Unit 2- BUSSINESS ANALYTICS PRE-REQUISITES

What is Business Analysis?

Business Analysis is the set of tasks, knowledge, and techniques required to identify
business needs and determine solutions to an enterprise's business problems. Although,
the general definition is similar, the practices and procedures may vary in various
industries.
Business analysis may also be performed to understand the current state of an
organization or to serve as a basis for the identification of business needs. In most cases,
however, business analysis in performed to define and validate solutions that meet
business needs, goals, or objectives
The following are the principles of Business Analysis:
Principle 1: Focus on the Product
So often we focus on the solution, how the software will be written, the project timeline,
and the budget. Instead, we should focus on the product, not the project.
The product exists whether you make changes to it or not. Hy focusing on the product,
we can focus on the problem domain instead of getting caught up in the particulars of
the project.
This mindset shift also helps you to see the impact that a change to a product will have
on the people and processes. You also will consider the value of the change before you
start to determine if it's worth doing.
Principle 2: First Define the Problem, then the Solution
We are frequently given a solution to implement instead of a how do we know if it's the
right solution if we don't understand the problem? But
To combat this problem, ask "why' when we are given a solution. Before you implement
a solution, make sure you are solving the right problem.
Principle 3: Users Don't Have Requirements
Users and Stakeholders don't have requirements. All they have is information. We need
to elicit that information and analyze it within the context of the problem to determine
the requirements. Remember that requirements don't exist until we analyze them into
existence.
This mindset shift alleviates some of the main complaints from Business Analysts,
namely the business does not know what they want and the requirements keep
changing.

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Principle 4: Focus on Information, Not Individuals
Instead of following the trail of subject matter experts (SMEs) to get answers, first
determine the information you need to solve the problem. Then find out how to get that
information.
This solves the problem of biases toward a particular area and delays due to lack of
availability of SMEs.
Principle 5: Separate Elicitation from Analysis
When you elicit information, don't analyze. When you are analyzing, don't add new
information. If we analyze information by asking analytical questions as we are
receiving information, the stakeholder will feel judged. In this case, you will receive less
information and people will be less forthcoming in sharing their knowledge. We do not
want to do anything that would be detrimental to the flow of information
Instead, apply Miller's law which states “If you truly want to understand what a person
is saying, first assume that it's true and then try to find out what it is true of”
Failing to apply this principle could lead to biases, assumptions, and incorrect or
missing information.
Principle 6: Improve the Process First, then Add Technology
Often, the solution to the problem is not a technology solution. It may he a
communication or process issue, in which case a technical solution won't solve the
problem. Look for a non-technical solution first
We should also come up with more than one potential solution a problem. By doing so,
we'll be forced to look at other options (including non-technical solutions) and avoid
confirmation bias.
Principle 7: Communicate, Cooperate, Collaborate
The Business Analysts' primary job is a communicator and collaborator. That's how you
solve problems.
Constant communication, collaboration, and getting input is critical to success as a
Business Analyst. This also helps in the areas of negotiation, influence, mediation,
presentations, and conflict resolution.
You will be much more successful if you work collaboratively with others. Don't let
documentation substitute for communication and collaboration.
Principle 8: The Business Analyst Owns the Solution Requirements
We need to adopt the mindset that we own the requirements. No one can change the
requirements except you.
Ownership of the requirements includes the responsibility if something is wrong.

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Principle 9: Gain Acceptance as Well as Approval
Get confirmation of all of the requirements prior to seeking approval. Once you've
discussed and confirmed the requirements with stakeholders, then you can request
approval from those with authority to approve the requirements.
Often, requirements approvers will seek input from those stakeholders before
submitting their approval Gaining acceptance of your requirements prior to asking for
approval makes the approval process easier.
Principle 10: Make the Business Community Ready For the Product
Don't forget about transition requirements. Consider what is needed to make sure the
business or customer is ready to use the solution.
Transition requirements may include training, documentation, and creating awareness
addition to a change management process. We need to prepare the user for the solution
before we implement it.
Principle 11: Measure Twice, Cut Once
As Business Analysts, we want to measure, cut, and then measure again. We need to
understand the problem and identify metrics to determine outcomes, implement a
solution, and then measure those areas again to see what kind of an impact the solution
had.
Benefits realization is a key focus for successful Business Analysts. Before we implement
a solution, we need to understand how to measure success and track those metrics
before and after we implement the solution.

identify the category of analytical people

The four personality types are: Driver, Expressive, Amiable, and Analytical. There are
two variables to identify any personality: Are they better at facts &
data or relationships? And are they introverted or extroverted.

