EPM Conversations

Oh How The Tables Are Turned

I trust you’ve listened to Part the First of the interview with Gabby.  This episode is better.  Why?  Simply because Gabby starts interviewing us and we get a taste of what it’s like to be on the other side of the metaphorical table.

 I’m not going to reveal any more than that – it’s simply too good and if you don’t end up laughing at Gabby’s interrogation techniques and our squeamish answers, well, you must be bereft of humor.

 Join us, won’t you?

I (and the rest of your EPM Conversations hosts) first knew Gabby from his time in Essbase product management, a role he has long left.  Celvin and I (50% of your host population) have been out of the Oracle space since 2017 so it’s difficult to remind ourselves that nothing stands still, and certainly not a dynamic personality like Gabby.  Forgive us two if some of our questions dwell overmuch on the past, where Natalie’s and Tim’s are focused on today.  

 However, Gabby’s past story is one worth exploring as it informs the present – from the military to multiple startups to Big Red.  Throughout it, he’s his inimitable self, bringing humor (yeah, this is the plug for the first episode, but wait till the second episode – it’s…incredible, and it doesn’t make sense unless this episode is heard first) and a playful wit to the performance management space.

HyperRoll and its first home in Oracle Express, ASO, the lawsuit, HyperRoll’s purchase by Oracle. just what exactly is Hybrid Essbase (the number of hours we’ve debated just what is happening under the covers), Essbase’s place today and tomorrow, working at small and large firms alike, helping out idiots who write multiple books on Essbase, and philosophy.  That’s an awful lot to cover in an hour, hence this episode as part one of two.

Join us, won’t you?

EPM Conversations has been lucky to have a variety of Performance Management guests:  vendors, people from other places and tongues, fantastic players in our little technological space, and of course the Women in EPM series.  All of them are great (even the ones where Yr. Obt. Svt. is a guest), insightful, interesting, and often quite funny.  In short, they are the stuff that technology podcasts dream of.

 What we have not had is a consultant who does not primarily have a technical bent.  By that I mean, EPM Conversations is a technical podcast, it is presented by four consultants (although our participation switches round as our guests’ background dictates) who (mostly, although as you’ll hear in this episode that isn’t 100% true) are techies first and foremost.  This episode’s guest, Sharon Wang, has an element of a technologist’s perspective, but at her core she is a management consultant focused on organizational change within the context of technology.  Without – hopefully – sounding like a hick from the sticks, I find that utterly fascinating.  It also opened my eyes about yet another professional path not taken in my so-called career because of the breadth that this dual focus brings to work, but such are the fortunes of war and of life.

Oh dear, that makes consultants sound like monsters who care not a whit for their poor clients.  Of course that cannot be true lest said consultant wants a very short time in the workforce, but regardless putting oneself in someone else’s shoes can be difficult, particularly if you haven’t walked a mile in someone else’s shoes.  Yes, two idioms referencing shoes in one sentence but they work.

 Sharon has that experience in industry and so understands the needs and goals of both sides of the project table.  Consultants work with clients during project implementation but then, if the Good Lord’s willing and the creek don’t rise, they leave at project end.  The customer then owns the application.  What happens then?  A good consultant, a consultant who understands the customer’s world – in other words, an emphatic consultant – understands these potential outcomes and their likelihood.  In my (gasp) 28 years of consulting I’ve sometimes been witness (surely never party) to a distinct lack of empathy; pain ensues.  A consultant that understands the other side of the conference table never lets that happen.

We technologists often view technology as the lever to move the organizational world and we are often successful in that approach.  However, in my (gasp, yeah, again) 28 years of consulting, I have seen (alas, this time sometimes as party to, but always against my better judgement and will) projects that only focus on the system and not the people.  Sometimes clients need only a better mousetrap, other times they need a wholesale change in the way they think and work.  Sharon (and I might note Natalie does as well) sees that gap and how to fill that.

