October Update
Fall is here, and to me that means football. Lots and lots of football. I personally enjoy the college game more than the professional game, as I find it more entertaining because of the wide variety of offenses. Some teams will run a Pro-Style offense, others will run a spread offense, others an option offense, and many, many others. Each of these styles requires specific types of players to get the most out of their system. In the end, while there are obviously winners and losers for every game, there are a multitude of data pieces that can be analyzed in order to determine more accurately how one team is doing as compared to others. Pieces of information that can be used to determine who has a “better” team if they don’t get to play each other.
Data. Statistically relevant data. In football there are countless data, some more relevant than others. Hours and hours of time can be spent at a tailgate analyzing these data sets as they relate to your team, or your team’s competitor, that week. What a great way to spend time with friends and families, perhaps putting back a couple of cold ones and some brisket. But who has this kind of time during their busy work week? Yet these same types of discussions and analysis should take place within our businesses and facilities.
“The most valuable commodity I know of is information.” – Gordon Gekko, Wall Street
Data is a set of values of qualitative or quantitative variables. Data should be measured, collected and reported, and analyzed, whereupon it can be used to make decisions. Some companies and individuals utilize graphs, pictures, infographics or some other analysis method. This is a matter of personal preference more than anything. But the gathering of data, the analysis of data and the decision making process based on that data is a like a three legged stool. If you remove or ignore any piece of the process, it’s worthless.
“Without big data analytics, companies are blind and deaf, wandering out onto the web like deer on a freeway.” – Geoffrey Moore
What types of information should you be collecting for your operation? Most companies will routinely gather financial information, and will routinely use some type of analysis to make decisions for the future. But what else? How often should it be collected, and how? These are more specific questions that depend on your operation. Give us a call or drop us an email, we’d love to discuss your data needs to help you grow your business.