Geordie Data

The last three weeks have been introductions for many into the world of what is needed to achieve business success as far as your data is concerned. This topic is one where the certainties are normally the legal limits of what you can do. In other words, it can be a tricky landscape to navigate. All organisations have and produce different data while also having different performance tracking and reporting requirements. So how can anyone external possibly hope to help?

Data is a topic that we all get wrapped up in, the reality though is that very rarely is your situation as unique as you would like to think. All businesses are transactional and those transactions need to be tracked. Some transactions will be simpler than others, there will also be internal transactional relationships to track and understand before the main customer transaction can be completed – we may after all need to manufacture that product or order it in from a supplier (the start of another transaction tracking journey for another organisation) … The core of your business is about tracking transactions that leaves your people reporting right? No one wants to think of those relationships as transactional, but of course they are. If you don’t believe us, ask yourself how long you would keep working for your company if they stopped honouring their side of the transaction – you know paying you? That harsh burst of reality brings into sharp focus that there is truth in the statement “There’s nothing new under the sun”. Our organisations have more in common than they have uniqueness and that should not surprise us, after all how we talk about finding our organisations Unique Selling Point (USP), that one thing that is unique to what we do, the flip side being that the rest is the same as everyone else.
So, if all our organisations have broadly similar data challenges and requirements, what can we all learn together? The first thing is to establish that your need to build commonality of language within your organisation to allow easy communication about performance. This is your Data Culture. You need to be able to ensure that what you are analysing and reporting is legal and complies with your corporate vision – your Data Ethics and you need to ensure that you are storing, managing and protecting all that data in the right way – your Data Governance. From the top down you can now see that there is a hierarchy to this, but that they are also circular and co-dependant. You cannot have good Data Ethics if you do not have a good Data Culture or good Data Governance.

Since the turn of the millennium data has been revolutionised, the average user device now has more processing power, storage and capability than most servers from the year 2000, with that the way we hold, use and consider data has to change. Terms like “Democratisation of Data” have been brought to the fore and with Self-Service BI, this becomes a reality. The challenge here is that this becomes a significant problem, the quantity of data involved is overwhelming. Being able to just crunch 10 million+ rows of data means that when this happens without consideration or understanding the impact on your business can cease to be positive. Now the importance of the three data areas becomes clear. Governance – what data is available to be used, Ethics – how can that data be used within our organisation and lastly culture brings us to the language we use to present results.

The right time to start to talk to a consultancy or data partner is “As soon as possible”. Having a 3rd party who has been through this with many customers before you is only going to be of benefit. Early on you may just want to have a conversation then as you move further you may want more. Don’t be afraid to ask a consultancy just for a call! Not every client needs more than just a conversation and a decent consultancy will recognise that.
At Geordie Consulting we’re always happy to have conversations with you, so why not book a free “First Contact” call and start your journey?