The PrecisionAg® Vision Conference will feature high-powered and thought-provoking speakers that will bring new perspective to the challenges and opportunities in technology and big data in agriculture. PrecisionAg® Media, producers of this important inaugural event, is pleased to welcome William Schmarzo, author and renowned expert on the relationship between businesses, business leaders and big data.
Schmarzo is Chief Technology Officer at EMC Global Services, but is best known for his work as Executive Fellow at the University of San Francisco School of Management. His course, The “Big Data MBA,” is extremely popular, and the textbook he authored for the course is used by educational institutions across the country.
His presentation at the PrecisionAg Vision Conference, “Leveraging Big Data For Business Value,” will be designed to help managers and executives to properly calibrate their organization’s approach to big data.
“Organizations do not need a big data strategy, they need a business strategy that incorporates big data,” says Schmarzo. “When you do that, it changes the conversation, and changes how you think about data and analytics.”
Schmarzo also believes that business managers and executives must embrace analytics as a business discipline, and to start thinking like data scientists. “The days where you simply flip analytics over to the IT department are over,” he says. “Business leaders need to think like data scientists, analytics needs to be a part of their core discipline. Leaders that embrace analytics as a business discipline experience astounding results.”
Schmarzo has over three decades of experience in data warehousing, BI and analytics, and he has authored EMC’s Vision Workshop methodology that links an organization’s strategic business initiatives with their supporting data and analytic requirements. He also co-authored with Ralph Kimball a series of articles on analytic applications. He has served on The Data Warehouse Institute’s faculty as the head of the analytic applications curriculum.
Previously, Schmarzo was the vice president of Analytics at Yahoo where he was responsible for the development of Yahoo’s Advertiser and Website analytics products, including the delivery of “actionable insights” through a holistic user experience. Before that, he oversaw the Analytic Applications business unit at Business Objects, including the development, marketing and sales of their industry-defining analytic applications.
Schmarzo holds a Masters degree in Business Administration from the University of Iowa and a Bachelor of Science degree in Mathematics, Computer Science and Business Administration from Coe College.
Recent blogs can be found at: http://infocus.emc.com/author/william_schmarzo/
You can also follow him on twitter @schmarzo and LinkedIn www.linkedin.com/in/schmarzo
