We first want to say thanks for attending the Most Important Xcelsius Webinar of 2012! Consider  this to be one of three upcoming blog posts discussing the details of the webinar. Please be sure to read it all the way through before previewing the video to view some great outcomes from the webinar.  Enjoy!

10 Amazing Webinar Facts

1. Registration soared to a record 1086! (30+ countries)
2. 64% show up rate with over 700+ attendees
3. 400+ Questions received
4. 96% Attendee approval rate from feedback survey!
5. 500+ tweets on our twitter hashtags #AllAccessSAP and #XcelsiusSOD reflected the traffic of a mini conference (and still going BTW)!
6. 48% of the customers on the call had both SAP BW and Business Objects when polled
7. 82% of the attendees had no idea what SAP Zen was (though Zen reflected 30% of the questions asked and is the next most requested AllAccessSAP Webinar)
8. #SAPZen twitter hashtag has been bred into life!
9. SAP BI Commnity Response was historical and overwhelming! To date we have 7 blog posts, 1 podcast and 1 semantic analysis and counting…
10. 6 Amazing SAP BI panelist, namely Mani Gill, Ty Miller, Jason Rose, Ian Mayor, Scott Leaver and Mani Srinivasan did an AMAZING job answering questions!  Big thanks to them for participating and making this a success.

Anticipated Xcelsius Book Giveaways!

You couldn’t possibly think that we forgot the BOOK GIVEAWAY from our friends at SAP Press?!  CONGRATS to our winners (check your emails for more details).

• Winner #1 – Marc Teixido Ibarz (SP)
• Winner #2 – Ruby Norley (US)
• Winner #3 – Bala Seetharaman (IN)

I wrote the foreword for this book and can personally recommend that you buy it now, especially if BI4 is on your plate.  Electronic versions available for non US folks too!

AllAccess SAP Xcelsius Webinar Recording (60 mins of No BS)

Sit back and turn up the volume…

If you are having trouble viewing the video, please click the direct link: http://youtu.be/vMVnBnr0PHY

Useful Links & SAP BI Community Webinar Responses

• Download - AllAccessSAP Xcelsius Webinar Slides
• Download – Xcelsius Statement of Direction
• An SAP BI Exec Response Blog – “The Future of Dashboards – Strategy and Direction” (by @adam_binnie)
• BOBJExpert Community Response Blog – “A Quick Primer on Dashboarding with Zen — and SAP’s Recommendations” (by @BOBJExpert)
• An SAP Partner Response Blog  - “Live blog of AllAccessSAP Xcelsius Webinar” (by @pieter_hendrikx)
• Former BOBJ CTO Response Blog – “Xcelsius, Zen and Nirvana” (by @donaldmac)
• A Consultants’s Response Blog – “The Future of SAP Dashboards” (by @dallasmarks)
• An SAPMentor Response Blog – “Is Patience still a virtue” (by @oswaldxxl)
• ASUGNews Diplomatic Response Blog – “SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards Roadmap: Unveiled and Inspected” (by @twailgum)
• Listen to SAPMentors  in DSLayered Response Podcast – “State of Dashboard Take 2” (feat @ericvallo, @dallasmarks, @oswaldxxl and @gpmyers)
• Influence is Everything! Check out the Semantic Analysis of #AllAccessSAP hashtag, compliments of IT-Logix (created by @rbranger, @rogermathis and @codehopper)
• How far did this webinar reach? Check out the #AllAccessSAP twitter reach!

Additional Responses from the Community post this blog:

• BI Expert Response Blog- “For Many of You, Zen is Indeed New Information“ (by @BI_expert)
• TechTarget Response Blog- “SAP and the art of dashboarding Zen” (by @JacquelynHoward)
• An SAP Partner Response Blog-” Zen and the future of Xcelsius” (by @graphomate)
• ASUGNews Weekly Wrap up- April 27, 2012 (by twailgum)
• Dr. Berg’s Response- “Dashboards in HTML-5 and the Zen the BEx Web Application Designer Killer“

Our Fav Tweets – Share the Community Passion!

What’s Next?

I will follow up with 2 more blog posts in the next week. One that seeks to get even deeper answers from SAP on the most pressing questions not covered in the webinar. My 2nd blog post will focus on my thoughts on the Xcelsius SOD and what it means for SAP customers and their existing and future dashboards.

