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Katt Williams Threatened With A Gun By Atlanta Radio Host’s Husband Outside Comedy Club

September 18, 2018 Humor

Katt Williams told police that Wanda Smith’s husband, Lamorris Sellers, pulled a gun on him and pointed it in his face outside the Atlanta Comedy Theater.

Comedian Katt Williams and Atlanta radio host Wanda Smith allegedly got into a fight outside the Atlanta Comedy Theater in Norcross that ended with Smith’s husband pulling a gun on Williams, according to a report from the Gwinnett County Police Department.

Smith and Williams reportedly started arguing at the club about an interview Smith did with Williams on Saturday, Sept. 15 around 9:30 p.m. According to the police synopsis, Williams told police that Smith’s husband, Lamorris Sellers, pulled a gun on him and pointed it in his face.

Williams and his security guard ran to the Food Depot next door to meet with police.

Sellers told police that Williams had a verbal fight with Smith, and Williams indicated he wanted to fight, according to the report. Sellers approached Williams and chased him into the Food Depot, then turned back to the Atlanta Comedy Club, police said.

Sellers admitted to police he had a gun, and that it fell from his waistband while he was chasing Williams, and he stopped to retrieve it, according to the report. He denied pointing a gun at anyone.

No independent witnesses came forward to talk with officers about what happened, according to police.

Gwinnett Police said surveillance video from the Food Depot surveillance cameras shows Sellers chasing Williams into the store, but does not show Sellers holding a gun.

The officer was told the Atlanta Comedy Theater has surveillance cameras but they could not be accessed at the time. Williams told police he did not wish the press charges.

Police said if the video surveillance shows any crimes, criminal charges could be filed.

Katt Williams Goes In On Tiffany Haddish, Kevin Hart And Others On Atlanta Radio

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The Humor Mill

Disaster Recovery with Microsoft Azure: The Tools You Need to Protect Your Business

September 18, 2018 Microsoft Dynamics CRM

Your business’s IT systems show their vulnerabilities when faced with disaster. Business owners always wish they had a more robust and safeguarded IT system when it’s too late: after a natural disaster like an earthquake, hurricane, or flood, or a human-caused attack like a computer virus or hacking scandal, has already struck. Be proactive– now is the time to institute disaster recovery systems and protocols before an IT disaster strikes.

Right now, Microsoft and other IT service providers are working with businesses in the path of Hurricane Florence to make sure they can get back up and running as soon as possible. Those with disaster recovery plans already in place had their data backed up to the cloud and their data restore services regularly tested before Hurricane Florence was even on their radar. They regularly reviewed their staff and customer contact lists and made sure their virtual cloud systems were working once their on-premises systems inevitably lost power in the event of a disaster. The catastrophic flooding brought by Hurricane Florence may have already destroyed these businesses’ IT systems, but they will be quickly replaced and back up and running as soon as those business owners are ready to open their doors again– even if those doors are virtual while their brick-and-mortar locations are repaired.

Unfortunately, businesses with robust disaster recovery protocols are in the minority. Many businesses will be suffering the consequences of data loss and other IT disasters in the wake of Hurricane Florence for months or years ahead, or may never open again as a result.

Learn from these businesses today and have a plan in place for when disaster strikes in your area. Unfortunately, studies show that once a business loses a significant amount of data, 93% of them shut down within the next 5 years. 80% of those close within a year, while a staggering 43% immediately shut down and never open back up again. Your business, and everything you’ve worked hard to achieve with it, deserves more than getting washed out with the next flood or computer attack.

Consider this: when was the last time you backed up the data for your business, and where are those backups located? If you answered that they are on the same premises as your business, that backup data is just as exposed to a disaster as your primary IT systems. Would you be able to absorb the cost of the significant time it would take to restore that data? What if you lost that data; what would that mean for your organization?

Eric Raff, Cloud Solutions Architect at JourneyTEAM, says that with “today’s modern technology… modern businesses don’t need to suffer a setback or shut their doors” once an IT system failure occurs. JourneyTEAM is a Microsoft Gold Partner and can help evaluate your company’s infrastructure. They will provide you with a custom Managed Disaster Recovery Plan to account for any IT disaster that may strike. Their customized Microsoft Azure Recovery Strategy will assess any potential impacts, account for your existing systems like Dynamics 365, Office 365, and SharePoint, and create a response plan.

