Data analytics is rapidly emerging as a key to success in the new digital economy. To capitalize on this opportunity, organizations need to rethink the status quo and invest accordingly.
When it comes to organizations and their data analytics journeys, a quote often attributed to Mark Twain seems especially appropriate: “The secret to getting ahead is getting started.”
While data analytics is rapidly emerging as a key to business success in the new digitally driven economy, many organizations are just exploring or in the early stages of their data analytics journeys. Basically, many people are just kicking the tires of the data analytics vehicle. And that’s a problem, because you can’t get anywhere with data analytics until you are actively using data analytics.
A survey by IDG Research Services suggests that just 36 percent of organizations have data analytics projects in progress. Most of the rest of the survey respondents fall into the stages of exploring, planning or pilot testing analytics projects. And then there are the laggards—the 10 percent of organizations who don’t have data analytics on their radar.[i]
These numbers need to change. Based on the business results organizations see as they gain competitive advantages through data analytics, it’s extremely important to get started down the path to data analytics with the ultimate goal of digital transformation.
About those business results: An extensive survey of IT and business decision-makers, commissioned by Dell and conducted by TNS, found that organizations actively using big data, cloud and mobility technologies are growing up to 53 percent faster than the laggards of the world.[ii]
In another large survey, this one of more than 4,000 business leaders around the world, Vanson Bourne and Dell Technologies found that more than half of respondents (52 percent) have already experienced significant disruption to their industries as a result of digital technologies, and more than three-fourths of respondents (78 percent) consider digital startups as a threat, either now or in the future.[iii]
Clearly, digital transformation is not just an opportunity; it’s also a threat—to those organizations that don’t get started in a timely manner. So, what’s holding organizations back?
The Vanson Bourne/Dell Technologies survey found that the top barriers to progress are:
- Insufficient budget and resources
- Lack of executive support
- Inadequate expertise and skills
- Technologies that can’t work at the speed of business
- Data privacy and security concerns
How can your organization overcome these barriers? The first step is to recognize that the digital transformation you make today is the key to future competitiveness. The next step is to rethink the status quo and invest accordingly.
The report from Vanson Bourne and Dell Technologies boils the advice down to a simple, clear sentence: “Organizations, at every stage, will need to couple the latest and greatest in technology with a shift in mindset, an investment in their staff and a bold approach which includes rethinking business models.”
If you follow that advice, your organization will be positioned to compete more effectively in the digital economy. That’s what happens when you put the strategies and technologies in place to capitalize fully on your digital assets—the massive amounts of data you generate every day.
As the Vanson Bourne/Dell Technologies report notes: “Businesses of every kind still have a chance to leap ahead. Change, if embraced correctly, can open a world of opportunity.”
The key is to get started.
[i] IDG Research Services. IDG TechPulse survey. Jan. 10, 2016.
[ii] “Global Technology Adoption Index 2015.” A survey commissioned by Dell and conducted by TNS.
[iii] Dell Technologies. “Embracing a Digital Future.” 2016.