Episode 62: Taking Technology Fandom to the Next Level

Guest: Christoph Hein

Most of us are ambivalent about the technology we use at work. Ideally, we don’t even want to think about it. We know that technology enables business operations to proceed at a speed and scale that would have been unthinkable just a generation ago. In fact, anytime our work-technology attracts attention to itself, it’s usually not for a good reason.

But sometimes a piece of technology gets a foothold somewhere and becomes the basis for a community of passionate fans whose imaginations are sparked by all the creative possibilities it enables.

Christoph Hein, our guest this week, epitomizes this kind of fandom as an active member of the global community of TM1 adherents. TM1, which is now IBM Planning Analytics, is a multi-dimensional database and modeling platform used for many financial and operational planning and reporting applications in companies of all sizes around the world.

In this conversation, Christoph shares how he went from studying History in University to being the “TM1 Fan Boy” and shares several interesting non-traditional examples of how TM1 is used where he works, at Deutsche Bahn. We also get to hear about the planninganalyticsguide.com website, which Christoph’s passion project in collaboration with BARC, and analyst firm.