Your data investments should help your organisation see; they could be doing the opposite. This introduction to our Data Strategy and Platforms practice explores why.
How well can you see?
I don’t mean with glasses, or contacts, or even with a telescope or binoculars. I’m asking about your organisation, your company, your business, or perhaps your government department. How well can you see? Do you know what you need to see? And can you see enough of it?
These are some downright peculiar questions, but it will all snap into focus in a moment or two.
To be effective, an organisation needs to be able to “see”, that is, it needs to be able to understand – at a collective level – what is going on in the outside world. It also needs to know if whatever that organisation is set up to do is actually happening, how much it’s happening, and (if so) if it’s having the intended effect. This is a relatively modest challenge for small or tactical operations, but rapidly becomes formidable as the domain to be surveyed scales.
What are you looking at, and how do you look?
What, then, is our organisation looking at? And what, indeed, is the ocular apparatus involved – the “eyes”, so to speak?
The subject of our organisation’s gaze could be anything – organisational goals are as varied as the range of different organisations, of course – but the medium, the flux, is consistent. I’m talking about “data”. There are plenty of watery metaphors for the way data behaves and is organised (lakes, pipelines, and more), but let’s think of it more like light, or even more abstractly as energy, moving through and throughout a universal phlogiston as waves (which are, I admit, also a watery metaphor!). And if data can be thought of as light, information being broadcast throughout a mysterious yet universal substrate, then what better to receive and understand it than the spectacular evolutionary miracle of the Eye.
Let’s peel back this metaphor further and see if it yields any clarity.
Whose eyes are you relying on?
Insofar as an organisation has “eyes” at all, do we trust what they see? Are they “eyes” our sales team? Our dev team? IT? The C-suite? The cleaners? All will see something, but all will see it imperfectly – each has a limited vantage point, “restricted view” seats in the stadium of the world. Developing a holistic perspective and deep insight focused on the value the organisation exists to deliver is key, and to do that, our “all seeing eye” must be of the 20/20 variety.
Great data platforms achieve this clarity for organisations, whoever in that organisation needs to “see”, and whatever they need to look at. Effective data platforms are a hard engineering and business problem, and an ever-changing one, and therefore need sound strategy. Too many small tactical decisions without a coherent guiding strategy inevitably yields a hideous multi-eyed beast insensibly confused by what each malformed eye sees – perhaps something akin to the perfectly-named monstrous and terrible “Beholder” that is anything but beautiful.
Designing the perfect eye
We at Softwire have seen (naturally enough!) the results of – and developed in collaboration with clients – many successful data strategies, and many clear-eyed data platforms. There’s plenty to consider in designing the perfect “eye”. Is it secure, and resistant to intrusion and irritation? Does it see, in a timely fashion, what you need it to see, and without rose-tinted lenses? Can it see at scale – can it see both near and far, and in many directions? Can it see deeply, as well as near or far – not merely an unblinking Eye of Sauron, knowing that the One Ring is out there somewhere, but unsure exactly where? And once it has spotted something of interest, can this all-seeing-eye see into the past, too? Can it see through the superficial to an accurate appreciation of an object’s history and lineage – where and from whom did this thing come from, and why? And how about an eye that can even see into the future: an eye that can predict what will happen, as well as reliably inform on what has happened? All of these are vital considerations for a successful data strategy, and for a truly valuable long-term data platform to result.
Unified visibility is the goal
The central goal, therefore, of a strategically-designed data platform, is to provide unified, comprehensive visibility. A tactical, one might say even myopic approach to data investment without a coherent strategy wastes resources and impedes good decision-making. Rather than multiple disconnected data sources, and conflicting or incomplete information, the over-arching objective is for a single, clear-sighted capability, able to see “near and far”, understand historical context, and ultimately to predict future trends. Thinking of data in terms of what you can see, rather than in terms of something you have to manage, is the useful perspective I’m suggesting you take.
At Softwire, we may not have seen C-Beams glittering in the dark near the Tannhauser gate, but we have seen what works, and we’ve got a watchful eye on the future too. We always love to share and implement these visions with our clients: we call it our Data Strategy & Platforms practice – but, with a wink and a twinkle, you and I can call it the eye division if you like, and definitely not the water-works. Come and take a look!