Your Feedback is Required

We want to hear from you! Do post your comments below or on twitter using our hashtags #AllAccessSAP and #XcelsiusSOD to keep the conversation going. Remember big brother is reading.

Mico Yuk is a SAP Mentor and SAP BI Influencer, co-founder of Benchmarkers Business Intelligence and founder of the Xcelsius Gurus Network, the Everything Xcelsius blog. To learn more about her, please visit her about page.

If you have used, invested or are curious about the Xcelsius software, this may the be most important email you will read in 2012!  It’s been a LOOONGG, SLOW year in the Xcelsius world, but I’m sure most of you have seen or heard the buzz about the upcoming “All Access Xcelsius” Webinar tomorrow (4/18/12) at 10am PST/ 1p EST that I will be hosting along with the SAP BI Team.

If you recall, SAP promised to give us the long awaited ‘Xcelsius Statement of Direction’ back in Jan of 2012. To date we have seen NULL.  This call is to follow up on that request and get your future of Xcelsius questions answered.

Besides the NO BS or Marketing theme (had to make SAP promise), there are a number of reasons why you need to attend:

1. UPDATE: The Xcelsius Statement of Direction (SOD) has been delivered! Read it here: http://bit.ly/HUkPqW / or if behind a firewall, try here: http://bit.ly/HUmfli
2. NEW Call Format - Unlike traditional webinars, where SAP typically whips out a PPT for 45 mins, tells you all the good things they hope to come and then leave 10 mins for questions, we will have 15 mins of PPT and 40 mins of questions. Expect most of the questions entered in the registration form to be answered at this time. We will also be taking questions via Twitter and monitoring the Hashtags #AllAccessSAP or #XcelsiusSOD.
3. Panel.. the whole  SAP BI team! - This usually exists at conferences, and to be honest as the registration numbers started increasing to alarming heights SAP just kept adding team members. GO COMMUNITY. Let’s keep them on their toes!  Guess no one wants to be the naked emperor.
4. Live Polls – During the call we want to give SAP as much feedback as possible, so we will be hosting a few live polls on the call and showing the results in real time.
5. Post Surveys – It is also critical that you fill out the post webinar survey that will feature some questions that SAP needs to gain feedback on to ensure that we continue to gain updates. Snuck into there, we will also ask what you would like to see happen with EverythingXcelsius.com in 2012.
6. Continuity.. Lets do it again! - Now note, because of the overwhelming response SAP is already considering doing this same kind of No BS webinar for other areas and tools such as WebI etc. Please be sure again to fill out the post survey if you want this repeated.
7. Three Xcelsius Book Giveaways – As a thank you for your support our friends at SAP Press provided 3 of the NEW Creating Dashboards with SAP BusinessObjects (2nd ed.) books to raffle on the call.  You Must be present to WIN. I personally wrote the foreword for this book and it is the only book that will give you clear guidance on how to use Xcelsius in an Enterprise environment. Don’t miss out!

Registration Link: You can register using this link: http://bit.ly/XcelsiusSOD. Even if you can’t make the actual webinar, we encourage you to sign up to receive the recording afterwards.

Now to the NO BS Clang… Joining us from SAP will be:

We asked the community to come out and support us, and the response is overwhelming! At 100 registrants per day globally, we have over 750+ registrants and counting.  As the global evangelist for this product, I  just want to say your response makes my 2nd (unpaid) job worth the while. THANK YOU! Don’t forget, even if you can’t make the webinar, still sign up to receive the recording afterwards: http://bit.ly/XcelsiusSOD.

PS – Sorry that I have not been blogging as much. It’s very challenging working a day job, dealing with SAP on the back end to keep things moving, being on twitter trying to gain real time responses, and blogging.  I do have lots to say and will work on getting this going soon.  Meanwhile I would appreciate if you could let me know what you want to see on EverythingXcelsius.com in 2012. Thanks!

Mico Yuk is a SAP Mentor and Influencer, founder of the Xcelsius Gurus Network, the Everything Xcelsius blog, and co-founder of Benchmarkers Business Intelligence. To learn more about her, please visit her about page.

This tutorial illustrates how to create a custom Push Button by layering it on top of an Image component. To start:

1. Add a Push Button component to the canvas and select its properties.

2. On the General tab clear the text in the Label property and set Source Data and Destination properties as required. For this demonstration I set them correspondingly to the ranges $A$2:$A$6 and $B$2:$B$6.

