be in our generally accepted definition of a coin if it has one side or three, or four, or ten sides. It will be something else. It won’t be a cube, if it only has 5 sides, or 25. That is the power of context. Of convention. Of what has been agreed. Of what could be understood. Every story, exists in a context. Is told in a context. Makes sense in a context. And may not make sense in another. Universality is agreed. But context evolves. Context should be appreciated. Context should be factored in. Otherwise, we will be getting high on our fumes and be surprised that no one else cares. What is the context in which your opportunity or challenge exists? Factor that into how you address it.

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Microsoft Edge

I went from being a Firefox adherent for many years to being a Chrome lover. Internet Explorer was relegated to the backseat of testing web products I worked on (whilst, always, imagining why anyone was using internet explorer). I was exclusive with Chrome for more than a decade. Yes, I looked with side eye and some time disdain at those who complain about Chrome and worse still those who argue that Chrome isn’t a browser. I laughed at those who point at the resource intensity of Chrome (please: get a lot of RAM and the extra battery your computer needs and stop bitching about my Chrome). Then came my flirtations with Edge. At first it was occasional. You know, just to get the compulsory Internet Explorer/Edge only work related bits done. Then it became more regular. I saw Edge more often than Chrome would like, and more often than I could have imagined. Today, I am officially coming out of the closet to declare: I am a two browser man. Edge during the day (for obvious reasons), Chrome at every other time. Edge on Windows. Chrome everywhere else (Mac, iOS and Android). To be honest, Microsoft did reinvent the Internet Explorer in Edge. The same way, Windows 10, restored Operating System excellence to the levels only experienced in Windows 98. Kudos Microsoft! And please, don’t mess this up.

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What do you want to change and why?

What do you want to change (challenge, modify, improve, destroy – the list goes on) and why? Is it because the change is within your power? Or because it helps moves society forward? Or because It helps build culture? Will your change add to the commonwealth?  And contribute to the general good? Will the change move the needle, a tad forward in humanity’s best interest? Remember, a change that helps solidify an individual’s or corporation’s position to the detriment of our collective well being is not only selfish, but criminal.

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Can water go uphill?

With a need. With an understanding of how water flows and the rules that guide the flow. With determination. Water can be made to go in any direction other than that dictated by nature. In doubt? For the need of using water as energy source, man created dams. For the need of creating artificial rain, man invented and perfected irrigation (well copied the idea from nature). For the need to use water for domestic purposes, far away from the source(s) of water, man invented water distribution systems that includes water treatment plants, water distribution systems and plumbing. And eventually, man bottled and bagged water for the added convenience of taking water with them everywhere they went. And this goes on. So, I ask again, can water go uphill? The answer is, start with a need. Mix in knowledge. Then add in deliberate execution. And you will make water go uphill.   — Note: Icons made by Eucalyp from www.flaticon.com

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Exploring the Business of YouTube with my Guest #MibiAfolabi

YouTube has indeed leveled the playing field for content creators, irrespective of creed, gender or other affiliations or biases. What does it take to succeed on the platform? What is even success on YouTube? In this show Oluwakorede Asuni, explores some of these with a fast rising YouTuber – one Olu admires and one that has shown Olu some of the ropes of worth navigating on the path to leveraging YouTube as a vent for his aspirations.  

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Know the audience: Segment and target

Comedians know this. They know that failing to reach a room and convert them is failure. A bomb! The best of them, those we know and hear about. Have for the most part developed techniques for reading and understanding the room. Whilst it is advantageous that you know everyone in the room and their preferences and the nuances surrounding these, in order to reach them, or ensure your message resonates with them, it might be difficult to pull this off. Very difficult, if you do not have years and months to dedicate to this – note that the room changes and so does the people in it, including you. So working with aggregates and averages come into play. What are the needs of the people in this age group or that age group? What is the prevailing practice in this or that industry? These over simplified questions can be nuanced to entire markets, faith, geographies and all the other artificial or natural groupings of people, to help you get started selecting a slice of the room to target. That is segmenting. And in knowing your audience, you can craft your story, your product or the experience you want to create for this selected audience. That is targeting. There is no one size fits all. And there are no true averages – but we can always make do with aggregates. Note: Icons made by surang from www.flaticon.com

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Design Thinking in a Waterfall World

