Here’s the full interview:

Get the bonus Q&A with the audience by visiting  GreatTechPros.com.

Here are some short video clips of topics discussed:

• What has changed in Business Analytics?
• What is your approach to creating data visualizations?
• Free/Low cost data visualization tools for small businesses.
• What type of data visualization recommendations do you offer to larger businesses that do not have tool/platform preferences?
• What were you doing with CDC?
• What drove you to Analytics & Data Visualization as a Career?

Useful Links:

• You can connect with Teneika on her website, Twitter and Linkedin.
• Tools include PowerQuery, PowerBI, Tableau, Google Data Studio and SAP Tools.
• Though it is important to implement a new platform/solution, it is equally as important to inform and educate end-users on how to utilize the new platform or solution.
• Every career/job has a data component – Do make an effort to learn how to utilize data as a skill. Doing so will enhance your skill-set and help you enhance your career.
• College students should look into scholarship, internship and other opportunities offered by their university like the Thurgood Marshall College Fund (TMCF) and INROADS internships.
• For those who are new to data visualizations, start with Microsoft Excel, work to graduate from a beginner Excel user to an advanced Excel user, then learn Microsoft Power BI and Tableau.
• Microsoft currently offers free Power BI training, Tableau Prep & Tableau Desktop are not free unless you are a student, freeCodeCamp and SimpliLearn.

Watch or Listen to Great Tech Pros anytime, anywhere.

• Watch on YouTube, 
• Tune in on Facebook Watch, 
• Listen on Google Podcasts, 
• Be all ears on Spotify, 
• Eavesdrop on Apple Podcasts, 
• and more.

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With the 1st day of 2020 approaching, there is no need to wait until the new year to begin planning goals and efforts, let’s do it now…

• Learn a new technical skill to push your career-expertise to the next step.
• Travel to a new destination to immerse yourself in new cultures, interactions and experiences.
• Ask yourself, “What am I avoiding that I should be taking on headfirst, then take action on it.”

The people we interact with and actions we take impact future outcomes. Higher a coach, ask a mentor for help, demand excellence from yourself, and never stop taking action.

Wylie Blanchard

Let’s meet up in 2020.

In the meantime here are a few of my activities from 2019:

• Reflection: Global Immersion in Brazil 2019
• Interview with Eric Schmuttenmaer: Building Executive Presence for Technical Professionals
• Interview with Don Alava: Integrating Digital and Traditional Marketing
• Reflection: Global Immersion in Germany 2019
• 2+2 Information Technology and Management Bachelor’s Degree Program – College of DuPage
• SQL Saturday Chicago – 2019

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I just returned from a 9 day immersion trip in Brazil learning about their economy and business practices with a group of MBA graduate students from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

First, let me say that I’ve always wanted to visit Brazil. Prior to this trip, I had an interest in the economics of South America, along with Africa and the Central American region of North America, thus I was very happy to participate in the Brazil immersion in order to gain a better understanding of at least one of the countries in South America. This immersion trip gave me a higher understanding of Brazil’s unique economy, complicated tax system and the country’s need for tax reform.

Here’s a list of businesses that we visited. 

• Prof. Roberto Nagai (FEA/USP) for a guest lecture on “Doing Business in Brazil” (São Paulo, Brazil).
• Geru (São Paulo, Brazil).
• XP investments (São Paulo, Brazil).
• Leroy Merlin (São Paulo, Brazil).
• Ibmec (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil).
• SICOOB (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil).

Prior to the trip, I began researching Brazil’s economy and culture, which included buying two books:

• The Politics of Blackness: Racial Identity and Political Behavior in Contemporary Brazil​ by Gladys L. Mitchell-Walthour; and​​
• Africans in Brazil a Pan African Perspective: A Pan-African Perspective​ by Abdias Do Nascimento.

I’ve not yet finished reading the first book but plan to have completely read both books by the end of 2019.

The businesses that we met with were all excellent choices. My expectations of the business leader meetings/discussions were mostly met. The discussions with economics professor Roberto Nagai and the faculty at Ibmec delved into the challenges facing the country’s economy with both discussions reaffirming that taxation is a major problem in Brazil. These conversations forced me to consider whether taxation was partly the reason for the declining revenue that one of my USA clients, an American Fortune 500 business, recently experienced in Brazil that eventually led to the closure of its Brazil division.

At Leroy Merlin, we met with Michelle Dapper, Director of Organizational Transformation and Continuous Improvement, who I found excellent to learn from and engage with. She gave us a greater understanding of how and engages leaders at Leroy Merlin to create change. Personally I felt that this company visit was more unique than the others because, prior to the visit, I’d never pondered on the operations of a hardware/furniture business.

SICOOB was another great visit. I enjoyed speaking with the Company Director, Eduardo Diniz, and his team. The visit helped me visualize the challenges that member-owned companies can face in Brazil.

