In a survey, the global analytics and business intelligence software market reached $21.6 billion in 2018. The survey has also predicted that “through 2022, only 20% of analytic insights will deliver business outcomes.” That means that organizations are investing billions of dollars in analytics with a minimal return — hardly a recipe for success.
Oftentimes, this disconnect stems not from faulty data science, but from an organization’s failure to consider the activation-readiness of their approaches to real-world applications of analytics. For many organizations, activation, or the art of leveraging data to do something meaningfully different in the market, is the missing piece that bridges the divide between insight and business value.
While most mature organizations understand how to leverage analytics for knowledge discovery, far too few are able to consistently aim this discovery in the right direction. This results in undeniably impressive analytics that is functionally useless.
To avoid this trap of analytics for analytics’ sake, organizations should take the following steps when designing and evolving their analytics processes:
- Compute High-Value Key Business Queries Over Pipe Dreams.
- Assemble Cross-Functional Teams Competent in Translating Insight into Action.
- Use Process Interpretation as a Stand-in for Someone Who Can Translate Analytics.
- Bringing It All Together: A Layered Approach to Activation-Ready Analytics