Join us, won’t you?

A Portrait in Leadership:  Women in EPM with Oracle Barbie aka Kate Helmer

Kata Helmer, aka Oracle Barbie formerly known as Hyperion Barbie, Oracle Ace Director, and oh yes ODTUG board member is just one person, but oh my, what an accomplished one.  

 I’ve always been intrigued by Kate’s alias:  she’s quite obviously a professional of some import and yet names herself after a child’s doll.  Why?

Subversion vs. celebration

Barbie (the doll, not the guest of this episode in the Women in EPM series) – or at least I thought so before recording this episode – sort of has a not totally awesome reputation.  How wrong I was (again, Cameron, again?) and, having been the host (and listened to the episode eleventy times during the edit), how sure I am there can be real difference between a man’s and a woman’s perspective.  Or I was just wrong.  Or why not both?

Kate views Barbie as an exemplar of a woman that can do anything.  Beyond the popularity of Barbie as a doll and the success of the recent Barbie movie, there are any number of academic posts on the subject.

So is “Oracle Barbie” a sly flip of an incorrect impression or an overt embrace of a powerful woman?  Listen and find out.

NB – I was strictly a 12 inch GI Joe (surely the only real one – those Wee Willie Winkie ones are sort of an action figure abomination) fan and they taught me that camping is fun, which although a nice leisure activity, was not a transformative life effect.

Kate’s journey from the defense industry to Hallmark to consulting with an ever-increasing emphasis on managing the data that defines data is interesting. 

What I also find interesting that Kate was introduced to Essbase in a manner similar to mine:  her manager asked her to take a look at Hyperion System 9 and the rest is history.  Performance Management has many branches but its roots are the same.

EPM Conversation episodes have a “rule of 3” where the guests tell us what their favorite three books, movies, and people in history are.  Nowhere in that list is the subject of serial killers although I suppose opening it up to “people in history” could include them.  Don’t believe me?  Go to about 52:25 to hear the immortal words. “You’re not a true crime junkie until you have a favorite serial killer”.  All I can think of is this song.

There’s more, much more than the above précis.  The only way for you to know is for you to listen to Kate’s episode.

Join us, won’t you? 

We (your EPM Conversations hosts) owe a lot – a financial kind of debt as well as a professional one  – to Shankar and Hyperion/Oracle on premises /PBCS/EPBCS/EPM Cloud Planning.  Seriously, I first set eyes on what was then Hyperion Planning Desktop (which alas I cannot find a screenshot of but know it’s out there somewhere), I thought, “Cameron, you idiot, this is the future” and so it has been through (gulp) decades of work.  Never, our Performance Management audience, look askance at a sure thing.  

 Part of that product’s success has been Shankar Viswanathan’s careful stewardship of a product that grew from an application wrapper around Essbase (and a horrific and quickly abandoned Win32 app that was supposed to be the workspace of users of All Things Hyperion and yes, Shankar, I really do hope you didn’t create that) to a complete EPM cloud platform.  At its core, planning and budgeting hasn’t at it’s core really changed all that much (ZBB came and went, driver based planning is still here, and yes AI/ML now has its turn in the Wheel of Planning  Fortune) but what we still call Planning certainly has.  Of course Shankar didn’t write each line of code nor did he define and design every bit and bob of UI, but it’s easy to see his steady hand in Planning’s evolution through the lens of customer success.

Each and every one of EPM Conversations’ guests is a joy for they are enthusiastic, open, thoughtful, visionary, and just about everything one might hope for in a colleague and a friend.  Shankar is all of things and yet he is different.

 By that I mean Shankar is quiet in the physical sense.  We struggled with Shankar’s voice until we (we = Celvin) realized that is simply how Shankar talks; he is well worth listening to and the volume button on your phone isn’t that hard to use.  Sometimes how we think is reflected in how we speak:  introspection, consideration, reasoning, and sensitivity don’t need to be shouted to be understood.  Shankar is well worth a listen.

