Many companies seek to become more "data-driven." But not all data is created equal — and "all data" can be an overwhelming amount of noise.
We pursue a decision-driven approach with our clients to ensure that the right data and metrics are prioritized to be impactful to the enterprise.
In recent years, data has often been called the "new gold" or the "new oil" — a reference to its enormous value and potential to power businesses. So it's no surprise that many companies have launched major efforts to better manage and harness it. Transformation initiatives that once focused on new business processes and systems like ERP, CRM, and HRIS now build on that transactional foundation with data warehouses and lakes, self-serve analytics, and AI and predictive solutions.
These initiatives can bring major new capabilities — but we often meet companies where the increased access to data simply overwhelms leaders with a chaotic, inconsistent mix of spreadsheets, numbers, and cluttered dashboards, without providing real insight to drive decisions.
Faced with sprawling spreadsheets and a never-ending parade of tables, it remains easier to default to heuristics and standard operating procedures — to keep doing things the way they always were. It may not lead to the best decisions, but the decisions get made. The trouble is that standard heuristics are increasingly out of date in a dynamic market: more sophisticated competitors continually improve service levels and reduce costs, while companies stuck in the past miss major opportunities.
Start With the Basics
Sorting through the crush of available data can seem daunting, but using it to make better decisions isn't rocket science. As almost always, it comes back to the basics:
- What is the real problem to be addressed? Absent a clear understanding of the problem and the audience, a mass of data just increases confusion. A program manager may need progress and profitability by task; corporate HR may simply need gross capacity by skillset and which programs have the highest demand.
- What are the key metrics? Modern systems let managers collect data on a vast array of metrics — but which matter most for the core problem? Are profitability challenges driven by rising costs or reduced pricing leverage? Metrics are just math on base data; the real challenge is getting decision-makers to agree on the most important ones.
- How can I get the big picture and drill down where needed? Senior leaders need the context first, then the ability to drill into specific indicators. This is where a picture is worth a thousand dollars — an effective visual can show that a 5% price increase in one category matters far more than a price doubling in a rarely used item.
The focus on problem definition and effective communication — not the volume of data — is increasingly the real differentiator for improving company performance.
To really move the needle, effective data visualization grounded in a solid understanding of the core problem and key metrics is critical. We increasingly help clients turn sprawling data models into highly visual, interactive dashboards with compelling storyboards. Better insight on pricing helped one client improve EBITDA margins by more than 5%, while quickly seeing workforce capacity versus project demand helped another optimize resource allocation and save millions in excess labor costs.
