In the current digital era, where transactions have turned paperless, organizations are generating tonnes of data. Large volumes of excel sheets containing raw data are pulled out from the organizations’ systems at the close of business every day. To make meaningful insights from these sets of data, data analytics is used.
From raw data sheet…
…to a summary dashboard. The journey is called data analytics.
Data in most organizations today has four qualities that magnify its complexity: volume; where business processes and transaction generate too much data to be handled easily; velocity– the speed of data flowing in and out makes it difficult to analyze; variety– where the range and type of data sources are too great to assimilate; veracity -the measure of the accuracy of the data being produced.
When using data analytics, data are extracted, and categorized to point out and analyze behavioral pattern as per the user’s requirement. Organizations collect data related to customers, business processes, market economics, and practical experience.
Ways in which data analytics works
▪ Prescriptive data analysis; this involves analysis of data with an aim of identifying what actions should be taken
▪ Predictive data analysis; this is an analysis of the likely scenarios of what is expected to happen and leads to a predictive forecast.
▪ Diagnostic data analytics; in this kind of analysis, it involves a critical review of past performance and establishing what actually happened and why it happened. This is best represented in an analytic dashboard.
▪ Descriptive data analytics; this type of analysis determines what is currently happening based on incoming data and uses real-time dashboard for the reports.
Applications of data analytics
Is your organization seeking innovative solutions in competitive analysis, call center optimization, consumer satisfaction analysis, stock management, sales optimization, supply chain optimization? Do not allow your data to overwhelm you, the data should make things much better and easier. In fact, data is one of the most valuable asset but its true potential is ignored by most managers and organizations.
Data analytics is critical in the helping an organization transform from being reactive to being predictive. Having data is the first step in gaining understanding. This was echoed by Carly Fiorina, a former Executive, President, and chair of Hewlett-Packard Co in her statement that, “The goal is turn data into information, and information into insight.”
Sun Tzu is his famous book, “The Art of War” on strategy, states that, “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.” This knowledge on “oneself” and “enemy” can only be realized through the process of data analytics.
Importance of Data Analytics
Data analytics helps organizations harness to their data and use this to identify new opportunities. Some importance of data analytics to a business include:
❖ Cost reduction; through data analytics businesses can help the organizations discover more efficient ways of doing business.
❖ Faster, better, and informed decision making; the real use of having data is to gain insight. Data analytics offers a solution to a scenario where organizations are overwhelmed by information but always short of knowledge.
❖ New products and services; an all-time task for organizations is to gauge customers’ needs and satisfaction and respond accordingly with products and services that meets customers’ needs.
Having said all that about data analytics, it is important to understand how to do it right. As it is said, “If you do not know how to ask the right question, you discover nothing.” The success of the process of data analytics largely depends on the correct framing of the questions. It requires an understanding of the right data required for each objective to be achieved.
DataScience Limited will be offering a 2-day training program on Data Analytics. This training offers an opportunity for internal capacity building on data analysis, visualizations and reporting.
The training helps managers and analysts in examining raw data to uncover hidden patterns, correlations and insights. It goes beyond the capability of traditional business intelligence solutions in terms of speed and efficiency.
Come learn from the best, and data will no longer be an ocean of information but a harbor of insight and knowledge.