To Be Best-In-Class: Harness Big Data
By Sam Sliman, President, Optimal Solutions Integration
According to Gartner, enterprise data will increase 650 percent over the next five years. IDC pegs enterprise data doubling every 18 months, and MGI estimates that enterprises globally stored more than 7 exabytes - thousands of petabytes - of new data in 2010 alone.
Not surprisingly, a strong positive correlation can be traced over the past decade between data growth and enterprise adoption of analytics and BI solutions as businesses and public sector organizations of all sizes step up initiatives to tap their growing data stores for greater business insight, increased operational efficiency, better customer service and new revenue streams. Yet despite its enormous value (realized and as yet untapped) big data can also be a big burden - with exponential data growth threatening to overwhelm IT and dumb down BI gains.
The success of any analytics or BI program hinges heavily on quality data. For these programs to be effective an array of questions about how your organization deals with data must be answered in the affirmative. For instance: Is your data accurate? Consistent? Complete? Up-to-date? Relevant? Appropriately formatted? Securely stored? Easily accessed? Adequately shared?
The questions are straightforward enough, but answering ‘yes’ with confidence is proving to be a formidable challenge to business and IT executives alike. According to a recent Avande survey, more than half of business and IT execs (56 percent) report feeling overwhelmed by the amount of data their company manages. Gartner reports that 47 percent of respondents to its survey rank data growth among their top three challenges, and findings from a recent Aberdeen survey reveal that the productivity and decision making of a majority of organizations is negatively impacted by inaccurate or incomplete data.
Action against data-quality falls largely under the purview of master data management (MDM), and it is no surprise that companies with well established MDM programs fare the best with their analytics and business intelligence programs. However, according to an Aberdeen Group report, only 20 percent of companies/organizations merit ‘Best in Class’ status when it comes to MDM.
These companies share the following attributes:
- 72 % have a formal MDM program in place
- 58% have discovered & identified all of their data
- 57% have classified and defined all of their data
- 52% continuously maintain and update their master data
Analytics and BI benefits gained from efficient and effective MDM programs include:
- Faster data integration: Best-in-Class organizations took an average of 12 days to integrate new data sources, compared to the industry average of 60 days, and 143 days for Laggard organizations.
- Superior timely information delivery: 93% of information is delivered in ‘right-time’ in Best-in-Class organizations, 83% for industry average, and only 34% for Laggard organizations.
- Increased revenue: Best-in-Class organizations achieved an average 16% increase in year-over-year organic revenue, compared to the industry average of 11%, and 7% increase for Laggard organizations.
- Superior customer satisfaction: Best-in-Class organizations are experiencing an 88% customer satisfaction rate, compared with 80% for the industry average, and 78% for Laggards.
These are simple correlations that yield a powerful conclusion. It is becoming increasingly clear that superior data management capabilities are a prerequisite for turning data into clear answers to intelligently framed, goal oriented business questions.
Improved forecasts. Smarter, more strategic real-time decisions. Sustainable competitive advantage. First-rate customer service. More impactful, better targeted marketing campaigns. Increased productivity, efficiency and revenue.
All proven gains from analytics and BI.
All dependant on businesses making data quality a top priority when it comes to managing the big-data deluge.
Aberdeen Group Reports:
Data Management for BI: Fueling the Analytical Engine with High-Octane Information
