In today’s competitive environment, companies must better position themselves to act quickly on business opportunities and threats as they deepen their experiences as data-driven organizations.
This journey to analytics maturity starts with the ability to measure the performance of a company’s business (or at least within specific functional areas) and respond to changes in market and business conditions.
As companies further develop and refine their aptitudes with data and analytics, business leaders are able to become less reactive to changing business and operational conditions.
Rather, they can become more anticipatory and proactive as the use of data and analytics become embedded in their day-to-day operations and company cultures.
Companies that are able to develop these sense-and-respond types of capabilities position themselves to act on opportunities or potential threats ahead of the market, thus strengthening their abilities to obtain and sustain competitive advantage in a number of vital areas.
One of the key ways that industry leaders are able to distinguish themselves is through their abilities to gather, analyze, and act on data quickly. Companies that have analytics woven into the fabrics of their organizations at all levels are able to act quickly on emerging trends – often ahead of their competitors.
For instance, business leaders for an electricity provider in the central US could identify opportunities for investing in and harnessing wind power ahead of the company’s top rivals. Such a discovery could lead to new revenue opportunities with residential, industrial, and commercial customers.
Organizations that are further along in their journeys to analytics maturity are also better equipped to spot and act on potential threats that could disrupt their operations or pose risks to the successes of their businesses.
In fact, companies have advanced their analytics maturity to the point that they can act immediately on events as they’re occurring in real-time. For instance, event analytics can be used to detect and isolate security breaches before they become widespread.
Companies that are able to extend their analytics maturity enable their organizations to consistently pinpoint opportunities to improve business performance, generate new revenue streams, achieve operational excellence, and mitigate risk faster and more successfully than their competitors.
In the next installment in our series, we’ll examine the six stages of the journey an organization must take to reach analytics maturity.
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