Poor data management can be extremely costly. According to global research firm Gartner, organizations lose up to $9.7 million a year from bad business decisions stemming from poor data quality. As a whole, businesses in the United States lose an estimated $3.1 trillion every year — all due to bad data.
Hidden data carry their own penalties. This refers to information that is available within a business but cannot be easily accessed by users who need them; in other words they’re in a data silo. Siloed report management can result in anything from a slight inconvenience to an expensive nightmare, and there are several reasons:
- Lost Time
The more siloed data is, the harder it is for users to access them when needed. The more time they spend looking for information, the less time they have for actually analyzing and making use of the data. And lost time equates to a loss in profits, as manpower is bogged down in unnecessary and non-productive tasks. - Disastrous Decision-making
Crucial business decisions need to be backed by solid, actionable data. Having data that is disjointed and spread out in different silos can lead to poor decisions. At best, a business leader will be working with incomplete information and make less than stellar choices. At worst, they get a completely inaccurate understanding of the situation and make potentially business-crippling mistakes. - Compromised Data Security
When data is gathered and stored in silos, the chances of sensitive information leaking out is greater. When separate departments or groups are in charge of their own data storage, each of them opens up a vulnerability in the system. In contrast, having a central platform will leave fewer chances for data to get lost or compromised.
Data Management Using A BI Platform
Having established the disadvantages of siloed data, the question now is how to improve data management and reporting. A Business Intelligence (BI) Platform enables people to collate, organize, and analyze data from different sources. This analytical tool gives decision makers better insight into the status of the business and on what steps to take next in order to succeed. It provides several benefits, including:
- Better reporting
- Improved data quality
- Boosted operational efficiency
Higher profit, lower costs - Improved customer satisfaction
A well-designed BI platform offers many features: customized dashboards, data visualizations, scorecards, and more. These will enable productivity, collaboration, manageability and governance. It gives users a single interface from which they can get direct access to all analytics assets such as reports, dashboards, spreadsheets, and applications — thus solving the problems related to siloed and distributed reporting.
November 3, 2020