• Driver — Fact-Based Extrovert

• Analytical — Fact-Based Introvert

• Amiable — Relationship Introvert

• Expressive — Relationship Extrovert

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1. Analytical
The analytical personality type is very deep and thoughtful. They’re serious and
purposeful individuals. They set very high standards, so they have very high standards
of performance personally and professionally. Analyticals are orderly and organized.
They also tend to have that really dry but witty sense of humor.

Analytical strengths are that they are perfectionists. They want things done right and
they want them done right the first time. They’re neat and tidy individuals. Analyticals
are economical, and they are self-disciplined.

Analyticals weaknesses are that they can be moody, critical, and negative.
Analyticals can be indecisive and they over-analyze everything. Their perfectionism can
also manifest as a weakness at times, as they can be guilty of making their pursuit of
perfection stall completion.

2. Driver
Drivers are the dynamic and active personality type. They exude confidence and
naturally gravitate toward leadership positions. They move very quickly to action, but
they are not detail oriented. Drivers are great with the big picture—they’re visionaries
and they see how we’re going to get to where we need to go, but they’re not always great
at taking the interim steps needed to get there.
Drivers’ strengths are that they are very determined individuals. They are
independent and they are productive. Drivers get a lot of things done. They are
visionaries and they’re decisive. A driver would rather make a bad decision than no
decision. They just want that decision to be made.

On the weak side, the driver can be insensitive, unsympathetic, harsh, proud, and
sarcastic. Drivers do not like to admit when they are wrong. They can also rush to a
decision without thoroughly thinking through or understanding the results or
consequences of their decision.

3. Amiable
The amiable personality type is a very patient and well-balanced individual. They’re
quiet but witty. They’re very sympathetic, kind, and inoffensive—amiables do not like to
offend people.

An amiable is easy going and everybody likes the amiables. You know why? Because they
don’t like conflict so they’re very easy to get along with. They’re diplomatic and calm.
But on the weak side, amiables can be stubborn and selfish. Their aversion to offence
and conflict can also manifest as a weakness.

4. Expressive
We call the expressive the social specialist because they love to have fun. They are
individuals who turn disaster into humor, they prevent dull moments, and they are very
generous people. They want to be included. Expressives want to be included in projects.
They want to be included on teams. They want to be included in conversations.

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On the strong side, the expressive is very outgoing. They are ambitious, charismatic, and
persuasive. On the weak side, they can be disorganized, undisciplined, loud, and
incredibly talkative. Expressives can talk up to 200 words a minute with gusts up to
300. They can talk.

Distinguish And Define Roles And Responsibilities Of Professionals

In Data Analysis
Data Analyst vs. Data Scientist: What’s the Difference?

Data analysts and data scientists represent two of the most in-demand, high-
paying jobs in 2021. The World Economic Forum Future of Jobs Report 2020
listed these roles at number one for increasing demand across industries,
followed immediately by AI and machine learning specialists and big data
specialists.

Data analysts and data scientists: What do they do?

One of the biggest differences between data analysts and scientists is what they
do with data.

Data analysts typically work with structured data to solve tangible business
problems using tools like SQL, R or Python programming languages, data
visualization software, and statistical analysis. Common tasks for a data
analyst might include:
• Collaborating with organizational leaders to identify informational needs
• Acquiring data from primary and secondary sources
• Cleaning and reorganizing data for analysis
• Analyzing data sets to spot trends and patterns that can be translated into
actionable insights
• Presenting findings in an easy-to-understand way to inform data-driven
decisions

Data scientists often deal with the unknown by using more advanced data
techniques to make predictions about the future. They might automate their
own machine learning algorithms or design predictive modeling processes that
can handle both structured and unstructured data. This role is generally
considered a more advanced version of a data analyst. Some day-to-day tasks
might include:
• Gathering, cleaning, and processing raw data

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 • Designing predictive models and machine learning algorithms to mine
big data sets
• Developing tools and processes to monitor and analyze data accuracy
• Building data visualization tools, dashboards, and reports
• Writing programs to automate data collection and processing

Data science vs. analytics: Educational requirements

Data analyst roles require at least a bachelor’s degree in a field like mathematics,
statistics, computer science, or finance.

