Thinking Analytics – Organisation wide

“In God we trust; all others must bring data.” this famous quote by W. Edwards Deming changed the way corporations behaved with respect to process improvement and quality control. Over time organisations have evolved to be driven by numbers at different levels; most of these numbers that normally get debated and scrutinised are the financial one – the actual dollars.. Adoption of quality processes and global certifications have also contributed to number crunching at an operational level, however the seriousness of these is more of a function of organisation culture rather than statutory requirements associated with financial gains.

Getting an organisation to think analytics is more cultural than anything else and is going to be as challenging as getting employees to provide operational data in the earlier times. It will however be unfair to assume that this is something new. Matured corporations who have successfully implemented and transformed themselves into process centric organisations have already been practicing statistical techniques to improve themselves quality and therefore using analytics for the next level of growth is going to be a logical progression for most of them.

The challenge with thinking analytics is not going to be centred around process but for interdepartmental movement of the right data for use.. Similarly it is going to require managers to ask themselves what kind of data they would need from other departments to enable them improve their decision making processes and how their decisions might influence organisation wide changes. Last of all analytics at an organisational level will be a complex culmination of not only data but analysis of how this data and its interdependence on internal and external factors will really shape decision making and strategy ideation. It is time for CEO’s to start putting in place strategies of getting their employees think analytics. Are the consultants listening?