That’s it! More doubtful about the “Big Data” should read the latest “Gartner Executive Program Survey”, published January 16, 2013, the implementation of analytics and “Big Data” enters the “top ten” priority “business” of the CIO!
Two important messages I will develop in this post. The first is to consider the implementation of “Big Data” has to be considered in a “business” view rather than “technological” view and the second message is the importance of data visualization.
Big Data or the analytical of Big Data?
I am not of those who are fan of the term “Big Data” because the term “Big Data” has sense only if it provides an analysis of these data. Indeed, the data grow, are more disparate, and this, more and more quickly. And then? What’s the problem? These issues are really issues only if we are interested to analyze these data in order to make the business more competitive. And, I would add that these gains must be clearly measurable.
So what are the business interests of Big Data? When we see the whole mass of data that companies do not exploit the interest is just almost endless! A few examples:
- Consolidation of various existing CRM: typically, businesses do quite well multichannel, but the consolidation of these data to have a 360° view of the customer remains a major axis of advance.
- Content analysis of logs: the wealth of information that exists in various logs – that is to say the various traces that consumers let behind them when they cross applications, such as knowledge of consumer bounces on a e-commerce site, knowledge of consumer traffic in telecoms, analysis of habits and preferences about TV media.
- Operating data enterprise social network: in order to detect map key employees and knowledge to carry out an effective HR competency plan much.
In other words, address the Big Data from a technological point of view does not make sense, and it could be even completely unproductive. Try to convince your boss that a NoSQL database is more efficient than classical DBMS … I would say try like this; I can offer him reports more quickly, increasing the scope of data to be analyzed while reducing invoice software and hardware … With this sort of view, I’m sure to be heard, or at least to begin to start a discussion.
The Data Driven Attitude
To be effective in the analysis of these Big Data, it is necessary to change attitudes vis-à-vis the data. Yes, you read attitude. Firstly, do you know that data is able to speak? Our reporting tools have actually been too influenced by Excel, a tool that can do anything! And consequently, the end user finds himself frustrated by lack of skills or because he spends too much time to have what he wants. Yet, it is possible, by working a little bit on the data, to let the data talk by building so-called “data storytelling”. This is a feature that many software companies are beginning to set up because of the growing customer demand. Let the data tell us their story in order to better understand and thus to establish an appropriate action plan. The concept of “Data Driven ‘derives its full meaning when we come through these storytelling, from the data, the information we are going to turn out and therefore appropriate decisions! Here are some examples to illustrate this point:
- Concerning the analysis of updates to facebook accounts, the terms “break”, “rupture”, an analysis was conducted by David McCandless shows that people are “clean” in their relationship primarily during the spring and Christmas period … more surprising, the data tell us that in the week, people essentially break on Monday (weekends go wrong?). Here, the data tell us things, and this could be a source of analysis for psychology of couples and society behaviors! In business, human resources will be able to think if a company restructuring is relevant in these times of marital troubles, or, is it not more appropriate to plan important meetings on Fridays rather than Mondays …
- On health, an analysis of web consumer reviews on dietary supplements and so-called self-medication gives us directly the truth and feel the performance of these products on the human body … for example, green tea, omega 3, Vitamin D arrive well ahead of proven products for consumers, by cons, Ginseng does not seem to give satisfaction. Here again the data that speak to us and give us information that we can easily transform into effective action.
- It would be a mistake if I will not mention Hans Rosling. You can view the video of Hans Rosling entitled “The River of Myth” on the evolution of the number of births per country. It shows how far reveals incredible progress in saving the lives of children in what we called “developing countries”. There are still a few countries that still have high rates of infant mortality, child deaths may be ancient history in 2030. We must continue to monitor and measure progress. This is a real Storytelling (with sound and image) that explains the data and tells his story.
As pointed out by Philippe Nieuwbourg with his now famous formula: 3V * Visualization = Value at MicroStrategy Symposium November 22, 2012 in Paris, data visualization is an important step in the acquisition of information from these data, because it offers the ability to summarize a large amount of information using our most developed sense; the view! The data visualization is essential to summarize the data and I am not going to develop the concept of data visualization, because many books have been published on this subject (such as “Show me the numbers” by Stephen Few) and others are ongoing (like the one of Charles Henri Meledo), I would here be emphasize that the data visualization must be at the service of understanding the data and not only in the service of design. Indeed, we see these days, a multitude of infographics – which have the advantage of being beautiful – but unfortunately reflect a compilation of numbers harvested and tell a story without leaving the numbers talking.
A data visualization efficient is a visualization that provides ideas, messages that were not or hardly visible at first sight in a table of numbers, graphs or another form of restitution.
Data visualizations can in fact accelerate the “Data Driven Attitude” and discovering new things, ideas, and correlations that we had no idea.
Data, the new oil!
The Data Driven Attitude is about letting the data speaking to extract relevant information in order to transform into knowledge, always with the goal of developing the business.