Overall, the trip presented a great learning experience for my peers and I.

As a tourist, I visited Trianon Park (Parque Trianon), Museum of Art of São Paulo Assis Chateaubriand, Casa das Rosas – Espaço Haroldo de Campos de Poesia e Literatura, Sugarloaf Mountain (Pão de Açucar), Christ the Redeemer (Cristo Redentor), Paragliding from Rampa de Voo Livre da Pedra Bonita to São Conrado Beach (Praia de São Conrado), Maracanã Stadium to watch Clube de Regatas do Flamengo gain a win over Avaí Futebol Clube (SC), Copacabana Beach (Praia de Copacabana) and more. The highlight of the trip was meeting Aílton Macarrão, owner of the Rocinha Orginal Tour, who gave me a private tour of Rocinha, the largest favela in Brazil.

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EVENT UPDATE: The SQL Saturday Chicago event is always amazing. I presented two sessions at the event: Become a SQL Pro who’s in High Demand and You’re hired! Creating value before and after the interview.

Notable Sessions: Here are two sessions that I attended that were both educational and enjoyable.

• Andy Wickman (t, l, b) “Lessons from Consulting: Third-Party Vendors,” which explained what to expect and what questions to ask when dealing with third-party software that interacts and manages company data. Andy shared what key things to check and look for in 3rd party software that will have an impact on a data professionals role. He also shared advice on how to work with these vendors that can make integrating their software into a company’s enterprise more successful.
• David Klee (t, l, b) “My Brain Has Blue Screened – Let’s Laugh,” which was a fun exploration of unique stories that data professionals have encountered over their career. Since this was the last session of the day it was a much-needed laugh and break from learning.

More below, including  Event Photos.

Event Follow Up:

SESSION 1 DESCRIPTION:

Become a SQL Pro who’s in High Demand.

Speaker(s): Wylie Blanchard

Track: Professional Development

Expertise in SQL is an in-demand IT skill. As demand continues to grow, so does the increase of SQL professionals entering your specific industry. Learn what’s needed to ensure that you become a stronger technology authority in your industry and a SQL Pro who’s always in High Demand.  You’ll learn how to invest in growing your expertise, improve your social/people skills, how to effectively sell and market your talent, what is a “source of truth” and why is it extremely important and more.

Session Materials for Event Attendees: 

Download: Presentation Slides 

Event Follow Up:

SESSION 2 DESCRIPTION:

You’re hired! Creating value before and after the interview.

Speaker(s): Wylie Blanchard

Track: Professional Development

Landing a gig as an employee, consultant or contractor has become highly competitive. You need to differentiate yourself in a way that tells the hiring manager that you are more valuable than everyone else. In this session, I’ll share 3 things that I’ve learned from my experience as an employee, hiring manager and consultant that will help you market your expertise, create new opportunities and get them saying “you’re hired”.

Session Materials for Event Attendees:

Download: Presentation Slides 

Wylie provided excellent tips on how to make yourself stand out when marketing yourself and reinforced important principles like focusing on quantifying your achievements.

Steven A Osacky
Crowe LLP

Event Follow Up:

PHOTOS FROM THE EVENT:

SQLSaturday is a training event for Microsoft Data Platform professionals and those wanting to learn about SQL Server, Business Intelligence and Analytics. This event will be held on Mar 23, 2019, at Benedictine University, 5700 College Rd, Lisle, Illinois, 60532, United States.

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Learn what clients are saying about his programs....

Follow Up:

SESSION DESCRIPTION:

You’re hired! Creating value before and after the interview.

Speaker(s): Wylie Blanchard

Track: Professional Development

Landing a gig as an employee, consultant or contractor has become highly competitive. You need to differentiate yourself in a way that tells the hiring manager that you are more valuable than everyone else. In this session, I’ll share 3 things that I’ve learned from my experience as an employee, hiring manager and consultant that will help you market your expertise, create new opportunities and get them saying “you’re hired”.

Session Materials for Event Attendees:

Download: Presentation Slides 

Wylie provided excellent tips on how to make yourself stand out when marketing yourself and reinforced important principles like focusing on quantifying your achievements.

Steven A Osacky
Crowe LLP

Event Follow Up:

PHOTOS FROM THE EVENT:

RT @stilldrey: Great presentation @WylieBlanchard1 on creating value before and after the interview! #SQLSatChicago

RT @SQLBob: You’re hired! Creating value before and after the interview to be by @WylieBlanchard1 #SQLSatChicago

SQLSaturday is a training event for Microsoft Data Platform professionals and those wanting to learn about SQL Server, Business Intelligence and Analytics. This event will be held on Mar 23, 2019, at Benedictine University, 5700 College Rd, Lisle, Illinois, 60532, United States.

