The performance ideas blog

Category: Social

  • Mark Jeffries: “Have you invested in yourself?”

    GUESTPOST BY MARK JEFFRIES In the IT business – we have a big advantage. Very cool solutions that truly help businesses solve problems. Nice! However, that is not our challenge. The IT challenge is actually whether your target – be it client, colleague or boss – actually wants to buy YOU!  The unspoken questions become…

  • How to present numbers more effectively

    PRESENT NUMBERS MORE EFFECTIVELY My family and I just returned from a fantastic vacation on a cruise ship. On our last day we attended a Q&A session with the captain and a few of his officers. People were very interested in the details of the ship. The captain quoted a few numbers: Weight: 85,000 tons…

  • The TripIt app is the perfect business tool

    There are a bunch of apps for the iPhone and the iPad that I would not want to miss. But there is one that certainly sticks out because it really helps me. I am talking about TripIt. TripIt is a very cool service for all business travelers. Before I found this service I always struggled…

  • The start of a new romance? Google+

    Less than six weeks ago I was lucky to get an invitation to Google+ . While I have not had too much time to play around with it, I do have to admit that I have a serious crush on this tool. Here are some early impressions: Clean interface: Google+ looks awesome. It is pretty…

  • Blog migration wordpress.com to wordpress.org – lessons learned

    You might have noticed a few changes on this site: new URL and new layout. Encouraged by a bunch of friends and readers, I finally decided to migrate this blog from wordpress.com to wordpress.org. In other words, Performance Ideas moved from a hosted to a self-hosted model. The tremendous feedback and support from you along…

  • 8 ideas for delivering a better demo

    Demos are a critical part of every business analytics implementation. There are frequent occasions during any project where we have to show present tools & processes: At the beginning, we might show the new software to our users to educate them. Later on we might want to review a prototype and we need to solicit…

  • 7 reasons to get social

    This past month, I did something I haven’t done in a long time: I did not travel. Being home also opened up the opportunity to hang out in some of the famous beergardens in Munich. In case you haven’t been to a beergarden – it’s kind of like a social network: You connect with friends…

  • Making data sing in presentations

    The other day, I made a bold statement about presentations: many of them suck and they especially suck when it comes to presenting data. Real meaning is often hidden in complex and dense charts. The problem is sometimes amplified by poor communication skills. PRESENTATIONS ARE DIFFERENT There is a fundamental difference between sitting in your…

  • Data + Powerpoint = Wasted Time?

    Let me be blunt and honest: Too many presentations and their accompanying slide decks absolutely suck. And they especially suck when it comes to displaying and discussing data. Over the past few years, I have sat through days- worth of boring and utterly useless presentations. Such a waste! And there was so much potential: great…

  • How to read more blogs on your iPad

    About a year ago I discovered a true treasure: Blogs. No, I didn’t find out about them a year ago. Just like everybody else, I had been reading some of them here and there. Sure, I had a few bookmarks on my work & personal laptop. But I never really got into the habit of…