It’s the consumption of analytics, not the creation, that differentiates
Analytics is enjoying rapid uptake by organizations of all sizes – but we’re seeing an alarming trend.
Many companies seem overly focused on CREATING analytics, but aren’t spending enough time CONSUMING them.
What does that mean?
I bet that over the course of your career you’ve worked with a CEO (or maybe you are one!) who likes to use a dashboard to get a quick snapshot on the health of the business. A lot of effort goes into selecting the right metrics for the dashboard – but then the effort quickly deteriorates into the CEO’s direct reports all manipulating the numbers to meet the boss’s expectations. The exercise becomes all about executives looking good, rather than about using metrics to benchmark and then improve business performance.
Creating numbers – creating analytics – does not lead to competitive advantage. Organizations that have learned to consume analytics – to use those numbers, those actual results, in order to learn and to bring positive change to the business – they are the ones who will flourish.
This is a fundamental tenet at Mu Sigma, and something that we strive to impart to all of our clients. That’s why, while our competitors continue to deliver black-box models with no explanations, Mu Sigma works alongside our clients to educate them about what goes into the model, and how it can be applied to bring measurable, positive change.