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Showing posts with label Gartner. Show all posts

June 5, 2014

Hey QlikView - If you were the best tool, I would have chosen you!

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Earlier this week several people sent me a slide from a sales presentation from QlikView. In the slide, QlikView used a quote from me, my image and my name without my permission. (NOTE: Please see update at the bottom of this post.) The quote was in reference to a poll I ran (which I've since taken down because I wanted to stop the voting) in which I was critical of Tableau's performance. Apparently QlikView is using this quote as a competitive weapon against Tableau. QlikView has sent this to multiple customers in an effort to impact sales.

I can think of only one reason why QlikView would do this: Tableau must be killing them!

QlikView is obviously grasping for straws. While I'm sure Tableau is having to do some unplanned firefighting, they might see this as a compliment. Only competitors that are getting their asses kicked would resort to these tactics. All you have to do is look at the latest Gartner Magic Quadrant to see that Tableau is the leading platform.
I like to tell Tableau, and I know many other people tell them this too, that we chose them because they are the best end-to-end solution on the market. But they need to be aware of complacence. If another tool comes around that better meets my needs, you can be sure that I will switch. In the end, I want a tool that makes me look good.

 Performance remains my #1 concern with Tableau. Tableau is not an exclusively in-memory solution like QlikView, so Qlik comparing their performance to Tableau's is not an apples-to-apples comparison. I like to tell the Tableau execs that if they can make Tableau fast for data at Facebook's scale, imagine what they can do for the more typical customer. I am extremely confident that Tableau is listening and are actively working to address my performance concerns.

Here are some random thoughts about why I love Tableau:
  • One of the reasons I respect Tableau, its management and its employees so much is that they would never use anything I say without asking my permission. Tableau has quoted me quite often: on their blog posts, on their website, as part of ads, in sales presentations. But Tableau has asked permission EVERY SINGLE TIME.
  • I have never seen an example where Tableau has acted in the manner in which QlikView has.
  • I chose Tableau because it's the best overall data visualization tool on the market.QlikView, I didn't choose you because you simply can't compete. If you want to win, make a better tool.
  • Tableau listens unlike any other vendor I've ever known. They care about their customers. Customers drive feature development. Two great examples of Tableau listening to their customers are: (1) the upcoming Mac client and (2) the Apply button on multi-select drop-downs. I personally worked with Tableau to help create the Apply button, which they initially called the “Andy” button internally. They took the time to personally reach out to me and gather my feedback and showed me prototypes along the way.
  • Tableau has a community of users unlike any other product I've used. If you've ever been to one of their conferences, you know what I mean. If you haven't been to one, you must go. Tableau's forums are completely user driven. If you ever have a question, ask on the forum and you're all but guaranteed to get a high-quality response...for free! There are people like Joe Mako and Jonathan Drummey that hold working sessions with users to help them learn. I write this blog because it's a way that I can share with the community. The number of wonderful Tableau bloggers is astounding. Do you ever hear of other vendors having their users promote their product like Tableau's users do? I think not!
  • They have a mission and vision that matches my own.
  • I've spoken at four Tableau Customer Conferences with two more planned this year. I've spoken at their annual company meeting. Why would I speak on their behalf if I wasn't their biggest advocate?
  • Without Tableau, there's no way I would be working at Facebook. I have some incredible success stories from my days at Coke (like using Tableau with buyers and making $30M in 10 minutes). And the success stories have continued here at Facebook.
I'm disappointed and saddened by QlikView's behavior. If anyone knows who I can contact to get them to stop using my name, my image and the quote, I would greatly appreciate it. They didn't ask permission and I don't like how they're using me to market their product.

 If there are any companies or customers that are seeing this slide from QlikView and it's making you question which tool you should use, then consider why they would be resorting to such tactics. Only companies that are playing catchup behave like this. Think about why they would do this. Question their sales staff.

 I've always been more than happy to talk about the pros and cons of BI tools as I know them. If you are a prospective customer comparing QlikView and Tableau and have any questions, feel free to email me. I'd be more than happy to answer any questions you have.

UPDATE: 
6/6/2014 - I need to recognize Maria Scurry from QlikTech for being so responsive to my concerns. Maria left a comment shortly after this blog post went live. In addition, she has been very responsive to my emails and she has confirmed that she found the source of the slide in question and it will not be used publicly or internally from this point on.

March 17, 2013

Are you going to the Gartner BI Summit? Come hear Facebook’s Tableau deployment story.

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Stop by the Facebook talk on Tuesday from 11:45 AM to 12:30 PM in Texas C and hear our Tableau deployment story. Namit RaiSurana and I will be speaking.

Tableau Software: Like! Facebook’s Tableau Deployment

Facebook has defined a new standard for the world when it comes to social networking. A relentless focus on being a data-driven company is one of the underpinnings of this success. (Their Hadoop environment sees over 100TB of compressed data daily!) This session will describe why Tableau was selected to put analytics in the hands of every data user so they no longer were reliant on developers to serve up reports and analysis.

Stop by and say hi!  Also, we’re hiring!

June 1, 2010

What business intelligence is NOT

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I received the latest newsletter from BeyeNETWORK today and what immediately caught my eye was the article by Richard Herschel titled "What is Business Intelligence?" The article goes into all of the typical discussions about BI:
  • Is it part of Knowledge Management?
  • Should Business Intelligence be included in the information systems field?
  • Is Business intelligence a system, environment, a solution, and/or an offering?
  • Is it a combination of statistical and data-mining capabilities?
Before providing his own "definition" of BI, Herschel states "Data and analytics are together the foundations of business intelligence." I believe that data is an important part of the backbone needed to get at the intelligence, but I don't believe it is foundational to the definition itself.

The author would like us to consider an alternate definition:

    Business intelligence is the application of data, technology, and analytics to gain insight and knowledge that enables decisions about people, processes, products, and services that yield positive economic outcomes.
I don't understand why people continually try to define business intelligence when it has already been done. The Gartner Group coined the term business intelligence in the mid-1990s and defined it as follows:

    An interactive process for exploring and analyzing structured and domain-specific information to discern trends or patterns, thereby deriving insights and drawing conclusions. The business intelligence process includes communicating findings and effecting change. (Source: www.gartner.com)
There are clear distinctions between the definitions. Herschel insists on bringing data and technology into the equation when they have nothing whatsoever to do with deriving insights and drawing conclusions.

Please, please, please, stop re-inventing the wheel and causing even more confusion. It's madness already, another spin on the words is only going to make things worse.
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