Many South African corporates are world leading when it comes to utilising business intelligence (BI) within individual divisions or departments. However, organisations wanting to innovate must go beyond the departmental view.
"Companies looking for competitive-edge need to exploit the real value of all the data, text and voice they gather on a daily basis," says Bill Hoggarth, managing director of SAS Institute SA, the leader in business intelligence. "They are unlikely to find the depth of analytic insight they require from departmental BI, and need to move to an enterprise-wide approach."
According to Hoggarth, departments within many SA organisations use highly sophisticated business intelligence processes, a fact often borne out at international BI conferences.
"However, this can lead to many different 'single versions of the truth' within a single organisation," he says. "Companies require an enterprise-wide view of their intelligence so that all departments, from production to sales, work with the same version of the truth."
Hoggarth says most SA companies tend to slot into the second level of SAS's Information Evolution Model, developed by the US-based company to aid organisations in assessing how they use information to drive business. The model outlines how information is managed and utilised as a corporate asset, and enables organisations to objectively evaluate their use of information and accurately lay out a roadmap for improvements that optimise business returns.
"The model empowers companies to evaluate their information usage and performance against a five-level evolutionary continuum," he explains. "Organisations first have to recognise where they are in the continuum and why, and then understand how to move to the next level."
The five levels are classified as operate, consolidate, integrate, optimise and innovate.
In order to reap the benefits of information evolution, companies must be able to gain insight that allows for better alignment of strategies and the identity of critical relationships and gaps along four key company dimensions - people, process, culture and infrastructure. The Information Evolution Model provides a framework for companies to evaluate themselves relative to these dimensions. It also offers action plans that can be tailored to each company's unique characteristics. By understanding and improving alignment within these critical dimensions, companies can maximise the value and impact of information as a strategic corporate asset to gain competitive advantage.
"The goal of the model is not necessarily to help companies achieve the highest level," says Hoggarth. "Rather, the model offers a clear path for companies to follow in working toward incremental improvement based on their specific business needs."
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