All of what I wrote about Shankar’s professional interests hold true for his personal ones.  

There’s a wide range in all three areas of historical men, literature, and movies:  E.O. Wilson, , Gandhi, and Steve Jobs for the historical figures, in reading, Ayn Rand as a teenager, to E.F. Schumacher’s  Small is Beautiful, John Kenneth Galbraith’s  The Anatomy of Power, and Fritjof Capra’s  The Tao of Physics, and finally a varied palette of movies in Shawshank Redemption,  The Bang Bang Club,  and Heat.

This is, in case you’ve not been able to tell, one of my favorite episodes.

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Yr. Obt. Svt. finds broad cultural movements to be interesting both conceptually (what are they, why do they exist, how did they start, and the rest of the who, when, and where list) and in practice because of their broad outcomes and impact on individuals.

 My inveterate curiosity aside, women in STEM (STEAM) has been a current in social and professional change for roughly the past decade.  Various organizations and companies, e.g., ODTUG, PwC, OneStream, Oracle, and many others, have been active advocates of this program

In many (most, really) respects, EPM Conversations is a series of, um, conversations with the leading lights in our Performance Management (and others) community and we have been blessed with a truly eclectic and interesting set of guests.

 EPM Conversations has a started a new series in that vein – Portraits in Leadership:  Women in EPM.  Our first guest is Minie Parikh.  

She is a true renaissance woman:  driven, smart, far sighted, artistic, perceptive, altruistic, warm, positive, and more and oh yeah, right in the thick of EPM with her firm, EPMI.

Minie's  story is inspiring:  a first generation American who rejected her expected professional path and instead became a Big4 consultant, cofounded a boutique consultancy (EPMI), is a guest on this podcast (ahem, that’s only kind of a joke, one that is quite firmly tongue in cheek, but it is quite hard to pique our collective interest and oh by the way, she too has a podcast), while leading through active participation and by example in WIT.  If that isn’t leadership, I don’t know what is.

 And lest you become overwhelmed by all of this, there is of course that human story, and it’s kind of out there.

With the most profuse apologies possible to Old Blue Eyes and Sammy Khan, love and marriage and Excel and Smartview and Essbase rarely, and I do mean just about never except maybe this one and only time, come together and yet in Minie’s case, it most absolutely did because she met her husband, Nihar Parikh in a bar where they bonded over their mutual love of SmartView.  It is totally geeky cool and very sweet.  Never say there’s nothing new under the Sun.

Fingers crossed, our new series finds favor with you, Gentle Listener.  One of the great things about this podcast is the ability to quickly jump from one theme to another.  As this section header notes, Minie is not the last.

 Join us, won’t you?

 Roger Cressy is a fascinating guest, unlike any other we’ve had.  His jobs have spanned from retail management (yup, a department store, a really nice one – I’ve been there – and not the one in the States or the UK) to our Beloved Performance Management.

Roger’s is also a geographical journey, from Malawi/Nyasaland (he just missed the Central African Federation) to Rhodesia/Zimbabwe, to South Africa, to the United Kingdom, back to South Africa, and thence to the United States – I may have missed a few countries in that list and perhaps got the order wrong.

Part of his peripatetic perambulation is an artefact of decolonization, the rest is a restless quest for opportunity.  Oddly, in person is a very calm man.

I first met Roger through, unsurprisingly, ODTUG’s Kscope.  Equally unsurprisingly given my stupendous memory, I don’t remember the year or the city.  Such is the hurly-burly nature of a good conference.

If you’ve not met him, Roger is tall (maybe it’s that I’m shrinking, ah the joys of middle age) and has a beard of biblical proportions;  once met, he is indelibly remembered.

Roger has a full life, more than most of us, safely ensconced in the West, and the places, roles, and people he’s met have given him a unique and philosophical outlook on the business and technical world we all share.