Become a proactive business owner in the face of potential IT disasters. Contact JourneyTEAM or give them a call at 800-439-6456 and assess or create your business’s Disaster Recovery Strategy today. Once catastrophe strikes, you’ll be glad you did!

Article by: Dave Bollard – National Director of Marketing

JourneyTEAM is an award-winning consulting firm with proven technology and measurable results. They take Microsoft products; Dynamics 365, SharePoint intranet, Office 365, Azure, CRM, GP, NAV, SL, AX, and modify them to work for you. The team has expert level, Microsoft Gold certified consultants that dive deep into the dynamics of your organization and solve complex issues. They have solutions for sales, marketing, productivity, collaboration, analytics, accounting, security and more. www.journeyteam.com

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CRM Software Blog | Dynamics 365

TIBCO NOW 2018: Innovating at the C-Level with the TIBCO Executive Summit

September 18, 2018 TIBCO Spotfire

TIBCO NOW presented a unique opportunity for the C-level executives in attendance. In parallel with the annual conference on September 5-6, TIBCO held the Executive Summit, catering to executives across all companies and industries. With over 40 executives in attendance, it was a great opportunity for networking and for companies to learn about how they can implement their own innovation initiatives.

The purpose of the event was to give a condensed, C-level experience around innovation at the edge, the theme of this year’s user conference. This event was exclusive by invitation only to bring together some of the best minds in innovation and digital transformation. Attendees consisted of TIBCO customers, partners, and other special guests.

After a networking dinner the evening of September 5, the summit officially opened the morning of September 6 with opening keynotes from TIBCO CEO Murray Rode and COO Matt Quinn. The two executives talked about innovation from the TIBCO perspective as well as their own, while answering questions from the crowd. During the morning, attendees also got to hear from the CEO of Change Healthcare (a TIBCO partner), Neil De Crescenzo, about innovating in the healthcare industry and serving their customers with analytic insights.

Afterwards, TIBCO CTO Nelson Petracek hosted a blockchain panel with the CTO of Change Healthcare, Aaron Symanski; Martha Bennett, an analyst at Forrester, and Manager for Blockchain, Carlo Donadio, from Accenture. The panel discussed how companies are leveraging the emerging blockchain technology for business use cases. This wasn’t a discussion of the technology itself, but rather how it can be used for innovation and improving businesses from a line of business perspective.

The summit continued with TIBCO’s Senior Director of Analytic Strategy, Shawn Rogers, who shared the results of the 2018 TIBCO CXO Innovation Survey. The survey was an in-depth research study conducted with over 550 respondents worldwide about how and why today’s businesses are innovating. The results clarified that the companies who are investing in digital transformation are more successful than those who are not. Businesses who have digitally transformed are constantly innovating to disrupt their industries. On the other hand, those who are not investing in digital transformation find it more difficult to disrupt their industries.

The afternoon kicked off with a fireside chat between Dr. Peggy Whitson, former NASA astronaut, and TIBCO CMO Thomas Been. The chat focused on innovation in space, a preview of what the audience was going to get from her keynote at the final general session later in the day. Then, Rode chatted with Brian Sheth from Vista Equity Partners about innovation from Vista’s perspective.

As the afternoon progressed, Quinn came back to host an artificial intelligence/machine learning panel for those in attendance. The panel consisted of VP of Product Management at Marketo, Ajay Awatramani; Managing Director at Morgan Stanley, Katherine Wetmur; VP of Technology and Innovation at PerkinElmer, Karen Madden; and Senior Product Manager for SageMaker at Amazon Web Services, Kumar Venkateswar. The panelists gave perspectives about the use of AI and ML from the eyes of the business user and how it can improve operations and customer experiences across companies.

The Executive Summit concluded with Rode and Managing Director Murat Sönmez from the World Economic Forum discussing their final thoughts on innovation from a world perspective. This served as the final takeaway for attendees to take back to their own companies to inspire the beginning of their own digital transformation journeys.

In order to get an organization on board with innovation efforts, it must first come from support at the C-level. This Executive Summit was catered specifically towards executives with this in mind. It provided a valuable learning opportunity and experience for those at the C-level to get inspired to innovate at their own companies while learning how others are doing it at theirs.

