Learn how your company can adopt a data-driven culture and transform into a data-driven company by embracing data governance, analytics, and strategies.
As the forerunner of your own company, you probably know very well how an organization relies on data in making daily decisions.
For sure, your company has lots of it. Left with all those data every day, you begin to ask yourself, how do I make use of all these data effectively? Having a data-based company means exhausting data in every aspect of the organization.
By that, it means including the concept of data management in considering its pool of talent, the creation of its company values, and in the overall attainment of its goals.
Organizations that give high value to data analysis and insights for their clients. The clients that don’t appreciate how most of those same data attached to their own business culture could easily find themselves making resolutions in seclusion.
Place Data in the Centre of Decision Making
Do you have a data analytics team? If you don’t, it is time for you to organize one. If you do, are they the only ones seeing and analyzing those data?
Your organization may not effectively utilize data for decision making. Make data centered decisions throughout the departments. This will help to see everything that’s running in the organization in a wider picture.
This is the reason why all companies from different lines of businesses rely on data in making every decision.
From its minor to major business decisions, more companies have learned that investing in data management is of utmost value. Data and analytics should be the pulse of every organization if such organization is looking at the future.
Align Your Company Culture: Maximize Insights
Creating a culture where everyone, especially you as the leader, understands and/or appreciate how data brings worth to business marketing initiatives. This will guarantee that your internal/external processes and culture are aligned with maximizing insights.
Acquiring the best value from all your data means that you, at your level, should first trust it yourself. Then, you need to give employees the time and space to appreciate and get familiarized with it.
That process begins with those at the top, those people who should pilot this new process before it gets disseminated among all the staff.
When decision making is data-driven, business or department focus group discussions improve. This is due to the fact that valuable information about the company’s performance, resource utilization, process efficiency, etc. are easily accessed and analyzed.
A Data-Driven Team
Focus on and support hiring on the right talent. Build a culture that gives credence to data science and management. You’d be surprised at how much benefit it will be bringing to your organization.
A data-driven staff is of the utmost demand in today’s workforce market. It has been reported that in the US alone, by the year 2018, they would experience a shortage of up to 190,000 of workers who are able to do data analysis. This brought about the extended rise in business process outsourcing.
Nowadays, numerous companies in the US depend on outsourcing their business not just for its financial benefits, but for the increasing demand for such skills. If we are to rely on the US alone they could be losing a 60% gap of workers who are able to analyze data and the actual supply.
That means, hiring the right workers, especially those capable of the same, is important. When hiring, always look for those candidates who are comfortable with skills related to data analysis.
Moreover, individuals who embrace data are open to what it can teach them. This is a very important trait for other inputs such as customer and managerial feedback, qualitative research and user testing. Thus, promoting feedback driven culture as well.
Value the Attitude/Willingness to Fail
Despite the importance of data in business decision making, the same should also be done based on an all-inclusive view of your company’s business aims, rather than on number analysis alone.
If your organization is making its decisions based only on numbers and figures, you are disregarding your staff’s intuition. You are ignoring their field experiences with both their experienced successes and/or failures.
Those kinds of input are indispensable additions to your quantifiable analysis. Although, even with more data insights and instinctual employees, errors can and will always occur. It is inevitable.
No success is achieved in a vacuum. Establish a culture that makes people feel comfortable with failing without being complacent.
Since success depends ultimately on everyone’s drive towards the same goal or outcome, establish an aura of confidence wherein failure is part of the expectations but the goal is a success.
Nurture a Company Culture
Deciding to establish a data cased company is the first step. A data-driven enterprise needs to sustain. The following are tips on how to nurture and sustain a data-driven culture:
Support Professional Development
First, find out your employees’ current competencies. Conduct company-wide testing to assess where your employees from the top to the bottom fare on data-based knowledge.
Then, create an action plan. Identify those who are in dire need of training. To save on training costs, it is best to train a few of your high potential employees and have them train their colleagues in the future. It is always a best practice observed among successful companies.
Then, create opportunities for professional development and continuing education. Technology requires an update and so does knowledge thereof.
