Big Data. It’s a term that most entrepreneurs have heard. But not all really understand what it means. One could be forgiven for shrugging it off as just another buzzword. The kind that come and go through the office like that squashed and forlorn looking Danish that nobody wants to eat. If you’ve had enough of blue sky thinking, red flags, bottlenecks, growth hacks and customer journeys Big Data is one more digitally-savvy platitude that you could do without. You prefer plain speaking, honest, transparency and clarity. After all, that’s what you’ve built your business and your brand upon! You wouldn’t want to bamboozle your customers with flashy sounding slogans, so you don’t expect them to permeate your operations. You want straight talk only in your boardroom.
Image by Markus Spiske via Pixabay
But even if you don’t like the somewhat obnoxious phrasing, you can’t really afford to neglect Big Data. Data is an extremely valuable commodity for business. In fact, its value surpasses that of oil as a commodity. The insights that it provides can help your business to chart a path to growth. It can make your operations more efficient. It can allow you to address customer pain points to which you’ve previously been oblivious. It can help you to deliver on the promises and qualities that are inherent in your branding.
However, if you don’t know how to manage, store, handle and interrogate your data, it can cause as many problems as it solves. Here, we’ll look at some of the ways in which Big Data can cause little problems, and how to avoid them. So that you can ensure that you’re using yours optimally to improve operational efficiency, improve your agility and face the challenges of the future in a state of preparation…
There’s no uniformity in how your data is stored
You’re storing huge volumes of data. But you’re not thinking all that much about how you’ll be able to access it later, much less mine it for strategic insights. Big Data and little insight can be a troublesome combination for businesses. It can mean that you are lumbered with all the costs, logistics and vulnerabilities associated with storing large volumes of data, without the ability to mine it for actionable insights.
Let’s look at two disparate examples of how this might affect businesses.
Insurance companies, for instance, can be missing out on a goldmine of data from their bordereaux claim files if they are not managed in a structures and standardized way. This is data that could insulate them from excessive payouts and cash flow-crippling losses. Likewise, media production houses may well store all manner of stock assets, but unless there’s uniformity in how those assets are labelled, those assets could be unreachable or sit unused in poorly labelled folders. Likewise the metadata of these files can yield all kinds of useful insights into where and how they are best used.
Make sure there is a standardized approach to data storage and management of your data, or you’ll never be able to harness its true capabilities.
You’re suffering from analysis paralysis
Analysis paralysis is common among businesses that are new to the concept of Big Data, and have yet to establish an infrastructure for dealing with it. The time taken to collect data and parse it for analysis can lead to stalled projects, extended lead times and cash flow problems. Especially when teams are not sure what the data is trying to tell them.
It’s good to be able to store large quantities of historic data. It’s great to store and manage it in a way that’s uniform and standardized. But unless you know what hypotheses your data supports, you could find yourself drowning in numbers and lose the gut instinct that can drive decision making.
This is why Big Data needs to be combined with the right Business intelligence (BI) platform to mine clear and actionable insights from your data.
But one BI tool is not necessarily as good as any other. You’ll need to know what to look for to choose the right one for your needs. It needs to:
- Integrate well with your existing infrastructure
- Be secure and reliable
- Allow you easy access even when you’re off site
- Use ranking reports to ascertain which aspects of your operations are working well and which need improvement
- Be tailored to the needs of your industry
- Be easy and intuitive to use
Your insights are colored by confirmation bias
Confirmation bias can taint everything it touches in terms of your data. Unfortunately, many businesses don’t use data to explore, but to confirm their existing hypotheses. And there’s a fine line between confirmation, and confirmation bias. The latter can inhibit the insights that you glean from your data or even cause you to “cherry pick” data to support what you want to believe.
While it’s easy to see why this might be comforting, it’s also easy to see how potentially dangerous this fallacy can be.
Your departments have become data silos
Big Data needs a big reach. It needs to be shared throughout your organization and used to demonstrate how their efforts tie into the broader operational and strategic goals of your business. However, the truth is that many companies, even those who would describe themselves as “doing” Big Data can find their constituent departments developing a miopic view of their data.
Departments can develop too tight a focus on their own KPIs and performance metrics without really understanding how their work goes towards improving operational efficiency, delivering quality for the customer or improving your company’s profitability.
This is why broader organizational data needs to be shared between departments, and the insights gleaned from data communicated clearly in ways that are relevant to them but also tied to the big picture.
And finally… Nobody is accountable for your data
Your responsibilities are diverse and numerous. Can you really handle the weight of all your business data alone? Many companies appoint a “Data Czar” or Chief Data Officer who is responsible for the proper storage, management and maintenance of data silos, maintaining quality of input (aka data hygiene) and reporting back to you with any issues that occur.
These individuals can be invaluable in helping you to get the most out of your data.
