Noone likes change, simple.
Especially when it comes to systems, tools, business data and producing information that guides business decisions. It can be perceived as risky & incredibly painful.
However, what is also true is most SME’s are not taking advantage of basic data techniques that corporates have been using for years. And are available now for a fraction of the cost.
So that’s why we have stumbled upon developed a four phase approach to Smart Data Enabled SME’s, which both transitions and change-manages the technical changes and more importantly the business itself to a Self-service analytics world that is, for the most part, tool agnostic and hugely beneficial.
In summary the four phases, which we will expand on in the coming weeks are;
1) Automate your existing spreadsheet based reports – update with one click via a datalake
Now your team has confidence in their new datalake, and time & appetite to create more benefits
2) Create small, goal based, period defined, cloud based reports for daily use & collaboration
Now you have true visibility on numbers and progress towards goals, daily, real-time and fully automated
3) Automate existing manual data processes using ExcelAddIns – cleans your data & saves tonnes of time, think RPA for SME’s that work
Now you really have happy staff, saving even more time, but most importantly have a fighting chance towards extremely clean data
4) Finally, you are in a place to look at predictive analytics
– 60% of data science is a clean dataset – (throw in marketing AI jargon here)
We know this approach works brilliantly well because we have multiple monthly clients, who we have worked with closely for the past three years, and seen this pattern & approach emerge and make material differences to their businesses.
The most incredibly key part of all the 4 steps is to not focus on a particular tool, like #Excel or #PowerBI or #GoogleDataStudio or #Tableau or #SQLQueries, but realise that your business will need a mixture of these tools and the only thing effective BI tooling has in common is clean and easy access to data.
Like some more info? Get in touch!
