This guest blog was written by Shanice Omare, Research Manager, Vanson Bourne
Organizations’ resiliency in the wake of the pandemic
So much has changed for organizations in recent times, with the pandemic accelerating shifts toward a more digital world. Some organizations have taken this as an opportunity for positive change by moving workloads to the cloud and utilizing enterprise data strategies that are key to their business resiliency.
To better understand the role that data and analytics play in helping organizations achieve business resiliency, we embarked on a global study with Cloudera and surveyed more than 3,000 IT and business decision makers from 15 markets. We found that organizations with clear strategies in place for longer than a year indeed report higher profit growth, with 96% of senior business decision makers reporting data strategies as essential to their organizations’ positive performance. What is clear is that implementing organization-wide, integrated, enterprise strategies can allow organizations to achieve positive impact and reap profits for the business.
Perhaps it is too soon for those with newer and less mature strategies to see such positive impacts. Identifying gaps and problems that can be resolved using data is a good place to start in terms of gaining an understanding of where organizations currently stand before moving on to optimizing data capabilities which augment business performance.
The maturity model suggests that those with clear strategies and approaches to transform their technologies are ahead of their competitors.
The Enterprise Data Maturity Model – Putting resiliency to the test
To explore these factors in a granular, measurable and comparable way, we developed a maturity model framework to assess organizations’ current capabilities and handling of data and analytics. Specific areas of the maturity model consisted of:
- Their current uses of data and analytics
- Parties championing the use of data and analytics
- The extent to which data is used across processes
- The presence of enterprise data strategies
- The extent to which capabilities relating to an Enterprise Data Cloud have been achieved
By determining their level of data maturity based on the model, organizations can better identify areas of improvement and missed opportunities. As the implementation and improvement of a data strategy is an ongoing process, this inaugural study aims to measure various organizations’ current data strategy efforts and results. Identifying gaps and unresolved questions help set clear objectives to chart the way forward in optimizing data capabilities.
The results of this research were fascinating and really highlight the need for organizations to utilize their data and analytics to best serve their business needs. While we know that organizations across the globe are engaging with a number of data sources and processes, the maturity model suggests that those with clear strategies and approaches to transform their technologies are ahead of their competitors. Data strategies are the foundation of organizations’ potential when it comes to data, but it is essential that these are centralized and governed in order to gain visibility over the entire data lifecycle.
Organizations should strive to become leaders in a digital world
The analysis of the maturity model has allowed us to distinguish the characteristics of organizations based on their use of data and analytics, their capabilities and strategies, as well as their practices that have led them to either excel or underperform. Based on the model, organizations can be broadly categorized into four main categories: Digital Leaders, Digital Adopters, Digital Evaluators, and Digital Laggards.
Digital Leaders are organizations that are most likely to be engaging with all five areas assessed in the maturity model:
- Sponsorship
- Data & Analytics
- Technology, Cloud & Infrastructure
- Organization & Skills
- Process Management
To put this into context, Digital Leaders are those that are most likely to be utilizing data sources such as customer and prospect data, connected product data and customer sentiment data. They are also most likely to have existing enterprise data strategies in place that are key to their business resiliency or are very effective – further reiterating the point that these organizations pave the way for both current and future data practices and recognize that such engagement can help to drive business insights.
Digital Adopters are not quite as advanced as Digital Leaders and could be doing a bit more to make positive and lasting changes. Positively though, this group are more likely to be achieving the above capabilities and recognize the value in doing so than both Digital Evaluators and Laggards.
Digital Evaluators are less likely to be achieving and engaging with the five key areas– demonstrating a notable requirement to improve their data and analytics standards. Surveyed organizations are most likely to fall into this maturity group, with both IT decision makers (ITDMs) (52%) and senior business decision makers (SDMs) (47%) in this category.
Digital Laggards are organizations that are significantly underperforming and to improve, they must re-evaluate their data and analytical practices. ITDMs within this group report that their organizations are most likely to be currently housing data and performance analytics solely on-premises. This alone will surely be holding organizations back, particularly when following the pandemic; the number of those remote working more than doubled and organizations anticipate having a hybrid workforce in place 12 months from now.
Embracing change – looking toward a hybrid future
Organizations are also further adapting to change, reporting an anticipated shift toward hybrid multi-cloud in the near future. According to surveyed ITDMs, 40% are currently housing their data and performance analytics in a hybrid environment that is mostly on-premises. This trend is expected to change, with organizations being more likely to shift their data and performance analytics toward a hybrid multi-cloud (36%) architecture in the next 18 months.
Leading businesses will be those driving and embracing change by harnessing data to its fullest potential. Continuing to innovate and accelerate growth are important factors in which leading organizations will be considering, if not already implementing, while keeping in mind the need to reduce both the potential risks and costs involved.
The findings derived from the research and maturity model align with trends in the market over recent years. In this context, there is clearly plenty of room for improvement when it comes to data and analytics – organizations should really take this as an opportunity to make progressive steps in this area.
Organizations that focus more attention on forming effective enterprise data strategies and recognize the value in doing so can expect to see notable improvements in achieving greater business resiliency.
Get the report: Cloudera Enterprise Data Maturity Report: Identifying the Business Impact of an Enterprise Data Strategy
About the report
The Cloudera Enterprise Data Maturity Report is a global survey of 3,150 business and IT decision makers assessing organizations’ maturity when it comes to their current capabilities and handling of data and analytics. Organizations were evaluated based on their current use of data and analytics, parties championing the use of data and the extent to which data is used across processes, the presence of enterprise data strategies, and the extent to which capabilities relating to an Enterprise Data Cloud have been achieved.
Drawing from the results of our “Cloudera Enterprise Data Maturity Report: Identifying the Impact of an Enterprise Data Strategy” survey, this series of 5 blog posts explores different ways in which a holistic, integrated enterprise data strategy enables businesses to realize desired outcomes, be it revenue, resilience or culture.
In the next blog in the series, we will explore how the 5Vs of data is critical to maintaining quality and consistency through the data lifecycle.
Editor's Choice
After reading this article it clearly explains artificial intelligence in business. Keep sharing like this blog with the users.