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The TIBCO Blog

Automation software platform UiPath raises $225 million from CapitalG, Sequoia, and Accel at $3 billion valuation

September 18, 2018 Big Data

UiPath, a robotic process automation (RPA) platform that helps companies automate repetitive tasks, has raised a whopping $ 225 million in a series C round of funding co-led by Alphabet’s late-stage venture capital (VC) fund CapitalG and Sequoia Capital, with participation from Accel.

This latest raise comes just six months after UiPath raised $ 153 million in its series B round, and the company has now raised north of $ 400 million since it was founded in 2012.

Additionally, the company said that its valuation is now pegged at $ 3 billion, up nearly $ 2 billion since its series B round valuation in March.

Automation

UiPath was founded initially out of Romania, though it is now officially headquartered in New York. The platform’s core selling point is that it brings automation to enterprises’ processes. It builds what it calls “intelligent software robots” that help businesses carry out what are often laborious and repetitive tasks using computer vision and rule-based processes.

Above: UiPath Studio

Image Credit: UiPath

The technology sits atop business applications such as enterprise resource planning (ERP) software and customer relationship management (CRM) tools to emulate a task that is usually carried out by a person sitting manually pressing buttons at their desk. These “robots” are trained to observe the interface to see and understand what is happening, and then carry out the task as a human would.

As with all machine learning applications today, the ultimate promise here is that it improves accuracy and productivity, allowing human employees to focus on other areas of work. Or, as a more cynical person might conclude, put humans out of work.

“We are enabling a future where employees at every organization are empowered to automate tedious and time-consuming work, enabling them to focus on creative, challenging problems,” UiPath cofounder and CEO Daniel Dines said.

Growth

UiPath claims some big-name clients already, including NASA, Airbus, HP, DHL, Equifax, Lufthansa, Autodesk, and nearly 2,000 companies around the world. Without giving specific numbers, UiPath said that it expects its annual recurring revenue (ARR) to increase by 400 percent by the end of this year compared to 2017, while it anticipates its employee headcount to grow 300 percent to 1,700 across 16 countries.

With another $ 225 million in the bank, it added that it plans to accelerate its product development, build out its partnerships, and acquire some more companies. The company made a rare acquisition earlier this year, when it snapped up a software platform belonging to Cluj-based smart data company Recognos, but UiPath hasn’t made any other known acquisitions in the past.

“We strongly believe that RPA is a primary route for organizations to benefit from AI, and UiPath is proving this potential with its unparalleled growth and incredible customer impact,” added CapitalG partner Laela Sturdy.

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Big Data – VentureBeat

Evolution of data platforms: Using the right data for the right outcomes

September 18, 2018 CRM News and Info

Last week, I ran my friend and thought leader Esteban Kolsky’s first part on how to think about data in a post-big data world — and it was a hit. Now, to end the suspense, we have part two, where EK looks at how data impacts B2C and B2B differently and what has to be done with that data. All this came as a result of research Esteban was asked to do by Radius, as I mentioned last week. Kudos to them for inspiring this excellent piece.

So, now, Esteban, onto part two.

Featured stories

What did you think of the last post on evolution of data?

If you know where you came from, you know where you are going. And to see where we are going, we need this second part: How have data platforms evolved?

Evolution of Data Platforms: Putting Data to Work

Data has been the “blood” of business since the early days of computing in the 1960s. Along the way changes brought different tools to collect, store, process, and manage data, all the while not asking the essential questions: Why are we doing this? Why do we need data? What are we doing with it? How do I know if we are doing the right things?

There is a difference in how data affects traditional mass market (B2C) organizations and those that sell to other businesses (B2B). There are issues related not just to the potential size of the market (a B2C company targeting hundreds of millions of potential customers versus a business targeting a few hundreds to a few thousands of other organizations) but also the complexity of the data models used.

Also: IBM Cloud Private for Data preps Red Hat OpenShift certification, queryplex search tool

We’ve had data aggregation happen in mass market organizations (buying and aggregating credit card information, for example, or collecting and sharing loyalty information about customers’ needs and actions) for a long time — we call that segment differentiation in B2C organizations. While this aggregation is interesting for those organizations, it is also far simpler than doing it for B2B worlds. And the tools necessary to solve those problems are focused on managing large quantities, not in focusing on the best data.

Evolution of data platforms: Using the right data for the right outcomes

In a B2B world, the problem becomes more complex and requires better tools and processes to be resolved. We cannot say that, for example, 120 of our 200 potential targets belong to the same segment. It becomes impossible to differentiate and very hard to serve properly.

