Decisively Digital is the #1 Best-Selling Computers & Technology Industry Book on Amazon

Decisively Digital is an Amazon Best Seller
Decisively Digital is an Amazon Best Seller

What a great start to the new year: I am absolutely thrilled and grateful that my book, Decisively Digital, is the #1 best-selling Computers & Technology Industry book on Amazon!

When I first started writing this book, I had a strong belief in the message that I wanted to share with the world. I wanted to share my insights and experiences on how businesses can harness the power of digital technologies to drive growth and success by interviewing thought leaders from a variety of industries.

I hope that Decisively Digital will continue to inspire and empower readers to embrace the digital age and harness the full potential of technology for their own businesses and organizations. Thank you again for all of your support, and I can’t wait to see what the future holds!

Feel free to spread the word:

The Data Operator: The World’s Largest Particle Accelerator was a Career Boost

Der Daten-Verarbeiter: Der weltgrößte Teilchenbeschleuniger war für Alexander Loth ein Karriere-Turbo
BNN, 14.07.2021: “Der Daten-Verarbeiter: Der weltgrößte Teilchenbeschleuniger war für Alexander Loth ein Karriere-Turbo”

Today in the news:

✔ The Data Operator: The world’s largest particle accelerator was a career boost for Alexander Loth
✔ “Data is the common thread of my professional life.”
✔ 2nd book, 📖 Decisively Digital, published by Wiley.

I am grateful for my journey from CERN, via Tableau, to Microsoft. Thank you.

Link to the online version of the newspaper article: Wie ein Karlsruher am CERN in die Welt der Daten eintauchte (BNN, 14.07.2021)

Decisively Digital is the #1 New Release in Organizational Change on Amazon

Our book Decisively Digital is the number 1 new release in Organizational Change on Amazon!

The paperback of Decisively Digital became available yesterday in the US, with other territories soon to follow.

It took a village to finish this book. Many thanks to all of you:

Decisively Digital — From Creating a Culture to Designing Strategy: Book is Now Available

My new book Decisively Digital — From Creating a Culture to Designing Strategy is now available for pre-order at most bookstores. The ebook is already available:

Book’s website | Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Books A Million | IndieBound | Thalia | Weltbild | published by Wiley

Check out 24 gripping interviews with Elissa Fink, Mohamed Abdel Hadi, Dr. Henna Karna, Derek Roos, Edna Conway, Kerem Tomak, André Rabold, Bora Beran, Florian Ramseger, Tatyana Yakushev, Patrick Kirchgäßner, Jordan Morrow, Yilian Villanueva Martinez, Lee Feinberg, Mark Kromer, Sarah Burnett, Andreas Kopp, Cameron Turner, Christy Marble, Prof. Dr. Patrick Glauner, Vladimir Alexeev, Sofie Blakstad, Sven Sommerfeld, and Ian Choo. Thanks also to Bernard Marr for the foreword, Patrick Walsh for editing, and everyone for supporting me in the preparation and reviews.

More about the book from the back cover:

INSIGHTS AND APPLICATIONS FROM 24 LEADERS OF THE DIGITAL REVOLUTION FROM CREATING A CULTURE TO DESIGNING STRATEGY

Today’s business world is Decisively Digital. Across the business landscape, the leaders rising to the top are the ones who can think big-picture about data, AI, analytics, and beyond. How do we build new capabilities around digital, so we can push into the future with full steam? That’s the question at the heart of the twenty-four incisive interviews inside this unique collection of up-to-the-minute expertise from the people who are moving business forward.

With this book, your mentors are the very digital masterminds behind some of today’s top global organizations. Discover how tech giants are reinventing the world of work, how the financial sector is streamlining with data analytics, and what the latest AI research means for the businesses of today and tomorrow. You’ll also gain access to a toolkit of updates, further reading, and digital strategy ideas on the included companion website.

