Effective Communication between departments is a problem that does not suffer from a lack of attention.  Books, studies, speaking tours, coursework, and more continue to proliferate in an effort to break through those barriers that seem to inevitably build up inside companies and organizations.  There is an entire industry that’s been created around this idea of improving business communication; and in fact, it’s an idea as old as human civilization.  Ever since “oouga booga” became “let’s work together” we have struggled to understand each other.

A powerful manifestation of this struggle is the one between Accounting and IT Departments.  Arguably the two nerdiest and most reviled misunderstood departments in a company, it’s surprising there’s not more feeling of simpatico.  There are similarities: They are never around when you need them; or if they are around (and looking for you), you want to avoid them.  And in those instances when you can’t get away fast enough, you can’t figure out what they are trying to say anyways!  True story; I have actually seen a guy physically turn and run when he saw the Director of Finance coming down the hall!  Another true story: an engineer friend of mine who described her week as one of “trying to hide from the Cost Accountant” who was looking for a breakdown of a manufacturing cycle.

Central to improving understanding is, of course, language; or more specifically, its smart-mouthed cousin, jargon.

“I’m not saying that you don’t know what you’re talking about, but I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

These technical terms and shortcuts every professional group develops in order to speed communication within the group.  The difficulty ensues when jargon escapes the confines of the department and runs roughshod over the rest of the company or the public at large.  Some terms and acronyms are able to make the transition and simply become part of the vernacular; however, most simply cause confusion and resentment.  A recent article in CGA Magazine by Management trainer Merge Gupta-Sunderji suggests using the “swear jar” method to discourage jargon use.  My view is more moderate, but it’s easy to see her point.  In a recent blog post, Boris Evelson at Forrester Research contemplates his resignation to the business case for Saas B.I. (or Online Management Reporting systems for the uninitiated) due to inability of Traditional B.I. solutions to meet the needs of end users.

“It is truly amazing that after 30 or so years of BI software, services and solutions vendors and internal IT organizations making a strong push and a case for BI, they are still not even making a dent in the front offices.”
- Boris Evelson, Forrester Research

Among the reasons he cites for non-IT professionals in front-office roles avoiding IT for their information needs was “IT not speaking their language”.  Out of a few dozen study participants a “BIG FAT ZERO” went to IT.  Ironically, later in the article when describing some key technology components to consider when evaluating Online Management Reporting systems Evelson falls back into “B.I. Speak” using hazy terms like “metadata”, “SQL or MDX based import”, “star schema”, “OLAP”, and “Querying”.  When I take delivery of my B.I. Rosetta Stone, I’ll let you know what that stuff means in plain English.

Attending Indicee’s first tradeshow appearance this past month at CGA-BC’s Annual Conference with Craig Todd (Indicee’s Director of Partner Development), we found that some of our terminology was definitely foreign to accountants attending the show.  Craig has a technical background in Business Intelligence and Computer Science, but he’s also spent a fair bit of time in sales.  He’s bilingual.  He also has an unhealthy affinity toward vintage calculators! NIXIE anyone?  My background, although in accounting, has also been heavily influenced by technology, particularly over the past few years.

At one point, Craig pointed out to me that whenever I used the terms “Saas” or “B.I.” the eyes of the person I was talking to reflected a comprehension problem.  In this case, I should been describing the Indicee product as an “online” “management reporting” software.

Speaking with another tradeshow exhibitor from Keystone Templates Inc (and I apologize for not remembering your name), he described a previous role as being a “translator” between Accounting and IT.  We have all of this technology and he’s going back and forth between departments like some kind of post-modern Pony Express Rider.  Or is the more apt analogy that of kids passing notes in class?  (“If this is the configuration you want, check this box”) Each side has their story and their own perspective. At one point, he had to sit them down and say, “Hey guys, do you realize you are both talking about the same thing??!!??”

So, what are we talking about, some kind of jargon-free panacea?  Should we all sit in a circle, link arms and sing “Kumbaya”, live off the land and forget about all this fun stuff?  Is there a solution to the language barrier between Accounting and IT?

In a completely self-serving attempt to establish a floor of understanding between Accounting and IT within the sphere of Business Intelligence, I’ve culled a list of B.I. terms from an industry blog for a short Word Association exercise.  I’ll list some words and you respond with the first thing that pops into your head.  Respond in the comments section.  Next week we’ll post some plain English translations.  We’ll also post some of your comments and definition ideas so please take a few moments to contribute.

This list is pulled directly from The Data Doghouse blog:

• Business Intelligence (BI)
• Performance Management (PM)
• On-Line Analytical Processing (OLAP)
• Analytical Applications
• “Slice & Dice” and Drill down
• Data Mining
• Data Visualization
• Dashboards, Scorecards
• Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)
• Data Shadow Systems or Spreadmarts
• Data Warehouses (DW)
• Data Marts (DM)
• Data Integration
• SOA (Service Oriented Architecture)
• SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) or On-Demand Software versus On-Premise Software
• Cloud Computing
• Dimensions & Facts
• Relational versus Columnar Databases
• Unstructured Data
• Metadata Management

Enjoy!