What you’d want is an organization that focuses on best practices and advances in data and marketing sciences. Establish active links with leading data and marketing sciences organizations, such as the Data and Marketing Association (DMA).
Take note that continuous product knowledge improvement should work two ways; both inside and outside. Allow some of your employee to train their peers with things learned from outside sources. This way, you are able to develop your own pool of training talents and save on costs.
Constantly Test Internal Processes
Conduct testing of internal processes and protocols. This would ensure that each employee involved in the utilization of such a system is aligned and comfortable with it.
This should run from the top to the bottom. Systems testing also allows for focussed group discussion on its practicability, efficiency, and effectivity. It also tests compatibility with the team’s desired business outcomes.
This isn’t possible without the management’s support and commitment. This should be clear within the company. This way, everyone has a view that the organization as a whole is moving in one direction.
Stay Up-to-Date
Being innovative also means looking beyond your company. Like I stated before, it should work both ways.
This also applies to systems update. Invest in your own research and development team and see to it that they make use of outside references as well. Looking at varied sources of knowledge can widen your list of strategies.
Develop links with some of the leading educational institutes and professional organizations. This will help to stay on top of current and innovative developments. These linkages can also help you attract future talents. Widen your network.
Data Privacy and Security
One of the things that are crucial in establishing a data-driven organization is the mitigation and prevention of potential risks. What you’d want is high-quality risk protection for your company’s data files.
Part of its establishment and implementation has to do with proper calibration and alignment among all concerned employees.
Everyone must be fully trained on the standard procedures and the consequences of not adhering to such security measures.
Lead by Example
When you are part of the workforce, it is a common stigma among the front-liners that management and all those people on top don’t have basic knowledge on the front line system.
You might have had that experience when the floor is undermanned. Some members of the management/supervisory team had to go down and get their hands on deck.
It usually becomes an interestingly hilarious day; your supervisor/manager keeps asking you on what to do due to the fact that they are no longer familiar with the systems in your level.
We’re sure it made you feel a bit superior to them for a moment; having to know things that they don’t. Well, such situations teach us one thing; never underestimate the value of each employee.
It also teaches us another valuable lesson; systems update without the higher ops even testing and knowing how they work. How would you feel if, during that time, your manager comes down, get his/her hands on deck and is able to work with the system just fine? It builds respect.
Knowing the system allows you to lead better. It’s used as leverage for your employees to provide you with feedback and suggestion regarding the system. This is what we meant by the decentralization of decision making.
An Integrated Approach to Strategy Making
After establishing the utilization of data, there is no exact strategy to integrate it. Please take note that although data is utilized in many ways, they come in the form of facts.
These facts serve as valuable tools in arriving at certain business decisions. Tools are utilized by us, not the other way around. Adopt an integrated approach; people, technology, and strategy.
Organizations are primarily made up of people. People within your organization are your greatest assets. The company’s success is highly dependent on people from the outside; your clients and customers. In adopting strategies, see to it that your strategies are people-centered both from the outside and inside.
A date driven company must be a data-based company for the benefit of its people. Take for example, in analyzing numbers and figures based on the company’s performance for the past year. Never detach its interpretation on your employee’s experience.
They are the forerunners, they run the system and deal with the clients. Facts brought by numbers must be coupled with employees experience and intuition.
A Better Customer Experience
Finally, it all goes down to better customer experience. It’s based on their experience of your company’s product, or directly with your employees, depending on your line business.
If you are able to identify this before your competition does, you owe that to certain factors:
- Better data gathering and analysis of employees
- More open participation of your employees in identifying data that reflect your product’s opportunity for improvement
- Their willingness to reach out and provide suggestions
Among all the three we have mentioned, all are dependent on employee experience. This is, therefore, the best investment and focus when creating data based company strategies.
Facts must be met with human experience and creativity. When your organization is able to integrate this view in its own culture, there is no other direction that you are going to but success.
If you find this article informative, you can also check certain cases wherein customer and employee experience are used to improve the company’s strategies.
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