Tips

CIO Strategies: Five best practice tips for implementing business intelligence

By Carlo Castille 6 months ago

Martin Draper, technology director at luxury retailer Liberty, says his big priority for 2017 is business intelligence. The firm gathers information from various sources and Draper wants to create a data-driven strategy that helps executives at the firm make smarter decisions quickly and effectively.

He joined the world-famous retailer in March last year, having completed a 13-year IT leadership stint at Harrods. Throughout his career, Draper has been eager to drive transformation through information. He spent a decade running his own business intelligence (BI) consultancy before becoming a retail CIO, helping organisations in all sectors turn data into insight.

Here, Draper draws on his experience and provides five best practice tips for running a successful BI imitative.

1. View your initiative as a pervasive cultural approach

Analysts are keen to talk up the continued investment in BI and analytics. Gartner says 48 percent of companies invested in big data in

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Personal Finance News Information Tips

By Carlo Castille 6 months ago

Greetings all,

I guess it’s about time to shut down this blog, Top Finance Blog. It’s been a nice run of 11 years and initially I had a lot of fun and made some nice money, but those days are gone and it’s time to move on.

Since I never had many return visitors or subscribers and had only one comment in the last 5 months, I doubt anyone will actually read this. But that’s okay because I’m turning off comments in any case, so I’ll probably never know if anyone ever cared about most of the content here in the last few years or so.

However, if there were things here that interested you, here’s a bit of information for you. Many of the articles here will be repurpose elsewhere. They’ll either go to my accountant’s blog, who I write for, or my relatively local blog, Syracuse Wiki, where

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5 Tips for Aligning Your Remote Team’s Goals

By Carlo Castille 6 months ago


5 min read

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.


With 52 percent of the global workforce already working remotely at least once per week before the current situation, it is becoming essential for businesses to cultivate a productive and engaged remote team. One key factor is alignment between employee and company goals. Studies show that when employees understand how their work contributes to company objectives, productivity increases by 56 percent. 

Here are five tips for how you can help your remote team align its goals. 

Communicate Regularly 

Remote teams cannot function without excellent communication. It is critical in any group dynamic, but in a remote work setting, when interactions are limited to explicit platforms like instant messages or emails, even more so.

You can schedule regular company-wide meetings to provide plenty of opportunities for information sharing. Daily check-ins or standup meetings are another great way

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4 Tips To Keep Your Business Afloat in a Downturn

By Carlo Castille 6 months ago


5 min read

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.


It’s official. We are in another recession. According to Kristalina Georgieva, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the downturn this time around is going to be as bad or worse than what the world experienced in 2009.

As an entrepreneur, this is bad news. As it is with any downturn, we can expect a lot of job losses and pay cuts. This inevitably leads to a drop in customers’ purchasing power, which, in turn, impacts your business, leading to further layoffs.

While it will be nearly impossible to get away from this unscathed, businesses may take a few steps to mitigate losses. Here are a few tips to consider.

1. Put business interests first.

With recession looming large, businesses — even those with healthy cash flow — face uncertainty in their operations. In

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4 Easy Productivity Tips for Every Entrepreneur

By Carlo Castille 6 months ago

As an entrepreneur, how often do you complete everything on your to-do list? Do you ever feel like there is too much to do in too little time? If so, you’re in the right place. I’m going to share with you, the entrepreneur, four easy productivity tips to decrease the size of your to-do list and increase your focus on the remaining critical tasks.

Having worked with brilliant and motivated people in my day job as Head of News & Media at InfoTrust, a digital analytics consultancy, I have seen the struggles of high performers. It generally comes back to too much to do, too little time.

Do, Decide, Delegate, or Delete

President Dwight D. Eisenhower, a five-star general during WWII and the 34th president of the United States knew a bit about productivity. He led one of the most productive administrations during his two terms as president, creating NASA,

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Interested in Starting a New Business? 8 Helpful Tips on How to Begin

By Carlo Castille 6 months ago

Taking a long-term view and breaking up projects into manageable tasks are key.

11 min read

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

In my travels, I speak to so many people who dream of starting their own business. They say they’re tired of working to make someone else’s dream come true, and they really want to take control of their life and future. I always ask them: Why don’t you just go for it? One of the most common responses I hear is that they have no idea where to even begin. I understand why they feel this way. Starting a new business is a big, overwhelming endeavor. However, if you take a long-term view and break the process up into a series of small tasks, starting a new business can feel safe and manageable.

If you’ve made the decision to move forward, where do

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Best practice tips for business intelligence success

By Carlo Castille 6 months ago

There is no doubt that companies understand the importance of business intelligence (BI) to supporting the efficient and effective running of the organisation.

Continued economic uncertainty and major industry-changing dynamics like mobility and the shift to digital business put a premium on data and information. Whether it’s optimising processes, improving customer service, increasing the accuracy of marketing initiatives, breaking into new markets, or seeking ways to get ahead of the competition, firms recognise that getting the right data to the right person at the right time is a key prerequisite to business success.

However, recognising the importance of data and analytics is one thing. Actually putting in place the processes and tools required to deliver data and analytics in the most efficient and appropriate way to meet the needs of business decision-makers is a different matter:

The majority of organisations continue to struggle to get the desired value out of

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4 Tips for Keeping Your Data Secure While Everyone Works From Home

By Carlo Castille 7 months ago

More employees are remote than ever before. Here’s how to make sure that doesn’t lead to breaches.


5 min read

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.


The COVID-19 pandemic has completely disrupted our normal way of doing things, and this is especially true of how employees go to work. As millions of Americans transition to working from home as part of social-distancing precautions, many analysts are predicting that the impact on where we work will last long after the pandemic ends.

Indeed, remote work has several advantages for employers and employees. Studies have reported greater levels of job satisfaction, less stress and higher productivity. Many employers have given feedback indicating improved retention, while also being able to reduce office expenses.

Of course, despite these opportunities, remote work also presents several challenges — one of the biggest being how to keep work-related information secure when someone

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Business Analytics/Business Intelligence information, news and tips

By Carlo Castille 7 months ago

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Insurance Tips: 10 Steps to Buying Car Insurance

By Carlo Castille 7 months ago

Experts recommend that if you have a lot of assets, you should get enough liability coverage to protect them. Let’s say you have $50,000 of bodily injury liability coverage but $100,000 in personal assets. If you’re at fault in an accident, attorneys for the other party could go after you for the $50,000 in medical bills that aren’t covered by your policy.

The general recommendations for liability limits are $50,000 bodily injury liability for one person injured in an accident, $100,000 for all people injured in an accident and $25,000 property damage liability (usually expressed in insurance shorthand as 50/100/25). Here again, let your financial situation be your guide. If you have no assets that an attorney can seek, don’t buy coverage unnecessarily.

Your driving habits might also be a consideration in determining the coverage you need. If your past is filled with crumpled fenders, if you routinely speed, or

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