Have a listen to this fascinating episode.

Be seeing you. 

It’s a Book, It’s a Podcast Episode, It’s Kismet

A bunch of geeks (native born, immigrants; Americans all) interviewing an Australian and a New Zealander/Australian/American (it’s complicated) set Yr. Obt. Svt. to immediately think of the title of this podcast (eh, I need to get more than one hobby), who then looked up the phrase and found that…it’s a travelogue of a New Zealander’s view of the USA, circa 1888.  Seriously, what are the chances that the Mind of Cameron (often non compos mentis, invariably kind of wacky) and reality and a not half bad title smack up against each other?  This podcast episode was destiny realized.

 What then is the value of a Culture Clash episode where people-who-are-practically-Americans (ahem) are interviewed by-people-who-are-practically-Aussies-and-Kiwis?  I have noted that those who are closest and yet different are often the best observers, for they are alike enough to understand nuance but separate enough to not be blinded by a common mindset.

Richard (the man of a million or so legitimate passports) and Pete (just the one country, but Godzone)  have lived/worked in the States.  Just what are their perceptions?  What are two very different (from the US-of-A) EPM markets like?

I should note that Pete got me (I did do some of the work) the 2017 Best Kscope Essbase co-speaker award that I have always, always, always wanted.  My oh my, did I want that, did I ever think I deserved it – yes, cruel ego as it was always unfulfilled – and I never did get it till Pete and I did a presentation on Hybrid Essbase.  I will note that Pete has won multiple best speaker awards at Kscope, so I have a sneaking suspicion our joint award is 20% Cameron, 80% Pete but no matter, a win is a win.  I should also note that Kscope 2017 was my last Oracle conference as a speaker, so it made the reward all the sweeter.

Richard graciously was my host at Flinders Uni way back in (I think) 2012 as part of an ODTUG conference tour of the Antipodes and facilitated (orchestrated?) an ODI/Essbase presentation at NZOUG.  My primary memory of that trip (I was in a constant state of jet lag) was dinner with Richard and a bunch of attendees and being stared at as a Real Life American geek, not commonly seen in the wild, sitting there eating his plate of spag bol, feeling more self-conscious than usual were that possible.  Oh well, I like to provide entertainment to all, no matter the cost.  

Having the two of them on the show was and is a special treat.

For those of delicate disposition, easily offended by adult words, mortally insulted by honest, open, and frank conversation, I fear you must put on your big boy/girl pants and buckle up.  We Americans, cultural descendants of the Puritans, beseeched our guests to tone down the language lest you, Gentle Listener, get a case of the vapors.  They mostly complied, but You Have Been Warned.  That takes care of the North Americans; the rest of the world won’t care.

 Sensitivities aside, as always our guests are witty, insightful, and extremely interesting.

Join us, won’t you?

The Culture Clash series has – from the feedback we’ve heard – been well received.  Thus far it’s been Americans talking to our comrades in performance management arms about their experience in their home country and in North America.  What we’ve not had is someone from another country talking to his countrymen.  This podcast deviates from that model because my Objectively Younger, Taller, Smarter and Subjectively Better Looking Brother From Other Parents is from India and is speaking with two of his Indian friends, Kishore Mukkamala and Sumit Deo.  It was – and this was quite difficult for someone who has figuratively kissed the Blarney Stone – my idea to redact myself and Natalie and Tim from the podcast as we simply don’t have the background to do justice to this episode, thus, Celvin as the host.

One of the things that makes this such an interesting episode is that Celvin really understands the immigrants journey – all three of them have had very different experiences and yet all three have had ones that are awfully close.  Because of this, I think you, oh Gentle Listener, will find nuance and understanding in this episode that may very well be unique.  

