'Decision gap' hurting business

A new study conducted among chief information officers, chief data officers and vice presidents in data-oriented positions released by American Fork’s cloud-based business intelligence platform Domo pointed to a significant data decision gap impacting companies’ business intelligence efforts. Organizations around the world are investing in data at a higher rate than ever, but 55 percent of respondents noted that the process for making decisions had not changed at all in their organizations, with decisions largely made “from the gut” rather than from data, the study found.{mprestriction ids="1,3"}

Respondents said that the top cultural or attitudinal challenge for using data effectively is that too few people across most organizations understand how to access useful data or use it to drive meaningful decisions. This indicates that failing to use data may begin in the C-suite, but it cascades down across every level of the business.

Domo’s study points out that the two most common explanations for this gap were business intelligence tools being disconnected from business processes and a lack of training. Even as organizations have embraced the power of data, most respondents saw them continuing to struggle with implementation because of their data tools. Nearly one in three (33 percent) also worried that the data decision gap would create significant data bottlenecks in the future. Organizations that adopt the right tools for democratizing their data are realizing the benefits of data-driven decision- making.

“We are constantly finding new ways to unlock information, but companies that want to be truly data-driven have to do more than just capture and store it,” said Mohammed Aaser, chief data officer at Domo. “It’s great to have all this data, but if you can’t enable your employees to use the data easily to drive improved decisions, then it doesn’t matter how much you invest in the effort.”

Shortcomings in technology that supports data within an organization likely points to both the culprit and the cure for this problem: Respondents to Domo’s study indicated that the majority (70 percent) of needs and interests in their personal lives were supported by well-built apps, but over half of their business needs (52 percent) did not have any kind of app support.{/mprestriction}