Note: This article has been published by: the IIBA – https://www.iiba.org/business-analysis-blogs/design-thinking-in-a-waterfall-world/ Modern Analyst – https://www.modernanalyst.com/Resources/Articles/tabid/115/ID/5617/Design-Thinking-in-a-Waterfall-World.aspx BA Times – https://www.batimes.com/articles/design-thinking-in-a-waterfall-world/ As much as we like to think we are now in a dynamic and agile world, most delivery initiatives are still some shades of agile and all shades of waterfall. These initiatives could have adopted an agile outlook and naming convention, but the businesses they support are often still predominantly waterfall – going from one clearly defined task to another until realizing value. Think for example, order to cash, just in time logistics etc. We often have some outliers, mostly modern businesses without legacy overloads and whose core business is digital or relies heavily on digital who may have cracked the agility question. Waterfall is seen by most agile advocates as a relic of a time that had been and that should be forgotten and buried. Waterfall is expensive, time consuming and unforgiving of errors.   Design thinking, on the other hand may be equally as expensive especially for organizations with legacy burdens switching over to an agile way of work, has picking up errors early built right into its DNA and offers opportunities to succeed quickly or fail fast. A variation of the plan-do-check management methodology – the decision is easy to reach if one strips down the elements of the methodology into its bare bones fundamentals –design thinking allows the business or the delivery team to involve the customer for whom a product or service is being designed early on

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BA Ideas, Thoughts & Opportunities

Thoughts & Ideas: Disco Lights, Hybrid Facilitation & Early BA Engagement (BlackMetric, UK): https://cutt.ly/evQAAuy What is a Maintenance Business Analyst Role? (Modern Analyst): https://cutt.ly/DvQSyud Design Thinking in a Waterfall World (Oluwakorede Asuni, Modern Analyst): https://cutt.ly/avQSl8J Growth Hacking Made Simple: A Step-by-Step Guide (Neil Patel): https://cutt.ly/zvQSHQ0 Service Design (Interaction Design): https://cutt.ly/yvQS9LE Total Quality Management (American Society for Quality): https://cutt.ly/svQSMc8 Events & Opportunities: Collaborating to Solve Business Challenges with Bonny Matlala (IIBA South Africa Webinar – 22 April 2021). Register here: https://cutt.ly/0vQS5Jw  How to become an Agile Certified Business Analyst (IIBA AAC): https://cutt.ly/8vQDaB8 9 Steps to Strategic Change that Delivers Desired Business Outcomes(IIBA International Webinar – 31 April 2021). Register here: https://cutt.ly/KvQDhO7 Do you perhaps prefer that I email you this type of communication once a week? Then consider subscribing here: 

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Do you perhaps prefer that I email you, once a week, with thoughts, ideas and opportunities? Then consider subscribing here:     

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Business Analysis Communities & Resources

Communities IIBA  IIBA Chapters IIBA South Africa IIBA Business Analytics Special Interest Group (LinkedIn) IIBA CBAP Group (linkedIn) Resources: Bridging the Gap: https://www.bridging-the-gap.com/ BA Times: https://www.batimes.com/ BA Excellence BABOK Study Group Modern Analyst: https://www.modernanalyst.com/ 5W-1H: https://joenewbert.com/5w-1h/ Thought leaders Angie Doyle Adriaan Reed Edward Ngubane Joe Newbert Paula Bell Ryan Folster Thsepo Matjila Paul Benn Jared Gorai Lucy Davies Oluwakorede Asuni All lists above are in no particular order. These lists are not a ranking and should not be treated as such. PS – Cover image was shamelessly copied from this location https://dilbert.com/strip/1996-03-24 Updated regularly! For occasional updates to this list and other Business Analysis news and thought leadership, please consider subscribing to my mailing list: 

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A thing or two about vanity metrics

Vanity metrics mean or measure nothing. Well, except to stoke ego of those reporting these vain metrics or used to hide a problem. Whilst saying your company moved goods worth US$ 6Billion in the first quarter of 2020, sounds good to the ears, it really doesn’t say much.  Except, if your shareholders have invested in ‘goods movement ‘ and not in a logistics business. Saying how much you made from moving that volume of goods is perhaps the real metric you should report. And you will agree that that is perhaps the most of interest to your investors and to your bottomline. In addition to stating your total sales, your investors and other stakeholders, will be more likely than not be interested in knowing the cost of moving the those goods (ypur cost of sale), total revenue (sales), and total earnings before interests (if you took a loan to finance any part of the sale or your operation), taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA). An interesting to have metric is also average revenue per transaction – knowing this sheds some light on how much output you get from your company’s effort on average. Perhaps the only use of the metric ‘volume of goods moved’ is to illustrate how efficient your operation is,  and to “pepper” your competition if your size is significantly higher than industry average.  But that is where the relevance and usefulness of the ‘volume of goods moved’ as with all vanity metrics ends. Vanity metrics on their own

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What if we could all be design thinkers?