One of the things that I found so interesting about this podcast (your hosts and our guests listen to all of our episodes before they go live, the former for OMG-is-this-any-good and the latter for OMG-am-I-going-to-get-fired-over-this-content) is the effort and challenges Sumit and Kishore underwent as they came to the States and built a life only to return to their homeland.  Their reasons differ slightly but commonly share the threads of family ties and duty.  One cannot but admire their undoubtedly hard (have a listen to what they had to go through to get into this country and work here – it ain’t easy) decisions, for this is what real men (and women but c’mon, they are quite literally guys) willingly sacrifice for their families.

Their paths here (and I include Celvin) are interesting, their careers varied, their love of Essbase similar.   They are inspiring stories and (for once) I as a listener was quite moved.  I am sorry they left the States as I would very much like to meet them in person. 

A couple of key things to listen for:  guns, sports (American sports), movies (Hollywood is more accurate than one might imagine), personal space, Americans’ openness and friendliness, and just where are the servants.   

At the end of every episode we (well, Celvin this time) ask our guests who in history they’d like to have dinner with, what they like to read, and the movies that they like in an attempt to know the real person.

I am as a native born American, somewhat taken aback by the well-read nature of our guests in this series.  Kishore and Sumit are from their answers, people whose interests go far beyond just work and sports (I fear I do a disservice to my fellow Americans but let’s be real:  how many philosophers does your average USAian list in his I’d-like-to-have-dinner-with-this-person) .   But most importantly, how many Americans are fans of the Famous Five?  Hah!  I am.  Well, I think the Secret Seven were better, but the Famous Five are just fine as well.  

I’m not sure if listening to this podcast will convince you to dive into the really quite magical world of Enid Blyton, but if you have children, I urge you to dip your to

The second in EPM Conversations’ Culture Clash series features two guests from Latin America:  David Blanco and Belen Ortiz.  I know both from conferences only.  Actually, all of my cohosts and all of our guests are, one way or another, part of EPM Conversations (and my life as well) because of conferences.  OneStream’s Splash is coming up in just over a week, 17 to 20 April, ODTUG’s Kscope is happening in Aurora, CO, 25 through 29 June.  If you work in either (or both) of these technology stacks, I encourage you to attend the conferences.  The sessions are key to our professional development; the networking is as well, cf. this podcast’s existence.

This series has been from the perspective of North Americans (well, USAians) who try to understand our comrades in arms across the world.  What we (and by we I mean your hosts and of course you, our audience) learn is always interesting.  Sometimes the lessons are surprising.

 It turns out that The Simpsons are wildly popular in Latin America.  From Mexico (geographically North American but culturally part of Latin America) to Argentina (Latin America yes, but oriented towards Europe), The Simpsons are a prime American cultural export.

Color me a bright pink for I am blushing.  A lot.  How mortifying:  what is possibly the most moronic television family in the US (stiff competition there) is how much of the world sees us.  At least it’s with amusement.  And at least they don’t equate us with Family Guy.

My personal embarrassment aside (Yr. Obt. Svt. is the only host native-born, so my humiliation is greater than Celvin’s and Tim’s), it was hugely entertaining to hear how the show is a window into my homeland.  I note that despite watching The Simpsons both Belen (California) and David (uh oh, he lives in Canada, so perhaps …) speak warmly of the United States.

David  has been in the field roughly as long as I have.  It’s always a pleasant trip to the past when I hear that someone worked for Comshare, the granddaddy of all Performance Management firms.  I can’t remember if he started with Essbase or went back even further to System W (2,048 members per cube in total on a gigantic IBM 3084-Q64 System 360 MVS/TSO mainframe). 

Belen started out in computer security and serendipitously ended up in the Performance Management space.  Anti-virus expert to Essbase to all-rounder in EPM is quite the trip.  It was also interesting to hear about the Argentine approach to software licensing and IT good practices.  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Their show is witty, warm, and interesting by turns.  We your hosts, and you Dear Listener, are lucky to have them as comrades in arms in our Performance Management world.

Join us, won’t you?