Analytical Analysis

Since I left the Navy, a whopping 21 years ago, some of the positions I've held electronic technician, engineering technician, service technician and even now as a user experience architect have all required analytical thinking skills or the ability to do analytical analysis. Let's face it, everyone does it, it's just that some people can do it at a very detailed level and even a smaller group enjoys doing it. I'm not boasting to be the best at analytical analysis, but I do enjoy it and I can break things down to a level that will bore many of you to death. Just ask my wife.

So what does analytical analysis mean? In the simplest terms, it's taking information (data) and drawing conclusions. Here are a few examples that will bore some of you, but stay with me. I'm going someplace a little different.

• Tracing errors through a system (software, hardware, etc.), isolating the working parts/sections/sub-systems to help pinpoint and identify failures, this is often a process of elimination - That's troubleshooting
• Breaking down and documenting the steps to maintain, repair or accomplish a higher level task - That's process flow
• Understanding user types, their goals and what's important to them; then taking that information to present a process or set of tasks to accomplish a business oriented goal - That's developing a user experience
• Tracking and evaluating the actions of a person, using that information to project what he or she will do in the future. Taking known data to calculate unknown data and then acting on that information to get a specific response from a person - That's poker!

Right about now, some you are calling bullshit. You're saying that poker is gambling and it's all luck. You may contest that people do win only to eventually lose it all. You would be correct for many that play the game; however, for those that study the game through analytical analysis, you would be very wrong.

In my next post, I’ll go a little deeper into the poker wormhole. For now, I'd like to hear what you think.