We need better data models that are more focused on our sales processes and our customers’ intents.

Also: Apache Flink takes ACID

The amount of data is not a problem in B2B, as in B2C markets, because the potential markets are far smaller, making the data easier to find, but the quality and aggregation of the data represent a bigger challenge. This is where data platforms began to shine.

A combination of easy access to the right data for multiple purposes and generating effective insights is what makes data platforms and insight engines so powerful — not just the data aggregation. It is not the amount of data stored and potentially used, but the necessary data that is used at the appropriate time. We need to rely on aggregated data to optimize processes and on the and insights generated from those transactions.

The chart shows the evolution of data platforms and data storage over time, including the pros and cons of each. It also includes guidelines as to what each model can accomplish and how it works best.

Matching these tools to the planned outcomes from using data is the first step in generating insights and this is not without problems.

Also: Digital transformation: Getting beyond the hype

The amount of data stored after big data systems were deployed has created, or exacerbated, the three critical problems for B2B companies seeking to optimize data in their digital transformation initiatives:

1. Trusted data aggregation: When organizations have too much data from too many sources, some of the datum may overlap and even conflict. Using insights as the outcome of aggregating data in platforms differentiates between trusted data sources based on the outcomes of the processes and those that should not be used as much.

2. Simple access and updates: Just because the data was collected, aggregated, and stored does not mean that the data is never going to change. In our always-on-the-go world, data changes as often as many times a day (in case of operational data) to every few weeks (in case of segmentation or identifying data).

3. Optimized data use: Business functions rely on having the most accurate and most current data to make the proper decisions. Businesses in the digital era demand the right data at the right time, to make the right decisions.

Until now, organizations have used most of the tools described in the chart to aggregate, consolidate, and centralize data in different versions of platforms used by myriad processes and functions. While this has given them a starting point and the illusion of movement and progress, the reality is that for B2B organizations making data-based decisions in real time requires not just more data but better-quality data and insights. Tools that simply focus on aggregating data regardless of the use of it don’t understand what’s needed and can’t do the job.

Also: Big data is now economics and not just technology TechRepublic

Master data management, for example, is a discipline and set of tools that focused on aggregating as much data as possible. This is done for creating a better centralized store of data that then becomes “the single source of truth.” While it creates massive, optimized data stores, there is no purpose or knowledge of the outcome, thus it misses the mark on knowing or highlighting what data to collect, store, and use for each different process.

Customer data platforms are a more modern model and intends to solve the problem of MDM systems by going beyond simply creating a single source of truth to focus on uses for that data. It consolidates data, provides access to many different systems, and ensures that data flows freely from A to Z and is used appropriately in between for known processes. While it does a good job of creating an ODS (operational data store) on the cloud, it fails in the same places where huge data stores failed: It does not know what happened to the data once it was used, whether it was good or needs to be updated or improved, and what were the outcomes.

It is About Using the Right Data for The Right Outcomes

Very often, data-use initiatives are focused on achieving one or more KPI change: Increase revenue, decrease costs, generate more customers, and many others. Traditionally, methodologies already exist for achieving these simple outcomes. For example, to acquire more customers, the steps are simple: Identify a target segment, understand what they need, create an offering that fulfills that need, generate marketing to match the need and identify customers, implement high-pressure sales tactics, and close the deal.

Thus, the next time more customers are needed, a variant of the above will be implemented, and results will be there. It has proven to work well so many times, it will continue to be repeated — usually the same way as before. With data platforms and aggregated data, the system can optimize the above model so that it reflects both real-time needs as well as lessons learned and insights from past occurrences.

If an organization wanted to optimize or transform based on lessons learned, it would create some sort of report post-event and analyze what could’ve been done differently. This is a way to generate delayed insights (or post-facto insights). It works but does not help optimization since by the time we learned what needs to be done, the event is over, and changes cannot be made anymore.

Also: Turning Big Data into Business Insights

Learnings and changes can be made in near real-time using real-time insights, artificial intelligence, and advanced analytics. Optimizations happen quickly, and results are captured dynamically, creating the insights that help improve the event this time and every other time. Campaigns can be optimized with a better message, sale cycles can use updated pricing and even bundling, marketers can use better content that has seen results, and so forth.

