Mid Tier Consultants Try the Turkey Tactic
November 27, 2014
Entering 2015, the economy is not ripping along like some of the MBAs suggest. Life is gloomy for many keyword search, content management, and indexing system vendors. And for good reason. These technologies have run their course. Instead of being must have enterprise solutions, the functions are now utilities. The vendors of proprietary systems have to realize that free and open source systems provide “good enough” utility type functions.
Perhaps this brutal fact is the reason that search “expert” Dave Schubmehl recycled our research on open source software, tried to flog it on Amazon without my permission, and then quietly removed the reports based on ArnoldIT research. When a mid tier consulting firm cannot sell recycled research taken without permission for sale via Amazon for the quite incredible price of $3,500 for eight pages of information garbling our work, you know that times are tough for the mid tier crowd.
Are the turkeys the mid-tier consultants or their customers? Predictions about the future wrapped in the tin foil of jargon may not work like touts who pick horses. The difference between a mid tier consulting firm and a predictive analytics firm is more than the distance between an art history major and a PhD in mathematics with a Master’s in engineering and an undergraduate degree in history in my opinion.
Now the focus at the mid tier consulting firms is turning to the issue of raising turkeys. Turkeys are stellar creatures. Is it true that the turkey is the only fowl that will drown itself during a rain storm. My grandmother told me the birds will open their beaks and capture the rain. According to the Arnold lore, some lightning quick turkeys will drown themselves.
For 2015, the mid tier consultants want to get the Big Data bird moving. Also, look for the elegant IoT or Internet of Things to get the blue ribbon treatment. You can get a taste of this dish in this news release: “IDC Hosts Worldwide Internet of Things 2015 Predictions Web Conference.”
Yep, a Web conference. I call this a webinar, and I have webinar fatigue. The conference is intended to get the turkeys in the barn. Presumably some of the well heeled turkeys will purchase the IDC Future Scape report. When I mentioned this to a person with whom I spoke yesterday, I think that individual said, “A predictions conference. You are kidding me.” An, no I wasn’t. Here’s the passage I noted:
“The Internet of Things will give IT managers a lot to think about,” said Vernon Turner, Senior Vice President of Research at IDC. “Enterprises will have to address every IT discipline to effectively balance the deluge of data from devices that are connected to the corporate network. In addition, IoT will drive tough organizational structure changes in companies to allow innovation to be transparent to everyone, while creating new competitive business models and products.”
I think I understand. “Every”, “tough organizational changes,” and “new competitive business models.” Yes. And the first example is a report with predictions.
When I think of predictions, I don’t think of mid tier consultants. I think of outfits like Recorded Future, Red Owl, and Haystax, among others. The predictions these companies output are based on data. Predictions from mid tier consultants are based on a wide range of methods. I have a hunch that some of these techniques include folks sitting around and asking, “Well, what do you think this Internet of Things stuff will mean?”
Give me the Recorded Future approach. Oh, I don’t like turkey. I am okay with macaroni and cheese. Basic but it lacks the artificial fizz with which some farmers charge their fowl.
Stephen E Arnold, November 27, 2014
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