Business intelligence and its importance in the Data Driven Journey

Strategic decision making, guided by reliable data and information, can help a company profit more, be more efficient, reduce risks and grow consistently. To do this, you need to eliminate intuition from your decisions. And business intelligence (BI) will be fundamental in this process.

You may have heard a lot about the benefits of BI in business. And if implementing BI is so easy, why do only very few companies do it correctly?

In this post, we will explain the importance of business intelligence in the Data Driven Journey and talk about its role in companies that are in the fourth stage of analytical maturity, propulsion. Check out!

What is the relationship between BI and the Data Driven Journey?

First of all, keep this in your memory:

much more than technologies and tools, business intelligence is a process about technologies, data, people and organizational culture that is closely linked to the Data Driven Journey.

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Business intelligence involves transforming data into powerful information and visualizations with the help of processes and technologies that facilitate business decision making.

But make no mistake: few people use BI correctly.

Understand: for business intelligence tools to deliver value, it is necessary to develop goals, indicators and strict business rules that reflect the organization's objectives.

On the other hand, when this is not done, the likelihood of a BI initiative becoming a problem and inducing a company to make hasty and harmful decisions is enormous.

Therefore, if you want to implement a successful BI initiative, you need to:

• develop an analytical culture
• create a robust data structure
• invest in technologies and analytical tools
• structure processes and strategies to eliminate intuition from business decisions.

You might be wondering what this has to do with the Data Driven Journey?

All!

Now, let's talk about the relationship between business intelligence and propulsion, the fourth stage of this journey, in which the use of BI becomes part of the company's daily life, generating habits and good practices in decision making.

Propulsion: the fourth stage of the Data Driven Journey

In fact, many companies fail to execute analytical projects.

However, this is not the case for businesses that navigate propulsion , the fourth stage of the Data Driven Journey.

They are past the pre-launch , launch , zero-gravity phase and are ready to use their data to accelerate their analytical maturity.

Propulsion x Zero Gravity

First, it is necessary to highlight: propulsion is very different from zero gravity, the stage that precedes it.

The first is very focused on executing data strategy, while the second is a transition stage that invests more time in planning and structuring.

Despite the differences, however, they are complementary and inseparable steps . Therefore, we often say that the efforts sown in stage 3 can finally be enjoyed in the propulsion phase.

But, after all, what is propulsion?

If we could summarize this stage in three words, they would be: past , present and future .

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Propulsion companies organize their past , with the structuring and centralization of data , to understand the present through data visualization and analysis tools and, therefore, prepare for the future with the use of basic modeling techniques and predictive analysis .

In other words: they use your data to understand your past, visualize the present and predict the future.

These companies implement data science and analytics into their business strategy and, as a result, have a less intuitive and more assertive decision-making process . They exploit the power of your data to reduce risks, improve results and structure intelligent strategies to gain a competitive advantage.

But, to reach this level, they invest in data and technologies, develop people and implement data driven business processes, as explained below.

Data

At this stage, the data discourse turns into practical actions, which bring real benefits to companies. But this would never happen if your data did not have the consistency necessary for analysis.

Therefore, in propulsion, data is consistent, accurate and centralized in modern unified repositories in the cloud, such as data lakes or data warehouses . Additionally, there are efforts to integrate important external data, such as big data .

But does not stop there.

In these companies, data is not just used from an IT perspective: it is treated as a crucial asset for business performance .

We explain

In step 4, all company data is already organized, centralized and connected to a robust BI structure, which contains the company's integral view and allows real-time analytical queries for accurate decision making.

But remember: this complex structure is very different from BI initiatives, located at the departmental level, that we see in stages 2 and 3 of the Data Driven Journey.

Technologies

The propulsion is marked by the use of advanced analytical tools.

Added to this, depending on the size and conditions of the company, there are continuous efforts to consolidate the integration of your data in the cloud .

And, of course, those who have already experienced this now enjoy the benefits of data visualization.

In technological terms, as already mentioned, it is in the propulsion that business intelligence prevails, in which there is the establishment of complete BI systems.

With this, important data is collected and made available for analysis in real time. This integrated structure generates other facilities such as automating decision processes and generating automatic business reports on a daily basis.

To top it off, basic predictive analysis techniques are used and it is possible that specific initiatives with AI and machine learning will occur, timidly, at a departmental level.

People

In terms of propulsion, companies have already evolved in a data-driven culture and analytical mindset.

Top management has committed and highly data-driven leaders. They support the use of analytics in decision making, execute data-driven strategies, and strive to develop analytical thinking at all levels.

To this end, we invest in initiatives , such as training, events and programs, with the aim of propagating good practices, developing analytical capabilities and aligning departments with the organization's data strategy.

Here, business teams are prepared to deal with data . Analysts are highly trained, engaged and already have direct access, often in real time, to the company's data.

Furthermore, IT teams are aligned with other departments and the creation of specific centers focused on data science and analytics has begun.

Law Suit

We often say that propulsion is a hands-on stage , in which data, technologies and people are managed in an integrated way through well-defined processes.

Furthermore, it is at this stage that processes initiated in zero gravity , such as data structuring in the cloud and analytical planning, begin to be executed intensively.

What does that mean?

Propulsion companies have data-driven strategies and structured IT processes. Furthermore, the data cycle is part of your daily life and it is common for a process similar to this to occur:

1. data collect
2. analysis of information
3. creating strategies based on data
4. determining metrics
5. measuring results
6. assessment of learning

And when the process comes to an end, it all starts again.

Do you know why?

Data processes have no end, on the contrary, they are fickle, marked by trial and error, iteration, optimization and monitoring.

Considering this, it is likely that different departments have different analytical challenges and maturities. Therefore, the main challenge of propulsion is to ensure that its processes are followed in a coherent and integrated manner by all departments of the company.

What's missing from the analytical advantage?

Propulsion organizations are highly data-driven, have the knowledge and an orderly structure to take the next step.

So why haven't they gotten there yet?

It is not because a company is in propulsion that it does not face challenges. The lack of introduction of analytical competition as a business strategy, for example, is one of them.

An analytically advanced company can have many attributes, such as technologies, tools, top management sponsorship... But, if it is not developed in one of them, it will not be able to evolve to the fifth and final stage of the journey.

And you? Are you also having difficulty accelerating your Data Driven Journey?

We can help. We have a team highly specialized in developing business analytical maturity.

Talk to us today by clicking here .