Data scientists (as well as many advanced data analysts) typically have a master’s or
doctoral degree in data science, information technology, mathematics, or statistics.

Data skills for scientists and analysts

Data scientists and data analysts both work with data, but each role uses a slightly
different set of skills and tools. Many skills involved in data science build off of those data
analysts use. Here’s a look at how they compare.

Data analyst Data scientist

Foundational math, Advanced statistics,

Mathematics
statistics predictive analytics

Basic fluency in R, Python, Advanced object-oriented

Programming
SQL programming

SAS, Excel, business Hadoop, MySQL,

Software and tools
intelligence software TensorFlow, Spark

Analytical thinking, data Machine learning, data

Other skills
visualization modeling

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Roles and Responsibilities of a Data Analyst
We have already discussed the Data Analyst roles and responsibilities with a practical
use case. In this section, we will look at the specific Data Analyst roles and
responsibilities.

The Data Analyst responsibilities in an organization include:

• Data mining: Data Analysts extract data from multiple sources that can be
primary or secondary. After that, they organize the data in a proper format that
can be easily understood.
• Maintaining databases: Data Analysts help design and maintain database
systems. This includes creating, updating, reading, and deleting a database.
• Data preparation: Data collected from multiple sources would always have
errors, redundancy, missing values, and many more, which means that the data is
in a raw format. After the extraction of the data, therefore, Data Analysts have to

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 convert the raw data into structured data by resolving the errors in the data,
removing irrelevant data, and identifying the potential data. They apply many
data cleaning techniques to make it ready for manipulation and visualization by
Data Scientists.
• Quality assurance: Most of the organizations rely on their data for their day-
to-day pursuits. Therefore, it becomes necessary to get quality data for enhancing
the productivity of the organization. Data Analysts make sure that the data
collected from multiple sources is relevant to the business.
• Collaborating with other teams: Data Analysts prepare data for Data
Scientists, ML Engineers, and other software development teams. They use the
data for building ML-based automated software. Data Analysts coordinate with
development teams to convey the necessary information related to the data.
• Maintaining the confidentiality of data: In 2020, data and information is a
vital resource for any business. Therefore, maintaining data and information
security is one of the important tasks of Data Analysts in the present day.
• Preparing reports: Data Analysts prepare reports that represent crucial
information. These reports consist of graphs and charts to represent factors
associated with the business. They help monitor the direction of business growth
by analyzing factors such as profitability, market analysis, internal activities, etc.
• Troubleshooting: Data Analysts help troubleshoot issues related to
information, reports, and databases.

Distinguishing Data Roles: Engineers, Analysts, and Scientists

In order for a company to get serious about working with data, a variety of roles can be
brought in to collect, organize, and analyze the data. Considering the large scope of this
process, taking the data from raw events all the way through actionable insights, there
can be some considerable confusion in what responsibilities each data role has.
Organizations that don’t have any experience with data may end up creating listings
where they attach responsibilities to a job title that are counter to general expectations.
Job hunters can also fall into the trap from the other direction, seeking opportunities
that they are not suited for or which will not match with their interests.

This article describes general guidelines for differentiating between three major data
roles that organizations hire for their data teams: data engineers, data analysts, and data
scientists. While these aren’t the only “data” roles out there, these three are the most
prominent, and the focus of most questions about distinguishing roles in data.

Data Engineer

Traditionally, data engineers have been the number one hire for a company to start
seriously working with data. It doesn’t really make sense to think about how to perform
data analysis until you actually have data to analyze. A data engineer is responsible for
figuring out how to gather data, organize it, and maintain it, so they are a vital role to
have on a data team.