Instead of waiting until the end and potentially the next event to see if changes worked (and in the process ignore the fact that conditions changed already between events), an organization can use insights from aligning the right data, the right processes, and the right outcomes to improve operations on the fly.

Of course, to do this requires not just a different set of tools (not focused on storing and aggregating data only) but also a different mentality. And a different methodology.

And for that, we have a framework — but you will have to download the paper to see what it is.

Back to you, my friend.

Thank you, Esteban. This was awesome. Come back if you want to expand on this — anytime.

NOTICE: The CRM Watchlist 2019 registration and the registration for The Emergence Maturity Index Award for 2019 is closing on Sept. 30 with no extensions possible. So, if you want to make sure that you are part of these (see the links in the names for the details), then you have roughly two weeks to go (a little less). I’d do it, if I were you, though I’m not. You, that is.

To request the registration form for either of them, please email me at mailto:paul-greenberg3@the56group.com.

Previous and related coverage:

What to do with the data? The evolution of data platforms in a post big data world

Thought leader Esteban Kolsky takes on the big question: What will data platforms look like now that big data’s hype is over and big data “solutions” are at hand?

The past, present, and future of streaming: Flink, Spark, and the gang

Reactive, real-time applications require real-time, eventful data flows. This is the premise on which a number of streaming frameworks have proliferated. The latest milestone was adding ACID capabilities, so let us take stock of where we are in this journey down the stream — or river.

Arcadia Data brings natural language query to the data lake

Arcadia Data provides a search engine-style text box as its latest query interface, bringing BI natural language query to the data lake.

This startup thinks it knows how to speed up real-time analytics on tons of data

Making sense of the vast amounts of data gathered by businesses is a problem for business that Iguazio says it’s cracked.

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ZDNet | crm RSS

Digitalist Magazine’s Top Picks [September 17, 2018]

September 18, 2018 SAP

Digitalist Magazine’s Top Picks [September 17, 2018]

Shelly Dutton

Digitalist Magazine, online edition, covers a wide variety of topics around the challenges businesses face in the digital economy. Whether you’re interested in the future of work, customer experience, digital economy, the Internet of Things, or digital supply networks, we provide a vast array of thought leadership and real-life stories on the practical application of digital technology.

Each week on Digitalist Magazine, the editorial team discusses its top picks of the week from across our content categories. Here’s a list of blogs that caught out attention this week, and we hope you find these articles valuable, informative, and interesting too.

The Space Economy: Ready For Liftoff

The Humanity in the Machine

Data Governance At GE: Driving Business Outcomes

Three Secrets To Sustainable Growth For Midsize Companies

Tiny Tech, Big Bang

Why Customer Service Is The New Utilities Battleground

Ensuring A Healthy Future At The Nelson Mandela Children’s Hospital

Tariffs, Inventory Optimization, And Digital Business Planning

Regulatory Reporting: A Thing Of The Past (Part 2)

Tech to Table

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Digitalist Magazine

Dog Feeds Rabbits On The Farm

September 17, 2018 Humor

Canine responsibility.

“Good boy feeding the farm animals!.”
Image courtesy of https://imgur.com/gallery/ZvNSk7K

Data Encryption 101: The Quick Guide to Data Encryption Best Practices

September 17, 2018 Big Data

Christopher Tozzi

September 17, 2018

You hear all the time about how important it is to encrypt data. But what does encryption actually mean? Which best practices should you follow when encrypting your data? Which tools are available for data encryption?

Keep reading for answers to these pressing data encryption questions.

What Is Data Encryption?

Put simply, data encryption is a process that changes data from its original format into a new format. To translate it back, you typically need a special encryption key or code.

A very simple data encryption example involves taking every letter in a word and changing it to the letter that follows it in the alphabet, so that the word “dog” becomes “eqh,” for instance. In this case, the encryption key to unlock the encrypted data would be code that switches the letters back by moving them one place lower in the alphabet.

Obviously, it would not be very difficult in the example above for someone to guess how your encryption scheme works and reverse-engineer your encryption key.

But if your process for encrypting your data were much more complicated — if, for example, you used a complex set of rules to move letters around, inserted random data in various places and converted the letters differently depending on where they are located as well as which letters they are — you would end up with encrypted data that would be much harder for someone to decrypt unless they had an encryption key that could reverse your encryption process.