3. Resize the Push Button dimensions as required by design.

4. Prepare an image file to be combined with the button. To avoid image distortion it should be proportionally similar to the desired dimensions of the Push Button. As an example, I copied from Google images an icon that symbolizes the Select All function.

5. Add an Image component to the canvas and on the General tab click the Import button. Although the label next to the Import button says JPEG or SWF options, Xcelsius also accepts BMP, GIF and PNG files.

6. Import the image file and check Resize Image to Component option.

7. If needed, resize both components to the same dimensions.

8. Place the Push Button on top of the Image component. To assure a proper layering apply Send To Back to the Image component.

9. Select the properties of the Push Button component, go to Appearance section and on the Layout Tab drag the Transparency slider to 100%. Alternatively, we can uncheck Show Button Background option on the same tab.

10. To ease maintenance, select both components and Group them together.

11. To visualize what happens under the hood, add to the canvas a Spreadsheet Table component with its Display Data property pointing to the range $A$1:$B$6.

12. Open Preview and test. It should be similar to the screen shots depicted below:

Preview on Load before click on a Push Button.	Preview after click on a Push Button

Combining a transparent Push Button component with an Image component underneath allows for a customized look and feel of the dashboard, enriching user experience.

Leonid Koyfman is a BI professional with over 10 years of experience in a database design and development and in delivering reporting solutions using enterprise reporting technologies. He is a big Xcelsius enthusiast passionate about dashboard design and other kinds of data visualization. In his leisure time Leonid enjoys solving mental puzzles and hiking in the Bay Area with his family.

For weeks there has been announcements all over Twitter that the Xcelsius 2008 Service Pack 5 (SP5) with support for Windows 7 and Office 2010 (32-bit) was available on the Service Marketplace. Today we were notified that SAP has made it generally available on its new product updates site: http://bit.ly/xgnFt1 (see the official announcement from Matt Lloyd).

This Service Pack is a cumulative patch, so it incorporates all the patches to-date and delivers new fixes and features. All files must be extracted and downloaded from the zip file and ran directly from your hard drive. After Service Pack 5 (SP5) is installed, the version number in the about box will change to: 5.5.0.0.

Noted additions to this service pack include:

1. Wrap Text Support for Scorecards: In scorecard components, text can be set to wrap within cells.
2. Enhanced Support for Bubble Charts: Now you can now bind the alert values in a bubble chart so you can have one series but have control over the bubble colors using alerts (before you had to define one series for each color which was a pain). Below is a screenshot of the Bubble Chart.

Listed below is all the provided documentation you will need:

• Xcelsius 2008 Service Pack 5 User Guide
• Xcelsius 2008 Service Pack 5 Supported Platforms
• SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1 Service Pack 5 Release Notes (includes Xcelsius) (SMP Login Required)
• What’s new in SAP BusinessObjects XI3.1 Service Pack 5 (includes Xcelsius)

Be sure to keep updated on everything BOBJ, BI4 & Xcelsius by following us on:

• Twitter
• Facebook
• LinkedIn

Soo Tang Yuk (@sootangyuk) is the ‘Xcelsius Gurus Network” community manager and evangelist. To find out more about her, please visit the About Us page.

Creating reports and dashboards in Excel prepared me well for transition to Xcelsius. Its mashup of art and technology impressed me from the moment I opened a trial version and I enthusiastically promoted Xcelsius in the company I worked for then.

Starting with Xcelsius 4.0 we developed a line of web analytics dashboards for financial institutions. Our clients loved them. Instead of hundreds static slides in PowerPoint decks, they received interactive dashboards with intuitive navigation and the level of detail not supported in the legacy reports.  While the data preparation on the database side and in Excel was the bulk of the work, using Xcelsius for the presentation delivered the knockout punch. The resounding success of the project made me even stronger proponent of Xcelsius. It also inspired me to be creative and look for workarounds when Xcelsius doesn’t support needed functionality out of the box.

While getting better with every new release, Xcelsius still needs more popularization. Everything Xcelsius is one of the major players in that field. I’ve been a big fan of the website for many years, regularly visiting the site, learning new techniques and developing new skills. I’m glad to have a chance to share some of my ideas, tips and tricks here.