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Data engineers frequently have to contend with messy or incomplete data and make
decisions on how that data will be processed and maintained. The engineer needs to
know how data applications are structured, test data pipelines, and monitor how data is
being used. Done well, the data engineer’s work makes sure that data users are able to
access what they need, and that their queries’ outputs are generated in a timely fashion.
While a data engineer is unlikely to be performing analyses themselves, other data roles
are dependent on the data engineer’s work in order to extract useful information from
the data.

In a smaller organization, however, having a data engineer might not be as high priority.
Over the past few years, data collection products like Stitch and Blendo have been
developed to help manage the extraction of data from common data sources in processes
also known as ETL and ELT. Cloud-based data storage solutions like Amazon Redshift
and Google BigQuery can flexibly manage the manipulation of large amounts of data. It
is not inconceivable that a data analyst or scientist can address an organization’s data
needs without a data engineer by setting up and leveraging these tools.

Data Architect

As a final note, the role of data engineer has a fair overlap with that of a data architect,
often the fourth “data” role added to the three focused on in this article. A data architect
shares a lot of the same knowledge as the data engineer in knowing how data can be
extracted from data sources, how data should be transformed into useful forms, and
how cleaned data can be stored. However, one general distinction that is made between
the two roles is that a data architect has responsibility for planning the architecture or
framework in which the data will be processed and stored. The architect dictates the
ways in which data should be collected, stored, and made available to users at a high
level, while anticipating and adapting to the changing needs of those users. The data
engineer, then, will be responsible for implementation and maintenance of the data
pipeline following the architect’s plan. The duties of the data architect may sometimes
fall to a senior data engineer, or be a step in a data engineer’s career path.

Data Analyst

One way that you can think about the distinction in data roles is whether they act before
the data is collected or after the data is collected. Data engineers and data architects are
responsible for operations before the data is collected, while data analysts and data
scientists are responsible for operations after the data is collected. Just as there can be
some confusion between the roles of data engineer and data architect, there also exists
confusion between the roles of data analyst and data scientist.

For a company that is just starting out, the most likely case is that they will want a data
analyst. (Discussion and contrast to the data scientist will follow in the next section.)
While there is a broad range of responsibilities that a data analyst might have depending
on the company, a good rule of thumb is to think of data analysts as explorers. A top
data analyst will have the curiosity and skills to investigate the data from multiple

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angles, performing cleaning and transformation operations to look for trends in the
data. They may find new paths for the company to explore, possibly identifying areas
where more data could be collected for deeper analysis.

Data analysts are well-served not just by the ability to mine through data, but also be
able to report their findings to others. An analyst should be able to create visualizations
or use tools to create dashboards that convey to others what they have found.
Visualizations and dashboards should not only be for members of a data team to
understand the data, they’re also for demonstrating findings to others outside of the
team. A good data analyst or data scientist should know how to polish their exploratory
visualization work into explanatory visualizations that effectively communicate findings.

Business Analyst

One data role that data analysts may cross over into is that of a business analyst. When a
data analyst performs their explorations and creates their reports, they may not
necessarily be required to interpret their findings in terms of company actions. On the
other hand, a business analyst will be primarily focused on their use of data to answer
business questions and suggest future actions to take. In a way, a business analyst might
be considered as a data analyst that acts in a specialized domain. Although the data
analyst might make use of domain knowledge and business ideas to guide their
exploration, they will be more concerned that trends and patterns in the data are
identified than collaborating with others to enact strategies based off those findings.

Data Scientist

One rule of thumb that is often put forth considers data analysts and data scientists to
be in the same general domain – gathering insights from data – but that the data analyst
is basically a junior role to the data scientist. This isn’t exactly wrong, but there’s
definitely more nuance to the two roles than just that.

One distinction promoted by Google’s Cassie Korzykov is that data analysts’ work is all
about stating what the data tells you, and about reporting facts rather than
uncertainties. Coming up with a conclusion should not be the job of an analyst’s report –
that’s the job of statistics and a data scientist. Data analysts tend to develop
performance metrics, report what is there, and convey those observations to others,
while data scientists are geared towards making sure those observations actually carry
statistical significance.