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Learn what clients are saying about his programs....

With the 1st day of 2019 approaching, there is no need to wait until the new year to begin planning goals and efforts, let’s do it now…

• Speak only great things about your family and colleagues.
• Learn a new soft skill (Communication skills – Adaptability skills – Teamwork skills).
• Share news about this skill to your family, friends and associates via mobile technology and social media. 

The people we interact with and actions we take impact future outcomes. Higher a coach, ask a mentor for help, demand excellence from yourself, and never stop taking action.

Wylie Blanchard.

Let’s meet up in 2019.

Contact Wylie today.

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Learn what clients are saying about his programs....

With the 1st day of 2018 approaching, there is no need to wait until the new year to begin planning goals and efforts, let’s do it now…

• Help someone else achieve a goal. 
• Speak only great things about yourself. 
• Take action on your goal today, then tomorrow say, “I did it yesterday”. 
• Use mobile technology and social media as business tools to achieve your goals. 

The people we interact with and actions we take impact future outcomes. Higher a coach, ask a mentor for help, demand excellence from yourself, and never stop taking action.

Wylie Blanchard.

Let’s meet up in 2018.

In the meantime here are a few of my activities from 2017:

• The Scope and Aim of Digital Channels.
• Expounding Business Intelligence in Two Sessions.
• Developing Business-Driven Self-Service BI – New York.
• Self Service BI With a Tool End Users Already Know & Love – @CNUG_.
• Developing Tabular Models with SSAS 2016 – #ChiSQL.

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Session Description:

Self Service BI With a Tool End Users Already Know & Love

Speaker(s): Wylie Blanchard

Duration: 60 minutes

Track: BI Information Delivery

Your end users want to analyze data in your data warehouse. They want it yesterday and they want to do it themselves so that it’s done “right”. Welcome, PowerPivot, a tool that analyzes data from your data warehouse by combining the power of Analysis Services models and your SQL Server Data warehouse within the familiar interface of MS Excel. In this presentation well explore the Analysis Services BI Semantic model & PowerPivot in Excel… Love, Like or hate Excel – Your end users are familiar with it and PowerPivot is the best thing to happen to it in years.

Accompanying Materials:

Download: Presentation Slides – Demo

Get the step by step guide:

The Chicago SQL BI User Group hosts monthly meetings for SQL and Business Intelligence professionals to meet, learn, and network. Speakers present a different topic each month covering both SQL BI topics and relevant non-SQL technologies. Dinner, refreshments, and door prizes are provided by sponsors. This meeting was held on Saturday, March 15, 2017, 6:00 PM at Microsoft Technical Center, 200 E Randolph St. Suite 200, Chicago, IL 60601.

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Event Update

Session Description:

Analyzing SQL Server Data using PowerPivot in MS Excel

Speaker(s): Wylie Blanchard

Duration: 60 minutes

Track: BI Information Delivery

Your end users want to analyze data in your data warehouse. They could deal with the learning curve of SSAS but they’d prefer to utilize a familiar application like MS Excel. Welcome, PowerPivot, a tool that retrieves data from your data warehouse by combining the power of SSAS models and your SQL Server Data warehouse within the familiar interface of MS Excel. In this presentation well explore SSAS BI Semantic model, PowerView, PowerPivot in Excel.

Accompanying Materials:

[pdf-embedder url=”https://www.wylieblanchard.com/wp-content/uploads/Analyzing-SQL-Server-Data-using-PowerPivot-in-MS-Excel_SQLSaturday-600-Chicago-2017_Wylie-Blanchard_Great-Tech-Pros1.pdf” title=”Analyzing-SQL-Server-Data-using-PowerPivot-in-MS-Excel_SQLSaturday-600-Chicago-2017″]

Download: Presentation Slides – Demo

Get the step by step guide:

Analyze & Visualize SQL Server Data w/ Power Pivot & Power View in Excel

In this tutorial we’ll use Microsoft Excel to retrieve data from our SQL Server database. We’ll then model, analyze and visualize the data using Excel’s Power Pivot and Power View features…

SQLSaturday is a training event for Microsoft Data Platform professionals and those wanting to learn about SQL Server, Business Intelligence, and Analytics. This event was held on Mar 11, 2017, at DeVry University – Addison Campus, 1221 North Swift Road, Addison, Illinois, 60101, United States

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Learn what clients are saying about his programs....

SQLSaturday is a training event for Microsoft Data Platform professionals and those wanting to learn about SQL Server, Business Intelligence, and Analytics. This event will be held on Mar 11, 2017, at DeVry University – Addison Campus, 1221 North Swift Road, Addison, Illinois, 60101, United States

Get more great content at WylieBlanchard.com... Need a great speaker for your next event, contact us to book Wylie Blanchard now.
Learn what clients are saying about his programs....