In the next several posts I’m going to examine various applications of customized Push Button controls in Xcelsius. Stay tuned!!

Leonid Koyfman is a BI professional with over 10 years of experience in a database design and development and in delivering reporting solutions using enterprise reporting technologies. He is a big Xcelsius enthusiast passionate about dashboard design and other kinds of data visualization. In his leisure time Leonid enjoys solving mental puzzles and hiking in the Bay Area with his family.

While we try to keep promotions to a minimum on EverythingXcelsius.com, we could not resist posting about this new component because it is so heavily requested among customers. While some would argue that a basic function like printing should be taken care of by SAP, history has told us that they prefer to use the ecosystem to fill in certain gaps. Frankly, I don’t think that it could have been done any better than this.

After clicking on the print icon, you can click and drag to draw the area for which you will print. This way if you only want a portion of your dashboard printed, you can do so.

While still inside of your dashboard, you can instantly toggle the scale, margins, layout, and alignment of your image to print exactly what you want. This way every user is presented with the same visual print setup regardless of operating system.

So if you need an advanced print button for Xcelsius, you can now look to DataSavy Tools for a sound solution moving forward. Get the Dash Printer NOW!

Ryan Goodman is the Founder of Centigon Solutions, an SAP® software solution partner, that is strategically focused on developing add-on products for use with Xcelsius®. To learn more about him, please visit our Gurus page.

All of these different types of BI can either be accessed in a standalone mode or embedded. With SAP BusinessObjects, standalone can mean either via a desktop application, BI LaunchPad, or one of the various mobile applications that exist. From an embedded standpoint, you could imagine information being delivered via an internal portal (e.g., SharePoint) or within another vendor’s application (e.g., Sage CRM). For SAP Crystal Reports, and other reporting tools, this has been a cornerstone for engaging partners and proliferating BI content.

Operational Reports

When you think of reporting, you would typically envision something like operational reports. These are reports that contain specific details about an entity and are directly responsible for supporting business processes. For example, if you were a support representative and were helping a customer on the phone, you might want to see a list of all orders that the customer has placed over the past 12 months. An operational report, such as the one below, would be one way to display this information.

In addition, operational reports are usually embedded directly within other applications. In the above example, the reports for support representatives could be embedded directly within a CRM application. This would allow the individual on the phone with the customer to click a button or a link and quickly bring up the information that they need to reference. In this scenario, the data is either contained within a database behind the CRM application or is generated by the application. In either case, the data is then pushed into the embedded report while the application is running so that the support representative can get what they need in real time.

The figure below shows an example of an application, Sage SalesLogix, which currently embeds Crystal Reports content.

In this workflow, a user has searched or browsed a list of available reports in order to find the one that is relevant for them.

In any case, the important bit is that Sage did not need to develop a report component on their own. They were able to take something, Crystal Reports, which was already built and embed it. The benefit to their customers is that they have a well known reporting solution built in, they can create their own reports using Crystal Reports, and can more easily upgrade their reporting solution by leveraging the SAP BusinessObjects suite to deliver other types of BI content.

Leveraging Embedded Reporting as a Model for Embedded BI

The widespread embedding of Crystal Reports, and other reporting solutions, into other software begs the question of how we (as a general BI ecosystem) can leverage all of this experience of embedding reporting so that we can make it easier to embed BI as a whole. There are examples out there today where interactive BI content and analytics are being embedded; however, this is an area of growth for BI.

What examples do you know of where this is being done today? How can BI software vendors make this easier?

Coy Yonce is a Principal Technical Architect at EV Technologies and has worked in Business Intelligence for over 10 years. Before joining EV Technologies, Coy was a Crystal Reports Product Owner at SAP for many years. His main focus is leading conversations and being active in the BI community. Connect with him directly via:

Twitter – SDN – Zerply – Scribd – Slideshare – LinkedIn – Google+

The product itself is commonly identified as a Business Intelligence tool; however, it is also referred to as a product for Enterprise Reporting, Operational Reporting, or Business Intelligence Reporting. Regardless of the classification, many market analysts consider reporting to be a key component of any Business Intelligence product suite. At SAP, it is classified under the Business Analytics suite of products.

Who are some of the key competitors for Crystal Reports?