A data scientist should be able to sift through data in the same way as an analyst, but
also be able to apply statistical techniques in order to differentiate between signal and
noise. Lead data scientists especially need the ability to make decisions about which
observations from a data analyst are worth following up on. They should understand
what questions are worth investigating and how to answer those questions with further
data gathering and running experiments. Understanding of how to create balanced
experiment designs and anticipating common design issues is an important skill for
moving beyond correlational observations to understanding of causal effects. Because of

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the data scientist’s specialization into making deeper dives, it makes more sense to start
with hiring data analysts to explore the data that already exists, then bring in a data
scientist later to create focus around the most promising points.

Other Data Analysis Roles

For a small company, a data scientist might need to be an expert in all of the aspects of
the role outlined above. But not all data scientists need to be responsible for all of these
points; as a company gets larger, there may be distinctions made between senior and
junior data scientist roles at a company. In addition, explicitly specialist roles of
statistician and machine learning engineer can also stand as part of a data team
alongside a data scientist.

Data-Driven Decision Making (DDDM)

WHAT IS DATA-DRIVEN DECISION-MAKING?

Data-driven decision-making (sometimes abbreviated as DDDM) is the process of using

data to inform your decision-making process and validate a course of action before
committing to it.

In business, this is seen in many forms. For example, a company might:

• Collect survey responses to identify products, services, and features their

customers would like
• Conduct user testing to observe how customers are inclined to use their
product or services and to identify potential issues that should be resolved
prior to a full release
• Launch a new product or service in a test market in order to test the waters
and understand how a product might perform in the market
• Analyze shifts in demographic data to determine business opportunities or
threats
BENEFITS OF DATA-DRIVEN DECISION-MAKING

1. You’ll Make More Confident Decisions

Once you begin collecting and analyzing data, you’re likely to find that it’s easier to
reach a confident decision about virtually any business challenge, whether you’re
deciding to launch or discontinue a product, adjust your marketing message, branch
into a new market, or something else entirely.

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Data performs multiple roles. On the one hand, it serves to benchmark what currently
exists, which allows you to better understand the impact that any decision you make will
have on your business.

Beyond this, data is logical and concrete in a way that gut instinct and intuition simply
aren’t. By removing the subjective elements from your business decisions, you can instill
confidence in yourself and your company as a whole. This confidence allows your
organization to commit fully to a particular vision or strategy without being overly
concerned that the wrong decision has been made.

Just because a decision is based on data doesn’t mean it will always be correct. While
the data might show a particular pattern or suggest a certain outcome, if the data
collection process or interpretation is flawed, then any decision based on the data would
be inaccurate. This is why the impact of every business decision should be regularly
measured and monitored.

2. You’ll Become More Proactive

When you first implement a data-driven decision-making process, it’s likely to be
reactionary in nature. The data tells a story, which you and your organization must then
react to.

While this is valuable in its own right, it’s not the only role that data and analysis can
play within your business. Given enough practice and the right types and quantities of
data, it’s possible to leverage it in a more proactive way—for example, by identifying
business opportunities before your competition does, or by detecting threats before they
grow too serious.

3. You Can Realize Cost Savings

There are many reasons a business might choose to invest in a big data initiative and
aim to become more data-driven in its processes. According to a recent survey of
Fortune 1,000 executives conducted by NewVantage Partners for the Harvard Business
Review, these initiatives vary in their rates of success.

One of the most impactful initiatives, according to the survey, is using data to decrease
expenses. Of the organizations which began projects designed to decrease expenses,
more than 49 percent have seen value from their projects. Other initiatives have shown
more mixed results.

“Big data is already being used to improve operational efficiency,” said Randy Bean,
CEO and managing partner of consultancy firm NewVantage Partners, when
announcing the results of the survey. “And the ability to make informed decisions based
on the very latest up-to-the-moment information is rapidly becoming the mainstream
norm.”
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How to Make Data-Driven Decisions

To effectively utilize data, professionals must achieve the following:

1. Know your mission.

A well-rounded data analyst knows the business well and posses sharp organizational
acumen. Ask yourself what the problems are in your given industry and competitive
market. Identify and understand them thoroughly. Establishing this foundational
knowledge will equip you to make better inferences with your data later on.

