Connecting data insights opportunities with business imperatives and data related initiatives (infrastructure, management, people, etc.) through a Data Strategy is a must for data oriented organisations.
A Data Strategy should be centred on delivering tangible business benefits to the organisation, therefore it should be anchored on a set of prioritised business outcomes/use cases identified in conjunction with business stakeholders.
The following sections outline Derilinx’s approach to building a Data Strategy.
1. Three pillars to a comprehensive Data Strategy
There are three key pillars to achieving the desired outcome of delivering actionable insight to drive business value in a sustainable way:
Clarity of Business Opportunities
Right Data and Technology supply
Organisational readiness to produce and act on insights
Where any one of the three pillars are missing, results will not meet expectations; a viable business case for data will not be built.
2. Key Success Factors
Our approach integrates four key success factors that will deliver a practical, cohesive and comprehensive data strategy:
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Business driven process delivering tangible Return on Investment
The development and implementation of a Data and Analytics Strategy needs to be business-focused first, driven by strategic imperatives and enabled by Data (Supporting technologies are now well proven and do not really constitute a challenge any longer).
Visible Leadership Commitment to Data and Analytics
Data is a corporate asset and source of competitive advantage. It is imperative to ensure that your organisation's top management is consulted and actively supports the work from the initial development of the strategy to its implementation on the ground.
Accounting for multiple levels of data “maturity” across the organisation
Your organisation might be organised in divisions or departments that have different levels of capability regarding data and analytics. It is key to recognise this situation to avoid a “one size fits all” type of strategy.
Removing silos
The most successful data-driven companies remove organisation silos and put in place the right environment for data to be shared across the organisation. The process of building the Data & Analytics Strategy should strongly encourage this outcome.
3. Metodology
Derilinx’s approach to deliver a Data Strategy consists on three stages:
1. Initiation
Focused on:
- Establishing project governance ensuring visible senior sponsorship and representation across the right teams in your organisation
- Scheduling key meetings/workshops and finalise project plan
- Establishing ways of working between Derilinx and your organisation
2. Discover and set vision (Phase 1)
Focused on engaging with your organisation stakeholders to proactively:
- Support them in the identification of data enabled use cases
- Draw an outline assessment of data related capability (skills and software/infrastructure) in order to build an outline vision and associated business case for Data
This stage is structured around the following key interventions:
World of the Possible Workshop
3 key objectives:
- Understand the landscape: Introduce how Analytics enables organisations to transform their business models
- Identify opportunities: Identify potential use cases (proven or new/innovative) that are relevant for your organisation
- Prioritise opportunities: Start prioritising these use cases against strategic priorities
Typical agenda |
Target outcome
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Outline Data Maturity Assessment
A series of one-to-one interviews structured around Derilinx Data Maturity Assessment questionnaire. Key assessment categories include clarity of vision, ability to deploy, capabilities and skills, etc. This will enable us to build in an efficient manner an outline picture of the current data capability across key departments in your organisation.
Business Opportunity Assessment
Primarily based on opportunities discussed in the ‘World of the Possible’ workshop, we build a clear suite of quantified financial and non-financial benefits linked to each use case. This will help us both build the business case and prioritise use cases.
3. Plan (Phase 2)
Focused on designing a roadmap that includes both the vision and the required interventions to deliver your organisation’s vision for data across the following categories:
- Clarity of Business Opportunities
- Right Data and Technology supply
- Organisational readiness to produce and act on insights
Key activities include:
Data Audit Workshop
This workshop, held with data owners and members of IT, is focused on identifying the most relevant data sources and systems, each being assessed on key markers such as quality, coverage and history.
Read more about our Data Audit Framework here.
Organisational Readiness Workshop
This workshop is dedicated to assessing key cultural and/or organisational blockers (including availability of skills) that may inhibit the successful deployment of data solutions.
Roadmapping Workshop
Derilinx collates information from the previous workshops together resulting in a shortlist of initiatives for the next 18 to 24 months. These initiatives will be grouped into work tracks and assessed for business value and cost.
Typical Agenda for the Visioning and Road-mapping Workshop is:
- Confirming a vision statement for Data & Analytics in your organisation
- Design principles for building the roadmap
- High level streams for the roadmap
- Detailed roadmap
You might also be interested in:
Data Audit
Identifying and understanding your data to better share it within and outside your organisation (Open Data).
