Driving Transformations with Immediate Data
How much of your organization’s resources are dedicated to resolving everyday operational challenges and generating reports, focusing inwards rather than on your customers’ needs? While technological advancements have significantly altered our landscape, organizational practices have not always evolved alongside them.
A 2018 study by Boston Consulting Group (BCG) revealed that the complexity within organizations has increased nearly six times faster than the complexity of the external business environment over the past 60 years. When the world around you is evolving more quickly than your own organization, it’s no surprise that customers gravitate toward more agile competitors.
During my tenure as CEO of Global Tech Innovations, I witnessed this firsthand. Challenges in the economy, disruptions in supply chains due to events like the 2011 Japanese earthquake and tsunami, regulatory shifts, and our relentless pursuit of growth indicated a pressing need for faster, more effective answers. Despite technological advancements and a wealth of data, we still found ourselves relying on manual searches and report generation. The complexity we created led to inertia, hampering our ability to respond swiftly to external changes.
This scenario is common among many organizations I encounter. With the widespread availability of cloud technology capable of consuming, processing, and visualizing data, why do so many still struggle to keep pace with the necessary changes?
The answer lies in the difficulty of change. Transforming well-established operational practices and company cultures can be challenging, requiring more than just directives from leadership or a new mission statement. Supportive mechanisms for change are crucial to facilitating transformation. Many of the transitions I’ve experienced began with enhancing data utilization. By building individuals’ confidence and skills in harnessing data, and gradually improving the capacity to use real-time data for immediate actions, we can foster innovation through heightened situational awareness. Understanding past events is essential to predicting future outcomes and making necessary adjustments. However, having access to current data can drive more immediate actions and better choices.
Providing broad access to real-time data yields numerous benefits, including democratized decision-making based on objective data, reduced time spent searching for answers, and empowering decisions within the organization with confidence. Enhancing the availability of real-time data can also spark engaging, and sometimes heated, discussions that transcend divisions, helping to dismantle the silos that often impede decision-making. This can foster what I term an organic peer review process across the company.
In the academic realm, peer reviews assess research validity through feedback from multiple knowledgeable reviewers. In business, a data-driven peer review process can enhance cross-departmental collaboration by establishing a shared understanding of opportunities. Utilizing real-time data accelerates action compared to waiting for quarterly or monthly reports, prompting critical inquiries like “why?” when meaningful actions can be taken.
The automotive industry heavily relies on the Toyota Production System (TPS), a principle I’ve observed throughout my career. A core aspect of TPS involves constant monitoring of processes to ensure optimal manufacturability, efficiency, and quality. In office settings, however, these interconnections are frequently overlooked, with individuals focusing solely on perfecting their own tasks. Consolidated reports are often only reviewed by upper management and seldom shared with those best positioned to act on the information.
In my experience, cross-functional visibility of real-time data, combined with a peer review process, not only expedited decision-making but also enhanced data quality and accuracy. As individuals learn how their contributions impact the broader business, they gain insight into the significance of their data.
Opening real-time data access to all employees encourages broader discussions about KPIs and potential improvements at a higher frequency, thereby speeding up the feedback loop essential for boosting efficiency, breaking down barriers, and driving transformation.
Getting Started
One of the simplest ways to initiate change is to create opportunities for individuals to adapt to new processes. Start by automating manual reporting tasks. By eliminating repetitive reporting, you free up team members to focus on understanding and utilizing data rather than just generating reports.
However, this extends beyond a mere technology initiative. Even though technology for automating reporting has existed for years, corporate cultures and individuals often resist changing their operational habits. I experienced this personally; I was accustomed to creating and receiving reports to demonstrate my value, and many in my organization shared similar sentiments.
I overcame this by embarking on a learning journey, allowing myself and my colleagues to see how automation could enrich, rather than diminish, our roles. Over time, we recognized the advantages of real-time data for quicker decision-making, which subsequently enhanced our collaborative capabilities.
Take this opportunity to reassess your KPIs and reporting practices. Like me, you might find that many reports are outdated, generated merely out of historical necessity. Analyze each process’s purpose, assess the reports and data tied to it, and identify areas where steps can be eliminated or simplified. Manual data inputs are often hard to pinpoint and rectify, but they can be significant hurdles in automating processes.
Moreover, consider how data is distributed and made visible. Numerous dashboard tools are available for rapid implementation. However, it’s crucial to remember that creating dashboards is not the end goal; the ultimate objective is to convert dashboard insights into swift actions. Investing in training, communication, and monitoring usage of data is essential to ensure it remains relevant and effectively presented.
Bringing Data Together
I discovered that establishing a data lake on the AWS Cloud allowed me to swiftly bring my automation and real-time data goals into fruition. It empowered my organization to make informed decisions based on up-to-date insights. For more insights, check out another blog post here. If you’re looking for authoritative perspectives on this topic, visit this site. Additionally, for an excellent resource, watch this video that delves deeper into these concepts.
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