Before you begin collecting data, you should start by identifying the business questions
that you want to answer to achieve your organizational goals. By determining the precise
questions you need to know to inform your strategy, you’ll be able to streamline the data
collection process and avoid wasting resources.

2. Identify data sources.

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Put together the sources from which you’ll be extracting your data. You might be
coordinating information from different databases, web-driven feedback forms, and
even social media.

Coordinating your various sources seems simple, but finding common variables among
each dataset can present a tremendously difficult problem. It can be easy to settle for the
immediate goal of utilizing the data for your current purpose alone, but it’s wise to
determine whether or not this data could also be used for additional projects in the
future. If so, you should strive to develop a strategy to present the data in a way that’s
accessible in other scenarios as well.

3. Clean and organize data.

Surprisingly, 80 percent of a data analyst’s time is devoted to cleaning and organizing

data, and only 20 percent is spent actually performing analysis. This so-called “80/20
rule” illustrates the importance of having clean, orderly information before you can
attempt to interpret what it might mean for your organization.

The term “data cleaning” refers to the process of preparing raw data for analysis by
removing or correcting data that is incorrect, incomplete, or irrelevant. To do so, start
by building tables to organize and catalog what you’ve found. Create a data dictionary—a
table that catalogs each of your variables and translates them into what they mean to
you in the context of this particular project. This information could include data type
and other processing factors, as well.

4. Perform statistical analysis.

Once you’ve thoroughly cleaned the data, you can begin to analyze the information using
statistical models. At this stage, you will start to build models to test your data and
answer the business questions you identified earlier in the process. Testing different
models such as linear regressions, decision trees, random forest modeling, and others
can help you determine which method is best suited to your data set.

Here, you will also need to decide how to present the information in order to answer the
question at hand. There are three different ways to demonstrate your findings:

Descriptive Information: Just the facts.

Inferential Information: The facts, plus an interpretation of what those facts indicate in
the context of a particular project.

Predictive Information: An inference based upon facts and advice for further action
based on your reasoning.

Clarifying how the information will be most effectively presented will help you remain
organized when it comes time to interpret the data.

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5. Draw conclusions.

The last step in data-driven decision making is coming to a conclusion. Ask yourself,
“What new information did you learn from the collection of statistics?” Despite pressure
to discover something entirely new, a great place to start is by asking yourself questions
to which you already know—or think you know—the answer.

Many companies make frequent assumptions about their products or market. For
example, they might believe, “A market for this product exists,” or, “This is what our
customers want.” But before seeking out new information, first put existing assumptions
to the test. Proving these assumptions are correct will give you a foundation to work
from. Alternatively, disproving these assumptions will allow you to eliminate any false
claims that have, perhaps unknowingly, been negatively impacting your company. Keep
in mind that an exceptional data-driven decision usually generates more questions than
answers.

The conclusions drawn from your analysis will ultimately help your organization make
more informed decisions and drive strategy moving forward. It is important to
remember, though, that these findings can be virtually useless if they are not presented
effectively. Thus, data analysts must become skilled in the art of data storytelling to
communicate their findings with key stakeholders as effectively as possible.

Identifying cultural barriers(challenges)

Lack of trust

To get teams collaborating effectively, you need to establish some trust, which usually
isn’t present at the get-go. Initially, there can be a lack of trust between cross functional
teams, seeing as you may not work with this group of people often, nor have a real
understanding of their experience or quality of work. When there is a lack of trust
between the different teams, collaboration inevitably fails.

Leaders should try to align the common goal of the organization as a whole, rather than
suboptimizing their own departments goals. Start with some small opportunities to
work together to build some trust before you embark on larger projects. Finally,
consider planning a couple of meeting icebreakers and team building activities to
encourage your teammates to get to know each other.

Poor communication

It’s not easy communicating with our own teams let alone with other departments that
we’re not used to working with. Departments tend to operate as silos, often using their
own unique communication amongst team members only. But effective collaboration

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requires effective communication. If you cannot communicate clearly and efficiently
with other teams, you are going to struggle to meet the common goal of the
organization.

