Dr. Joseph W. Perez (“Joe”)

Dr. Joseph W. Perez (“Joe”)

Position: Senior Systems Analyst / Team Lead
Company: NC Department of Health & Human Services

Biography
Having received advanced degrees in secondary education, Joe began a ten-year career as a high school teacher providing instruction in economics, Spanish, Bible, and computers. While in his teaching career, he furthered his graduate education, earning a doctorate in education with a double-minor in computers and theology. His career focus changed to IT in the early 1990’s when he started as a Computer Consultant at NC State University. Three promotions later, Dr. Perez ended his successful 25-year career at NC State as Business Intelligence Specialist when he took another promotion to become Senior Business Analyst at the NC Department of Health and Human Services in the fall of 2017, and has since been promoted to Senior Systems Analyst and Team Lead. With almost 10,000 followers on LinkedIn and several professional certifications, Perez has stayed active in the IT, HHS, and higher education communities as a much sought-after resource, highly-recommended international keynote speaker, data analytics & visualization expert, and specialist in efficiency and process improvement. Through the years, Dr. Perez has never lost his love for teaching, having been a guest speaker for many organizations and internationally-recognized podcasts. When he takes a break from work and public speaking, he enjoys spending time with his wife of more than 30 years and their children, whom he says are the “best things that ever happened to me.” He also sings, plays the piano, composes songs, serves on several advisory boards, and has performed PSA’s and voice-overs for schools and other organizations. He also serves as music director to his church’s Hispanic ministry, teaches their Men’s Bible Fellowship class, and interprets sermons to Spanish or English, depending upon the audience. If there’s any spare time left, he enjoys publishing a monthly military newsletter (as editor-in-chief of “The Patriot News”), working out in the gym, is an avid reader, and tries to catch up on Star Trek reruns. “A busy life indeed, but I wouldn’t trade it for anything in the world. I’m a firm believer that if I’m not innovating, then I’m stagnating,” says Joe.

Anyone can make a pretty bar graph, but can you make sound decisions based on that graph? Is it actionable, or is it only a concept? How do you turn flashy concepts into actionable visualizations? Can you see the end result of those concepts; will they ever become reality? Do you have the vision and drive to figure out how to get from today to tomorrow before it becomes yesterday?

American mathematician John Tukey once said, “The greatest value of a picture is when it forces us to notice what we never expected to see.” What value do you see in your data? And what ideas do you have when you see it? Learn how you can capitalize on your ideas and turn them into reality by blending internal with external, leveraging them into a cohesive strategy for both the short term AND the long term. See the five “Stages of the Spectrum” in action while discovering the difference between impact and influence, and how that difference plays into making data actionable.

BABOK V3 Alignment: Chapter 6: Strategy Analysis, Chapter 11: Perspectives