Big data analysis is transforming the way we do business and helping companies increase productivity. A huge range of reporting and analysis software has come on the market in recent years, empowering employers to have a greater understanding of their staff and processes.
Analytics for business has become an industry in its own right with professionals striving to understand how corporations function and how they can improve their efficiency levels.
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The unstoppable growth of business analytics
As more and more of our work lives move online, companies are generating a tremendous amount of data on a daily basis. Using specialist software, this data can be analyzed to identify problems with processes, staff, manufacturing practices or other internal procedures.
The growth of business analytics has been exponential over the last 20 years – and shows no signs of slowing any time soon. Indeed, a study reported on by Forbes, indicates that 71% of all businesses globally expect to increase investment in data and analytics in the future while 57% already have some form of Data Officer (responsible for their data analysis).
Why companies use data analysis
There are multiple reasons why a company might want to understand its data better, however, the most common are:
Driving better cost efficiencies: Understanding company data can help business owners identify areas where their company is losing money or not performing at optimum levels. Issues can be as varied as recognizing staff problems or discovering complications in production and manufacture. Data analysis allows the investigation of a company in incredible detail to isolate glitches.
Identifying and improving strategy or changes: The insights provided by data analysis enable companies to find improved working strategies or processes that can lead to improved productivity. For example, by closely studying a company’s delivery process, managers might find ways to cut costs or improve distribution channels.
Improving employee efficiency: With so much of our work being done on computers, it’s become considerably easier for companies to monitor their employees. There is now a vast range of management and analytics software available that can enhance the quality of your products and services and also make your employees’ tasks easier, more streamlined and – increasingly – more automated.
Improving employee communications: Unified Communications is a relatively new term describing software used to study how employees communicate with one another and clients – whether that be through Voice over IP (VoIP) tools, video chat, email or text. Consulting a unified communications report will let you identify any problems in your company’s communications structure and improve how your employees communicate with each other.
The increasing role of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in data analysis
Of course, with so much data to analyze, it would be impossible for humans to extrapolate results on their own so artificial intelligence is playing an increasingly more important role in the study of data – particularly of big data.
AI is incredibly efficient at spotting patterns in information – far better than any human – and is now powerful enough to draw conclusions and generate results on its own. Moreover, AI is now also used to predict likely outcomes or scenarios from data, allowing companies to peek into the future and choose successful courses of action.
Artificial Intelligence can also unify data from many different sources, to give a complete picture of a company. Indeed, modern AI is so potent it can even amalgamate voice data collected in calls.
If you run a company and feel you might have efficiency or productivity issues, you should consider installing data analysis software to get a better understanding of where things might be going wrong. Analyzing data will give you a fuller picture than any other technique and offer solutions to help you iron out problems.