Try using a universal communication approach that all employees are aware of and feel
comfortable with. Promote open and honest communication amongst team leaders and
managers.

Misaligned goals or priorities across departments

Typically, we measure employee success based on goals and objectives that are specific
to job description and responsibilities. While there’s nothing wrong with setting up
personal goals, sometimes the focus becomes prioritizing tasks that help individuals
work towards personal goals, losing sight of the bigger picture. There becomes little
room for improvements and initiatives that will benefit the company as a whole.

If you want to improve cross functional collaboration, you need to devote specific time
to working with other departments and reward the successes on cross functional
projects accordingly. Make it clear that working towards cross functional goals doesn’t
take away from personal development but actually enhances it!

Finally, make sure to spend some time aligning on goals and the vision for the project.
For instance, if two teams are collaborating on an initiative, both team leads could meet
separately to talk about their vision and strategy to accomplish the cross-functional
team’s goals.

Managing diverse teams and their personalities

Cross functional collaboration challenges intensify when there are more people to
manage and communicate with. More people means that there may be more dominant
personalities that are more difficult to manage, especially if a specific leadership role
isn’t identified. Sometimes this can cause a scenario where different individuals
compete to be seen as the leader. In this case, it’s important to clearly define roles before
you begin working with other groups or departments for successful collaborative efforts
to be seen.

Distinguish solution to cultural and cross-functional barriers

We speak to many people who are working to foster a continuous improvement mindset
within their organization. One of the biggest challenges that they report is improving
cross functional collaboration, which is an essential element of a culture of
improvement. Let’s look at a few of the barriers to cross functional collaboration and

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some ways to overcome them.

Barrier 1 – Conflicting Goals and Priorities

Department managers and employees are usually measured against goals and objectives
that are specific to their function and role. This makes sense, but can lead to
suboptimizing, where each team prioritizes activities that will further successful
completion of their own local goals, leaving little room for projects or improvements
that will benefit other teams or the organization as a whole.

Solution: Organizations that are serious about improvement must make room in
the reward structure for collaborative activities. This may mean rewarding success on
cross functional projects separately, or allowing for time and energy devoted to such
efforts within the framework of the departmental goals. Sometimes, this means allowing
one department to go over budget for labor when that reduces overall labor expense for
the entire value stream. Additionally, employees should have a clear understanding of
how their work on collaborative assignments will be recognized, and be certain that such
efforts won’t hinder their achievement of departmental objectives.

Barrier 2 – Lack of Communication

In many companies, departments operate as silos, with little communication between

them. In fact, teams can develop their own language with words and phrases that have
meaning only to them. Effective collaboration requires communication, so organizations
that don’t actively support it struggle to act as a cohesive team.

Solution: The first step is to establish a common language around the entire
organization’s improvement efforts. Adopting a business management methodology
like Six Sigma or Lean can help because these approaches come with a shared
vocabulary, but the same can be achieved without them.

Barrier 3 – Mistrust

The, “If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself,” attitude is the
Kryptonite of cross-functional collaboration. Mistrust and competition between

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departments can arise because of incentives, past failures, defensive attitudes, and a lack
of transparency.

Solution: Trust is earned through keeping promises and delivering quality results. If
mistrust is a barrier to collaboration in your organization, it makes sense to start with a
few small opportunities for teams to work together to get a quick wins. Seeing results
can help develop trust. Establishing SLAs (Service Level Agreements) between
departments can also be an effective method of building confidence.

Barrier 4 – Divergent Technologies

It is not uncommon for different departments to have different technologies that drive
their everyday work. Sales reps, for example, may rely on the CRM to track activities,
while the development team uses an entirely different ticketing system. While it makes
sense for each department to use the best-of-breed automation for their core function,
this can hinder cross functional improvement activities.

Solution: Companies that embrace continuous improvement should implement

technology designed specifically for that purpose. It should be standardized across the
company and easily accessible by every employee. In addition to supporting today’s
improvement efforts, a standardized system has the added advantage of serving as a
repository for the organization's tribal knowledge, an asset that will pay dividends long
into the future.

Cross-functional collaboration should be celebrated and supported by processes,

recognition, and technology. When this is the case, improvement becomes more fluid
and results are improved. Give these solutions a try and discover the potential benefits
for your organization.