• Microsoft SQL Reporting Services
• IBM Cognos Business Intelligence Reporting
• Information Builders
• Telerik Reporting
• JasperReports
• Pentaho Report Designer
• Microsoft Office Suite
• Oracle Reports
• ActiveReports
• Stonefield Query
• QlikTech
• Tableau

With all of these competitors, plus many others that I have not mentioned, the struggle is to differentiate while maintaining true to the vision of creating strongly typed, interactive reports on top of any data source and allowing those reports to be distributed to users in their own environment.  We don’t want to create an analysis tool. We don’t want to create a tool for the average user to start creating reports. SAP BusinessObjects provides other tools for that purpose. We want to be the tool used to create beautiful reports on top of the amalgamation of any data sources you can throw at it.

Through the years, we have found ways to create interest around the product. We’ve been an embedded report designer in many development environments: Visual Basic, Visual Studio, Eclipse, Borland, and Rational. We’ve created features that allow for accessing newer data sources like XML and web services. We’ve provided ways to embed more engaging visualizations via the embedding of Flash objects. We’ve also provided more interactive features for the report consumer – without stepping too far into the realm of creating a pure analysis tool.

We have our fans and we have our haters. Most people like our ability to create strongly typed reports, the fact that we connect to many different types of data, and the interactive features that we provide for report consumers. Some people struggle with using an outdated report design UI and with embedding reports into their own applications via our APIs. We have a plan for addressing those concerns and delighting our already ecstatic users.

Starting with SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0, we introduced a new report design tool that is currently called SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise. Over the next few years, you will see this become the primary report design tool that customers use; however, this will take some time. Not only do we need to close gaps between the mainstream version of crystal and the new version, but we also need to get customers onto the BI 4.0 platform before they can start using the product.

While closing gaps is a definitely a priority for creating interest in the new designer, we also want to introduce new features that will delight users when they find them. Some examples are our new REST and JavaScript APIs, new visualizations capabilities, a focus on best practices in information design, enhanced viewer workflows, and an online library of report templates. I will write posts about those topics later on both Everything Xcelsius and the SAP Community Network.

For now, I’d like to share with you a quick summary of the posts you will see over the next few weeks.

Types of Reports

I plan to write a four part series that will focus on the types of reports that typically created with products like SAP Crystal Reports and how you can go about creating them. The four types of reports that will be covered are: Operational Reports, Short-Term Strategic Reports, Long-Term Strategic Reports, and Forms. Each of these has their place and purpose in a Business Intelligence deployment.

Coy Yonce is a Principal Technical Architect at EV Technologies and has worked in Business Intelligence for over 10 years. Before joining EV Technologies, Coy was a Crystal Reports Product Owner at SAP for many years. His main focus is leading conversations and being active in the BI community. Connect with him directly via:

Twitter – SDN – Zerply – Scribd – Slideshare – LinkedIn – Google+

Steve Lucas and Adam Binnie of SAP

Hi Folks,

The most anticipated event of the ASUG SAP BusinessObjects conference is finally here and its BIGGER and BETTER!

We are excited to formally announce the Official SAP BI4 Release Party (aka the 3rd Annual Xcelsius Gurus Reception), hosted by none other than myself Mico Yuk (founder of Benchmarkers.com and EverythingXcelsius.com) and the infamous Steve Lucas, Global GM & Senior Executive of the SAP Business Analytics & Technology Portfolio!

If you attended our event in previous years, you probably know that it looks more like a Vegas nightclub on Friday night than a regular ‘boring’ corporate event.  We plan to keep it that way (just don’t tell our sponsors at SAP ).

Now for the long awaited details:

• Location: ASUG SAP BusinessObjects User Conference (Orlando, FL)
• Hosts: Steve Lucas & Mico Yuk
• Date/Time: Tuesday, October 11, from 6:30-9:30pm EST
• Room – (Final details will be sent in confirmation email on 9/29)
• Attendee Count: 250 (space is limited)
• Special Guests – Bridgette Chambers (ASUG CEO) and much more!
• Prizes – 3 door prizes (just drop your business card in at the door to enter), BI4 Video Confession prizes!
• BI4 Video Contest - Submit your videos now, or take them at the event to gain a chance to win an iPad2.  More details by clicking here!
• Features – 2 Open Bars, Open Buffet, networking tables..
• How to RSVP: Please send an email with ‘RSVP’ in the subject to events@everythingxcelsius.com by Wednesday, October 5, 2011.
• IMPORTANT! –  You MUST be REGISTERED for the ASUG SAP BusinessObjects conference to attend this event. Space is limited and we are always booked to capacity within 48 hours of this notice, so please send in your RSVP as soon as possible. Confirmation details will be sent out via email prior to the event with instructions on where to pickup your wrist band. All registered guests will be required to show a wristband upon entrance without exception.

