Our view of trends in IM and BI
1. DATA IS THE GOLD OF OUR TIMES
Data is your most important corporate asset. Data insight teaches you how to increase your employees’ productivity, how to improve the quality of your products and/or services, how to tailor the range of products and/or services you offer to market trends and how to increase your market share. Strategy based on data analysis offers the best guarantee of success.
War, as Napoleon knew, is 90% information. Without insight, you find yourself unarmed in the firing line. This is why information management (IM) and business intelligence (BI) are moving firmly to the heart of decision-making: the business.
2. BUSINESS HAS BECOME THE DRIVING FORCE
New technologies are placing business people at the heart of things. Financial and other business managers are becoming the driving force behind information management and BI. Business objectives determine the technological choices.
Real-time BI and self-service data discovery are becoming the norm. Advanced analytics are no longer the exclusive field of activity of experts and data scientists. Thanks to the cloud and collaborative analytics, knowledge sharing has become easier.
One fine day, data analysis will be as natural as reading and writing.
3. INFORMATION MANAGEMENT GETS MORE IMPORTANT
Decision-makers want to consolidate information, manage metrics and have a bird’s eye view of opportunities and obstacles. They want to have access to a wide range of data and sources. This is not without risk. Data and processes have to be secure, reliable and comply with legal requirements. For all these reasons, information management is gaining in importance. In big and small companies.
4. NEW ROLE FOR IT
Not all that long ago, IT was the driver of BI and information management. Data analysis was mostly a technological and complex story. IT determined what could and couldn’t be done. Often, the business was left unsatisfied. Waiting times were long, communication with IT went wrong, reports failed to meet expectations. IT was under fire. BI was the perfect illustration of the gap between business and IT.
The shift from BI to the business is pushing IT into a new role. Maker turns facilitator. The IT department provides technical support to the business and ensures the right balance is maintained with respect for good management, data security and regulations. IT and business have become each other’s trusted partners.