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Identifying six steps for data driven decision making model

Here are six steps organizations can take to begin deriving value from a data analytics
program:

Step 1: Strategy and Vision

First, identify your goals. What do you want your data to do for you? Data and analytics
leaders should coordinate with IT and business leaders to develop a holistic strategy.
They should also view the strategy as a continuous and dynamic process, so that any
future business or environmental changes can be taken into account.

Step 2: Start Small

Even the smallest of businesses are working with a huge quantity of data—more than
what is needed to gain impressive ROI from BI. Data is flowing into your organization
from all directions, from customer interactions to the machines used by your workforce.
For a proof of concept, decide which kind(s) of data your team will analyze:
transactional, human-generated (such as social media), mobile, or machine/sensor data.
Machine and sensor data that emanates from the Internet of Things (IoT) can be used to
build analytical models that do continuous monitoring for predictive behavior, such as
identifying when sensor values indicate a problem, and offer prescriptive directives,
such as alerting a store employee to check a low temperature in a freezer. This is a use
case deployed by Mission Data’s IoT platform, OpSense, as it’s tracking critical
operations data and the technology not only reduces costs but assures compliance.

Step 3: Gain the Skillset

Analytics is a science, and requires a more formal approach than, say, taking a one-
hour webinar. Tech professionals will benefit from an academic approach that delves
into model definition and training, and will most likely require a fundamentally new
skillset. No budding data scientists or analysts on your team? If your in-house analytics
capabilities are lacking, consider partnering or outsourcing—however, there are trade-
offs.

With analytics outsourcing, one of the biggest cons is relinquishing a certain amount of
control. Carefully review your contract and make sure it clarifies who owns the logic or
algorithm, and upon exit, who owns the data, models, approaches, framework, and
configuration. Another major concern is data security, and along with that comes issues
surrounding data governance, intellectual property (IP), ownership, liability, and more.

The trend towards the creation of a chief data officer is increasing. This could be
incredibly beneficial; one person to head your data collection and analytics department
and digital strategy would be a crucial component to the growth and long-term success
of your company.

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Step 4: Adopt Data Governance Enterprise-Wide
The continuing problem of data breaches coupled with increasing regulations such as
GDPR and the California Consumer Privacy Act are symptoms of the broken trust
between companies and customers. Effective governance of data should be a priority for
organizations in 2019 as they balance the opportunities and risks of a digital
environment. Companies must become true custodians of data, and data governance
must be driven by customer and stakeholder needs.

This requires an end-to-end strategy that includes data management and use of
analytics. Gone are the days of tossing large amounts of data into data lakes without first
applying data catalogs and metadata tagging processes. The evolution of data
management has even spawned a new practice—DataOps.

tep 5: Create an Integrated Analytics Platform

Once companies have empowered their data analytics teams, they can refine that raw
data and apply statistical and analytical methods, beginning a symbiotic relationship
between machines and humans to inform decision-making. To analyze the data
effectively, you’ll likely need integrated systems to connect all the different data sources.

As data science platforms gain momentum, analytics teams are turning to these open
source and commercial tools to support a broad range of uses at scale. Capabilities range
from advanced data mining, preparation, and visualization to machine learning to build
and deploy predictive data flows. Consider analytics platforms that offer an intuitive
user experience so that a variety of stakeholders can access data, which can help connect
the entire workforce and makes for a more unified organization.

Step 6: Turn Insights Into Action

Today’s data analytics tools pull together complex sets of data in ways that make the
information digestible for decision-makers. It’s not just about having a sleek dashboard,
rather, the platform should present synthesized insights in ways that make reporting
and planning easier, telling users which actions need to be taken.

For example, Mission Data created a data analytics platform for The Atlantic to measure
key performance indicators for its digital readership. Instead of using a convoluted
spreadsheet, The Atlantic’s editorial, advertising, and product teams were given access
to real-time data and predictive analytics, allowing them to better measure article
performance and respond to changes immediately. The publisher’s operations team can
now track their target audience and derive value from the data as they continue their
growth as the third-longest-running magazine in America.

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