Sponsored in part by SAP, the event promises to provide a host of surprise guest, as well as a BI4 video confession booth where customers can tell their story to win exciting prizes, a chance to network with fellow SAP BusinessObjects community members and the SAP BI team, door prizes, 2 open bars and an open buffet! Let’s also not forget it’s ASUG’s 20th Anniversary celebration!

We would also like put in a call for volunteers, if interested please send an email to gurus@everythingxcelsius.com. We can’t wait to see you! Thanks!

A SPECIAL THANK YOU to Kurt Bilafer, Jason Rose, Sanjay Poonen and of course my wonderful co-host Steve Lucas of the SAP BI Team, and Bridgette Chambers and her right-hand man Richard Zepeda of the ASUG team for making this event possible! Thanks for supporting our community!

Mico Yuk is a 2010 SAP Mentor and the founder of the Xcelsius Guru Network, the Everything Xcelsius blog, and co-founder of Benchmarkers Business Intelligence. To learn more about her, please visit her about page.

Here are 3 reasons why you should attend (IMO):

• Mico’s Part – In case you have never heard me speak, I love to rock the crowd.  This is no different.  I get to open the event by introducing all of the other speakers and also laying the foundation down on how to scope and plan one’s dashboards.  The feedback I got form the first hour from a few attendees was simple: “This was worth the entire cost Mico”.
• Two Hands-On Sessions: It also features 2-hard core hands on sessions that include building a dashboard and using other exciting features in BI4.0 with SAP’s very own Matt Lloyd and Decision First Technologies, Chris Hickman
• World Class Speakers – fellow Xcelsius Gurus, Chris Hickman of Decision First Technologies (who is an SAP BusinessObjects ace and provides deep insight on all BOE related topics), Dr. Bjarne Berg of Comerit (who is an SAP BW and Xcelsius specialist), Matt Lloyd of SAP (not sure there is anyone who knows the Xcelsius platform better, we go back many years), Emily Mui of SAP (another old friend who handles the marketing of the product and has deep insight and answers for customers regarding the roadmap), then myself Mico Yuk (just the biggest Xcelsius groupie that ever lived)
• I must add the 100% Money-back Guarantee though I can assure you, NO ONE will use it. We had a 97% referral rate from the Chicago event!
• Much more – Panel discussions, Governance and Performance Tips

Here is a pic from the Chicago event, just so you can see how packed and intense these sessions were.  Energy was amazing.  Even I learned a few things!

Philadelphia is coming up in just 7-days and we are almost sold out. Same goes for Vegas as far as I know.  As you know we always want to ensure our community is well taken care of.  So for those of you who sign up from reading this blog by 9/30 to ANY of the locations, you will get a complimentary free 6-month membership to the new BusinessObjects Expert website (high quality content) as a THANK YOU from EverythingXcelsius.com.  We created this deal especially for you and it is NOT available elsewhere, not even on the actual registration website. Sign up now!

Complimentary FREE 6 month Subscription to the BusinessObjects Expert Website (using our URL)

Note you MUST USE the specific URL in this blog to get the FREE membership.  Cut and paste into your browser if it is not working:  http://www.xcelsiusbootcamp.com/homePage.cfm?usergroup=bbi-us. (Please note, upon completion of  registration to the bootcamp, you will receive a notification within 24-48 hours with instructions on how to signup for the free 6-month subscription.)

I look forward to seeing all of you, so drop me a line if you plan to attend. I have another huge announcement this week for the ASUG SAPBusinessObjects User Conference attendees about our exclusive BI4 Release Party and how to RSVP. Stay tuned!

Ciao,

Mico Yuk

Mico Yuk is a 2010 SAP Mentor and the founder of the Xcelsius Guru Network, the Everything Xcelsius blog, and co-founder of Benchmarkers Business Intelligence. To learn more about her, please visit her about page.