What Is an Encryption Key?

An encryption key is used both to translate data into a scrambled, unreadable form, and to transfer it back.

There are different types of encryption keys and different ways to use them. If you use symmetric keys, you use the same key for both encrypting and decrypting data. Asymmetric encryption uses different keys for the encryption and decryption processes.

Which Data Can You Encrypt?

Although not all data is the same, virtually all data can be encrypted. You can encrypt data while it is “at rest,” which means it is stored in a static location like a disk. You can also encrypt data “in motion,” such as when it is being transferred over the network. You can encrypt data on any type of operating system. You can encrypt data stored in file systems, as well as data stored on block data. You can encrypt data stored directly on a bare-metal server, as well as data in a virtual machine or on a virtual disk.

There are certain types of data that you would probably not want to encrypt, such as the data stored in /proc on a Linux server. This type of data should be secured in other ways (such as via file-level access control, in the case of /proc).

bigstock 215648071 600x Data Encryption 101: The Quick Guide to Data Encryption Best Practices

Popular Data Encryption Algorithms

The specific process that you use to encrypt and decrypt data is called an algorithm. Dozens of different encryption algorithms have been widely used in the last several decades, but the leading ones today include:

AES
RSA
Triple DES
Twofish

Although all of these data encryption algorithms can encrypt data in ways that meet most modern standards, they are not created equal. Some are better at encrypting certain types of data than others. They can also perform differently on different types of infrastructure; some algorithms might be faster if you have lots of memory but less CPU power, for instance, whereas others do better in CPU-rich environments. It is, therefore, a good idea to experiment with different encryption algorithms in order to see which ones best serve your needs.

Data Encryption Tools

Most encryption algorithms can be implemented by many different tools. In other words, there is no single, specific program you have to use if you want to encrypt data using, say, the AES algorithm. You can choose from lots of different implementations, depending on which operating system you use.

Like the different encryption algorithms, some encryption tools might be faster than others, and some are better at encrypting or decrypting certain types of data. Some excel at encrypting small volumes of data but are not as effective with large amounts of data, or vice versa. This means that when it comes to selecting specific encryption tools, you should also experiment with at least a few to see which ones best meet your needs.

Data Encryption Best Practices

A complete guide to data encryption is beyond the scope of this 101-level article, but in general, the following principles are good to follow if you want to encrypt data securely and efficiently:

Keep your encryption key secure! This should be exceedingly obvious, but it can be easy to make mistakes that allow unauthorized parties to access your data. For example, if you leave your encryption key in an unencrypted file on your PC, there is a good chance that someone could find it and wreak havoc. A few solutions could be to: separate the keys from the data, separate the duties and access limits of users, and rotate your keys on a schedule.
Encrypt all types of sensitive data, no matter where they are stored or how unlikely you think someone is to find them. This should also be blatantly obvious, but if you follow IT security headlines, you know that lots of big-name companies have been breached simply because they left important data unencrypted and someone gained access to it. By encrypting your data, you make it much harder for someone who is able to breach your systems to do something bad.
Assess data encryption performance. Effective data encryption entails not just making your data unreadable to unauthorized parties, but doing so in a way that uses resources efficiently. If it is taking too long or consuming too much CPU time and memory to encrypt your data, consider switching to a different algorithm or experimenting with settings in your data encryption tools.

Make sure to also check out our on-demand webcast, Top 5 Encryption Myths for IBM i Users.

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Syncsort Blog

Two Business Trends Driving Change In Spend

September 17, 2018 BI News and Info

By now, you’re accustomed to an ever-increasing list of priorities and an ever-decreasing budget with which to get them done. In some areas, you may be able to get by, but in others, sticking with the status quo can cost you more than it’s worth.

Travel and spend management is one area where your organization may be missing out by making do. Whether deciding to automate just part of your expense process, building your own solution, or settling for technology that’s “good enough,” an inefficient, antiquated approach can hold you back. It limits your ability to capture spending and identify trends, causing you to leave money on the table and opening up your organization to legal and financial risks.

Now, more than ever, it’s time to rethink your approach. Two key trends are disrupting the business landscape, presenting enormous challenges and leaving your organization vulnerable to hidden costs like never before.

