To Squeeze Value from Business Data, Focus on Both Tech and Culture

August 14, 2024 No Comments

by Jeff Broth

The amount of data that’s being generated every day is increasing to unimaginable levels, with the WEF predicting that 181 zettabytes will be created globally over the course of 2025. To put that figure into context, it’s three times the amount of data that was created in 2020.

All this information, of course, represents a potentially valuable resource for business organizations, which might use it to predict consumer demand, cut business expenses, find operational efficiencies, and generally maintain their competitive edge.

A recent study conducted on behalf of AWS reported that 60% of companies with a mature and comprehensive data strategy financially outperform their competitors.

Emerging Tech Eases the Way

With so much data out there, the challenge is to tap into it in ways that advance business goals. New technology is appearing all the time to help organizations meet this challenge, with artificial intelligence (AI) innovations making a big difference when it comes to unlocking business value from company data.

For example, machine learning (ML) algorithms can analyze vast amounts of data to identify patterns and insights that humans can’t detect. Natural language processing (NLP), a subset of AI, enables stakeholders to generate data visualizations and narrations using casually spoken queries, to make graphs and charts more accessible and understandable. AI makes it possible to process data in real time, and AI-powered automation stores, backs up, normalizes, and preprocesses data to simplify data management.

“Until now, business leaders didn’t always have the expertise to analyze data and produce meaningful insights, and if they had the tools and the capabilities, they couldn’t get those insights in time to make tactical decisions at the speed of business,” says Omri Kohl, the CEO of Pyramid Analytics, a software firm that recently rolled out a set of innovative AI chatbot capabilities.

“With GenBI, BI is now truly self-service,” he continues, “because anyone can ask a question in natural language, without any expertise in data exploration, and receive the insights they need in under a minute.”

However, technology is not a magic wand. A pocketful of tech solutions isn’t enough to turn a mountain of business data into an effective business growth strategy. Organizations could be drowning in insights and still fail to identify effective business decisions, avoid emerging threats, or spot valuable opportunities.

Tech on Its Own Isn’t Enough

Data isn’t a treasure to be hoarded, but currency that needs to be spent – in this case, on driving informed decisions across your workforce.

Faster decision-making that’s based on measurable information leads to increased productivity and greater team efficiency. The improved transparency that comes with evidence-based strategic thinking opens up a holistic view of business operations, enhancing employee understanding and ownership and boosting employee engagement.

In today’s highly competitive environment, success takes more than AI-enhanced software, cloud databases and a few analytics enthusiasts. It’s vital to have employees who understand and know how to use the data insights that they receive. Too many executives struggle to see how their data insights are relevant to the issues they are dealing with, and mid-level team members may not even think of trying to do so.

Ultimately, a true data culture has to be a decision culture. The increased availability of data has thrown this distinction into sharp focus.

Adopting tech, as challenging as that can be, tends to be easier than nurturing a new culture. Wavestone’s Data and AI Leadership Executive Survey reveals that under half of data executives have successfully built data-driven organizations. When asked about the challenges in their path, 78% pointed to culture, while only 23% cited tech limitations.

Fomenting Data Cultures

Not surprisingly, leading data-driven companies invest at least as much in building a strong data culture as they do in buying data management solutions. For a start, data teams require strong leaders with skills that go beyond coding. You need someone with the business acumen to understand the impact that data insights can have for different departments, and the communication skills to convey it.

A data-driven culture has to come from the top, with business leaders who reinforce the expectation that strategy decisions are anchored in data. Nor can data scientists be isolated in an ivory tower. They should be seeded across departments, to enable ongoing informed data conversations with all teams.

This has to come along with a democratization of data, so that every employee can access it and feel comfortable interfacing with it.

“When information isn’t accessible, we make it harder for people to question, challenge, or innovate,” says Jarret Jackson, a leadership strategist from e3. “But, if we make the information accessible, we give employees the space to take more interest in the business and to get creative. That is where new insights and innovation come from.”

You need tools that simplify visualizations, data literacy programs that empower employees to use those tools effectively, and a single source of truth that shares organizational knowledge across all your teams. It’s necessary to encourage a learning culture that recognizes employees who use data to make meaningful contributions to the business, and offer continuous training so that staff are updated about the latest data techniques.

Tools and Culture, Hand in Hand

Successful data-driven organizations need to place equal emphasis on culture and technology. Your business needs the right advanced data management solutions to handle the sheer volume of business data – and to produce insights that are accessible to all your employees. At the same time, your employees need to understand the value represented by these insights, and know how to utilize them for efficient, effective decision-making.