Discover the inspiration you need to evolve your business for the digital age and learn to:

    • Establish a digital culture that empowers people to work smarter
    • Implement data democracy and analytics to discover new capabilities
    • Generate tangible business results using new tech tools
    • Realize efficiencies with artificial intelligence, blockchain, and the Internet of Things
    • Apply real-world examples as you build your own future-proof digital strategy

“Alexander has brought together some of the brightest voices and smartest thought leaders from leading organisations across many industries, to bring you unmissable insights and real-world examples to showcase how technology can improve your businesses and drive business results today and tomorrow.”
—Bernard Marr, Futurist, influencer and best-selling author of Tech Trends in Practice and The Intelligence Revolution

Decisively Digital is decisively executive. Great experts, great interviews, and great insights combine to a crisp, cohesive and powerful story. It would be quite a mistake for any (aspiring) leader not to dive into this book, so I will definitely put it on the list of mandatory readings for my future students!”
—Markus Maedler, Director Executive MBA Programmes at Frankfurt School of Finance & Management

Thank you all who helped me to complete this book — and please feel free to share the news:

The Empathy Machine: Are Digital Technologies the Best Bet in Telling about your Cause?

The panel discussion “The empathy machine: are digital technologies the best bet in telling about your cause?” took place on the opening day of the 2018 Fundamental Rights Forum (FRA). This forum was organized by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights, and took place at the METAStadt Vienna 25-27 September 2018.

In this panel discussion Kadri Kõusaar (a Oscar nominated film director), Fanny Hidvegi (European Policy Manager) and me discussed if digital technologies really are the “empathy machine” and how innovative applications can help human rights defenders to achieve some challenging goals such as a change in public attitudes or meeting tough fund-raising targets. The panel discussion was moderated by the virtual reality artist Dr. Frederick Baker.

In this blog post I want to share some of the panel’s questions, which I answered:

1. How do algorithms interfere with human rights?

When algorithms make certain decisions, these algorithms  tent to mirror what they are shown with training sets. This is especially apparent for issues such as bias and machine discrimination. Both might be the result of the content of the training data, which reflects existing inequalities.

2. So, it’s about the data? What else makes data so important today?

The effective use of data is vital for our understanding of fundamental issues, such as human rights violations and political instability, for informing our policy-making, and for enhancing our ability to predict the next crisis. Furthermore, the scope, complexity and life-changing importance of the work being done on topics like these across the European Union has made it more important than ever for everyone participating in the public conversation and in demographic decision-making to have access to and to be able to derive insights from key data sources.

3. Where is data coming from and how can people benefit?

Every time we google something, send a tweet, or just browse a website, we create data. With the rise of visual analytics we can benefit from this vast amount of information. Visual analytics is a hands-on approach to interacting with data that does not require any programming skills. Furthermore, communicating with data, is seen as one of the most relevant skills in today’s information age.

Global Refugee Crisis visualization on Tableau Public

4. What is the easiest way to find interesting data?

I would check out the Google’s new search engine for datasets that was just released recently! Tableau Public is a good source for existings visualizations. Many of these are based on public data.

5. What is required to enable organizations to use data for good?

Data can be used for the good of society, but private- and public-sector firms, nonprofits and NGOs still lack analytics resources and expertise. Data and analytics leaders must cross traditional boundaries to use data for good, to better compete for limited talent, and to foster an ethical culture. VizForSocialGood and Tableau Foundation are good examples.

6. How can the private sector contribute for good?

Some private sector organizations are making data open and available to researchers, nonprofits and NGOs. Examples include:

  • Mastercard anonymizing credit card data to be analyzed in smart city initiatives.
  • Google making search data available to hospitals to predict infection disease outbreaks such as flu and dengue fever.
  • Insurance companies providing anonymized healthcare data to improve patient outcomes and prevention strategies.
  • Yelp providing ratings data to cities to prioritize food safety inspectors.

The panel discussion was followed by workshops in the afternoon: