Identify and Empower the Data End User
The potential of operational data to provide us with insights for strategic decision making is clear. To realize this potential, we must empower operational data end users within the organization. These end users play a vital role in transforming operational data into meaningful improvements.
Operational data end users are those within an organization who are going to leverage the data on performance indicators, to gain insights to make informed decisions that drive the business performance. They range from executive leadership, business analysts, front-line managers and those closest to the processes. Whatever the position, operational data end users need the ability to access relevant, accurate data to effectively fulfill their responsibilities.
Once upon a time, the focus of data was to enable reporting to upper management to track performance against goals and objectives. Today, that focus has expanded to use data to unlock continuous improvement capabilities. This requires ensuring the people closest to the processes have the information they need, when they need it, to identify, investigate and capture opportunities. Further, enabling operational data sharing across teams can help connect the dots that are needed to contribute to achieving goals.
By providing operational data to those involved in the day-to-day operations, organizations can tap into their subject matter experts to uncover insights that might otherwise have gone unnoticed. The ability to monitor operational performance to identify opportunities and challenges in real time will lead to continuous improvement initiatives that will capture efficiencies and cost savings.
Identify who in the organization can benefit from your operational data and understand how and when they need this information in order to use it properly. Different user types and levels will have different data requirements that need to be considered for collection and visualization.
For example, take the key performance indicator for Accuracy to SLAs. Executive leadership may require a once-a-month report on that metric that simply states the percentage of accuracy in relation to the target. The manager of the team may require that the performance indicator be reported on a weekly basis and broken out further to see each accuracy metric, such as Errors and Timeliness, with the ability to slice the data by Line of Business, Region, Asset Type, etc. Those closest to the process, the subject matter experts, may require additional information in a real time dashboard for the data to be beneficial. They may require that Errors be defined by type and Timeliness visualized in certain buckets (hours late, days late, weeks late).
Operational data is the backbone of continuous improvement and in the hands of the right end user, provides a powerful tool in the form of a feedback loop for optimizing your creative and marketing operations.
By providing operational data to those involved in the day-to-day operations, organizations can tap into their subject matter experts to uncover insights that might otherwise have gone unnoticed.
Key takeaways and strategies to empower operational data end users:
- Provide user-friendly analytics tools that offer self-serve capabilities like custom reports and dashboards tailored to their needs.
- Ensure data quality by establishing robust data processes and governance models including data validation mechanisms, data cleansing routines and enforcing security.
- Prioritize data literacy initiatives that enhance the understanding of data concepts and bridge the gap between experienced data users and less experienced users.
- Foster collaboration and knowledge sharing such as project discovery sessions and project retrospectives.
- Identify the different personas or user types that could potentially benefit from your operational data.
- Share your established or proposed performance indicators along with the definitions for them to assess how they might use that data.
- Capture and collect requirements from user types. It is recommended to capture inputs from multiple users in each user type category and vary the levels for a complete understanding of how they will use the data.
- Utilize user stories – concise, informal descriptions from the perspective of the end user – on the requirements or functionality they desire, as this format encourages a user-centric approach while focusing on the “why” of each requirement. These should be written in a standardized format.
