Self-service is on the rise, and individuals now consume information and data when they want and how they want it. We live during a time of increasingly decentralized information, which means that consumers can select the news they follow, the social media they engage with, and the data that they choose to trust, with the consequence that consumers of information can be subjected to the selective presentation of data to support a wide range of often diverging viewpoints.

The Three Cultural Dynamics: Individual Freedom

Achieving data-driven leadership remains an aspiration for most organizations — just 26.5% of organizations report having established a data-driven organization. Becoming data-driven requires an organizational focus on cultural change. In this year’s survey, 91.9% of executives cite cultural obstacles as the greatest barrier to becoming data-driven. This is not a technology issue. It is a people challenge. Organizations are establishing the leadership function — in the role of the Chief Data and Analytics Officer — which will provide the foundation for becoming data-driven.

Barriers To Becoming Data-Driven: The Three Indicators Of Progress

Becoming data-driven is about the ability of people and organizations to adapt to change. Long-established companies, which have been successful over generations or centuries, are unlikely to change overnight — the adoption of the internet through digital transformation efforts has played out over the course of the past quarter-century. Similarly, the effort by companies to become data-driven represents a business transformation that is playing out over the course of a generation.

The Ability To Handle Change

Becoming a data-driven organization is a journey, which unfolds over time, measured in years, and sometimes decades. Experience tells us that data-driven organizations consistently demonstrate qualities that distinguish them from their contemporaries. Data-driven companies consistently execute on these three driving principles:<ul><li>Think different. </li><li>Fail fast, learn faster.</li><li>Focus on the long-term.</li></ul>

Steps Companies Can Take

The pandemic — and the disruptions it caused — raised awareness of the importance of data, science, and facts. While companies may have paid lip service to the importance of data before, the case that good data is essential to making informed, prudent, and judicious business decisions have been made crystal clear over the past two years.

The Three Cultural Dynamics: The Pandemic

The amount of data that is created each day continues to proliferate at exponential rates. With greater computing power, companies can now process massive quantities of data to generate a precise answer, rather than rely on representative data samples.