Purchasing power is in employees’ hands

Spending that was once under the control of your organization has now shifted to the employee. Employees are increasingly booking their own trips with airlines and others directly, choosing their own places to stay, and making purchases conveniently right from their mobile phones. In fact, the number of SAP Concur clients using Airbnb increased 42% from 2016 to 2017, including 63% of Fortune 500 customers. And the reality is, your technology likely isn’t set up to address this change.

When you can’t see all that’s being spent, you can’t control that spending. And unfortunately, you may have more invisible spend than you think. According to an August 2018 study by GBTA, 37% of hotels and 15% of flights are booked outside corporate channels, while just 20% of companies use technology to capture outside bookings. When you have limited visibility into what vendors are being used, you miss out on the opportunity to negotiate rates and risk leaving money behind. Moreover, as the amount of employees who purchase directly with suppliers continues to rise, so will the amount of cash you’re missing.

Rising tax and compliance regulations

Employees aren’t the only ones changing the way they do things. Governments are, too. Hungry for revenue, they continue to impose new taxes and make changes to regulations, and are increasing their investigations to crack down on violators.

“Good enough” isn’t going to cut it when it comes to meeting regulations. With more ways and more channels for employees to spend, you need to stay on top of every expenditure and every vendor. When your organization is audited, investigators will expect comprehensive, accurate reporting on all transactions. But if you’re still relying on an outdated, reactive approach, your chances of being successful are slim to none – resulting in executive involvement, additional costs, and a hard hit to your organization’s reputation.

As these two business trends bring change to your organization, how you approach your travel and spend should change, too. Embrace modern technology that integrates data across all sources, connects you to all your employee spending, captures every transaction, detects fraud immediately, and gives you the data you need to prove compliance.

Learn more about how to capture and manage ALL your employee spend and mitigate regulatory risks with SAP Concur.

This article originally appeared on Concur.com.

Follow SAP Finance online: @SAPFinance (Twitter) | LinkedIn | Facebook | YouTube

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Digitalist Magazine

Released: Public Preview 2 for Version Agnostic SQL Server MP (2012-2017)

September 17, 2018 BI News and Info

We are adding support in the existing version agnostic SQL Server MP (2017+) to monitor older versions of the server, specifically 2012 through 2016. SQL Server 2008 and R2 end of support is nearing (July 2019) so we will leave monitoring 2008 in its own MP. This is an update to the public preview we released earlier this year (release blog post). Please refer to that blog post for that release on the details of planned changes as it involves some naming changes and impacts custom MPs.

Please install and use this public preview and send us your feedback (sqlmpsfeedback@microsoft.com)! We appreciate the time and effort you spend on these previews which make the final product so much better.

Please download at:

Microsoft System Center Management Pack (Community Technology Preview) for SQL Server

SQL Server 2012+ MP 7.0.9.0 CTP2

Added a new property, called “Versions of SQL Server to be excluded”, in “SQL Server on Windows Local DB Engine Discovery” to exclude specified SQL Server versions from being discovered
Added the monitor “Database Log Backup Status” to check when the transaction log was last backed up
Added the monitor “Database Backup Status” to check the age of the last backup of a replica database
Added support for Distributed Availability Groups in SQL Server 2016 and higher
Added a monitor and performance rule to watch over the number of VLFs—“Virtual Log File Count” and “DB Virtual Log File Count” respectively
Added support for AG Configuration-Only replica in SQL Server on Linux
Added additional check in every workflow to make sure that they will not run against an unsupported SQL Server version
Improved the way workflows get information on what SQL Server namespaces are available in WMI
Updated the monitor “Product Version Compliance” in order to check instances of SQL Server 2012 and higher
Updated some display strings
Fixed: Focus jumps out of the SCOM console window when opening the Monitoring Wizard
Fixed: “DB Engine Seed” discovery doesn’t throw an error message when the action account doesn’t have enough permissions to access the required keys in Windows Registry

We are looking forward to hearing your feedback at sqlmpsfeedback@microsoft.com.

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SQL Server Release Services

Katt Williams Threatened With A Gun By Atlanta Radio Host’s Husband Outside Comedy Club

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Katt Williams Goes In On Tiffany Haddish, Kevin Hart And Others On Atlanta Radio

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TIBCO NOW 2018: Innovating at the C-Level with the TIBCO Executive Summit

Automation software platform UiPath raises $225 million from CapitalG, Sequoia, and Accel at $3 billion valuation

Automation

Growth