The most talked about term, after cloud computing, is big data. There is much discussion about big data and its opportunities for enterprises. As this a relatively new concept, there is also talk about the so called shortage of ‘data analysts’ which poses a challenge for those who are looking to make the most from the opportunities of big data. But is this really the case? Let’s take a closer look and find out
‘Big data and the opportunities it presents for businesses’ is the most commonly discussed topic. However, at the same time there are voices of caution. There seems to be a perception that without data analysts in good supply, big data will not deliver to its fullest potential. There is a growing perception that there is a shortage of trained individuals who can accurately analyse and harness the insights generated by big data.
Is this really so?
Business analysts the need of the hour
The basic assumption is that companies do not understand the data science required and that they lack the services of data scientists to handle big data. Critics argue that the investment in big data will not pay off if only a handful of people can take the advantage of it.
But let’s pause and consider here- are really data scientists the only way enterprises can get any value out of their data? We seem to have assumed that they are the only ones with special powers to make sense of this great wealth of information.
On a closer look, we see that enterprises today are already equipped with the resources to tackle big data – in the form of business analysts. These are the guys who figure out the market and come up with exact strategies to take a business forward. Instead of creating a lot of needless buzz about ‘big data, enterprises need to focus on the skills of already available analysts to derive value out of big data.
Intelligent technology…
Big data business BI (business intelligence) vendors have the responsibility to deliver easy to use and powerful applications with built in decisioning intelligence which enables the users, machines and devices to make decisions and implement best possible solutions in real time. This is the time when the industry needs simple and complete solutions instead of individualized solutions that are put together by PhD holders.
The way to understand Big Data lies in the solutions themselves. That would mean getting applications that are equipped with the tools and intelligence of data scientists. The tools themselves should be able to manage the
The solutions themselves have to hold the key to understanding data. This means applications that come pre-loaded with the intelligence of data scientists, so that enterprises don’t have to hire them. The tools need to do the heavy lifting so that any line-of-business manager can use them easily and effectively.
A data solution is the key to most problems in a business and we have to remember that big data is not only about measuring and analyzing data flow. Big data has the potential to identify business problems and then figure out a way as to how data solution can solve the problem intuitively and
Most business problems can be solved with a data solution. We should never lose sight of the fact that Big Data is not about sizing up and measuring data flows. It’s about identifying the business problem and then figuring out how data can help solve it in a way that is highly intuitive and visual; so that any business user can easily find the information that is most relevant to them, when they need it, where they need it, and how they need it so they can take the best course of action.
The future is here…
Increasingly, enterprises are starting to demand new, easy-to-use Big Data applications that remove the complexity for the average business person. Recently, John Ginder, the Big Data analytics leader at Ford Motor Co, bemoaned the fact that there are still very few turn-key tools to help big companies do Big Data.
He explained that his group mostly relies on open source tools, like Hadoop, for managing large sets of data and that while these tools are powerful, they require highly skilled professionals to operate them. He dreams of a world where even the most non-technical business analysts can use Big Data tools to ask the right questions and make the best decisions, where data specialists—but not computer scientists—could go in and interrogate it and look for correlations that they might not have been able to look at before.
In reality, we may be closer than Mr. Ginder thinks. There is already a movement afoot to create Big Data solutions that empower all users to make timely, intelligent, data-driven decisions by dramatically reducing the complexity of analytical applications.
If Big Data is to reach its full potential, it has to be as easy and intuitive as surfing the Web. We need powerful visualisation tools that can continuously do the analytics and then display insights through intuitive graphical dashboards that make decision making a snap. There’s no doubt Big Data holds the key to transformational business change, but to extract its full benefits, we must find solutions that make data insights available for all.