Yep! That is possible. We would be doing what we are ding today in our different teams within the delivery pipeline, except that: We would be thinking more about the customer than our egos or what we believe to be smart; We would meet with real users (customers) – who have bought is using or will buy the product/service ; We would listen to and observe these real users (customers) in their habitat interacting with the service or product – yes, flash bulbs will go off (and may be not); We will build low/high fidelity prototypes of the changes we have defined with customer and test with multiple sets of customers; We will perform (3) and repeat (4) and; We would have an open mind and wouldn’t be scared of what we find out in (5), rather; We would factor our learnings into (4); Once a measure of comfort is reached, we will proceed with building the actual product/service; We will perform (1) to (8) to infinity; And we can brag that we are design thinkers! To get posts like this in your inbox, weekly:  

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Design thinking is about the customer, not about design for its own sake

Yep! Design thinking may have been originally gifted to the world by industrial design firm Ideo*, **, today design thinking is as much about the design as solution architecture is about designing structures. Design thinking is an iterative process, that saves businesses from themselves and lets them interact with their customers before drawing the first line on their solution canvass. And then taking the customer along through out the journey of building a solution. Design thinking has several benefits including building a product or service that the customer truly wants and can pay for. Popularised by Tim Brown** at Ideo, the first recognisable output and potentially the poster child of design thinking is the mouse – yep, the humble computer mouse***. To get posts like this in your inbox, weekly: References * The Origins of Design Thinking (Wired) **Tim Brown, the father of Design Thinking ***Creating the first usable mouse – Ideo   

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UX thought leaders: Olu’s list

In no particular order IDEO –  https://www.ideo.com/ Interaction Design – https://www.interaction-design.org/literature Swathy Ranjendran – https://www.swathyrajendran.com/ Usman Abiola – https://www.crunchbase.com/person/usman-abiola

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Burna walking in path paved by Fela Anikulapo Kuti?

Like i said most of Burna’s hits are songs he sampled, educate yourself pic.twitter.com/Pl6DMyEXVs — prettyboy$po (@Kinyels) February 12, 2020   Artists copy, great artists steal – Steve Jobs (Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson)

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UX

UX is the envelope with which products are delivered. Excellent UX is the package in which customer needs are met, on time, in place, and as expected. UX is how the customer experiences the product or service. The entire journey from discovery to consumption to post consumption. Brilliant UX includes brilliant UI, making the product or service intuitive to use and easy to engage with. UI alone does not improve the UX of a product. Rather, the product MUST at first be capable of meeting a REAL need of the customer. Slapping a fancy UI on a dumb product, may make the product appealing when looked at, but will still be terrible when used. Beyond exciting user interfaces, UX includes user journeys mapped to deliver the core product with as little intrusions, distractions or other barriers to seamless use of the product or service. A pig is always a pig. Lipstick or lipstick not. But a poorly orchestrated UX can make a good product suck! Perhaps the foundation for an awesome UX is knowing the customer and putting their needs right bang centre of the whole product development process. Well, that’s right. UX is user experience. It will be extremely difficult to build an awesome user experience into our products (or make our products an awesome experience for users) if we do not consult with them (and no matter how much you think you know about the customer or how well you believe you or members of your team can

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Reflections on work and being busy?

Do we do work for the sake of it and its direct benefits (ability to buy things and by a stretch the ability to create wealth) or as a means to live a fulfilled life (where each is free to define fulfilment)? A position I might have maintained given “my confusion” is to maintain a hybrid view of work. I seize or attempt to seize every opportunity to create something that brings me fulfilment (I have been known to go as far as crossing boundaries of organisational hierarchy to get stuff done and apologise afterwards rather than wait endlessly for permission) and sometimes, too, I simply toe the line – in the hope that something great emerges – especially one that does emerge despite our efforts to the contrary.