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Analytics for
a cognitive business
POWERING A NEW ERA OF INSIGHT TO IMPROVE BUSINESS PROCESSES,
ACCELERATE INNOVATION AND OUTTHINK LIMITATIONS
SECTION 1
A N A LY T I C S F O R C O G N I T I V E B U S I N E S S
54
50
PERCENT
Perhaps more than ever, digital intelligence, fueled by information and insight,
is key to competitive advantage and long-term business viability. But to get
and stay ahead, organizations will need the ability to access, analyze and act
on increasingly more data. Theyll need to dig deeper to unlock new ideas
and discoveries from disparate sourcesincluding the Internet of Things
(IoT), video and weather datathan they did in the past. And theyll need to
empower more people in more ways to act on those opportunities with confidence and certainty.
SECTION 1
A N A LY T I C S F O R C O G N I T I V E B U S I N E S S
71
80
100
PERCENT
PERCENT
50
50
100
When people and technology are able to think together in this way, analytics
becomes an even more powerful tool for your organization, closing the gap
between data and insight, and insight and action. People seek and cultivate more
insights with greater ease, leading to better decisions and improving ongoing performance. Understanding and awareness are amplified, and inspired, informed
collaboration brings more ideas to fruition faster.
100
50
42
PERCENT
SECTION 2
A N A LY T I C S F O R C O G N I T I V E B U S I N E S S
Outthink limitations
with data made easy
Data is powerful and pervasive. It fuels just about every aspect of your
business, including back-office systems of record, systems of insight that
inform decision making and new systems of engagement that shape customer relationships. However, few organizations have the ability to harness
its full potential.
The reality is that limitations of current technology keep most data out of sight
and out of reach for many organizationsincluding unstructured data from
books, emails, social media posts, blogs, images, sound and videos as well as
machine and sensor data from the IoT. Siloed systems restrict the amount, type
and sources of data people can access and correlate as well as curb their ability to share it across the organization. Whats more, programmed systems that
are designed to handle specific scenarios and data sets can limit efforts to discover new insights. And that costs valuable time few organizations can afford
when trying to keep up with demand for greater business efficiency and stay
ahead of disruptive trends.
To realize the promise of cognitive business, you need to remove the current
challenges around data so that it is easy to access, analyze and use no matter
where it comes from or what form it takes. You need the ability to infuse those
insights into systems, processes and apps to elevate business efficiencies and
results. And you need the ability to make sense of all that data to change how
different roles across your organization workand work together.
88
PERCENT
50
100
SECTION 2
A N A LY T I C S F O R C O G N I T I V E B U S I N E S S
85
100
PERCENT
50
Breaking through the barriers that currently keep so much of todays data in the dark
for your organization is key to gaining the digital intelligence of a cognitive business.
Youre able to more easily augment existing, structured information from inside your
company with external data, such as social media and weather data, to sharpen
insight. And youre able to understand all data in more meaningful context that is
informed by new dimensions of perception and understanding to remove ambiguity
and clarify relevance.
SECTION 3
A N A LY T I C S F O R C O G N I T I V E B U S I N E S S
72
100
PERCENT
At the core of these new consumers of insight is a new generation of data professionals that are critical to enabling self-service and collaboration. They include
business professionals, IT architects, and new and emerging roles such as data
scientists, data engineers and application developers. Some organizations have
even appointed new roles to lead these teams. Chief data officers, for example,
are emerging as powerful strategic leaders who are helping drive new possibilities that span data integration and exploration, business optimization, and transformative marketplace innovation.
50
72 PERCENT OF SURVEY
RESPONDENTS SAY ORGANIZATIONAL SILOS ARE THE
NUMBER ONE INHIBITOR TO
DECISION MAKING.9
By removing the traditional constraints of data and analytics as well as the limitations in how these roles interact with technology, you can empower more
people and teams across your organization to outthink limitations and whats
possible for your business.
SECTION 3
A N A LY T I C S F O R C O G N I T I V E B U S I N E S S
Business professional
I think more creatively.
When I have the ability to put analytics to work on my own, I can benefit from more
data and decisions based on insight, not gut. As a result, I can make decisions and
take action with greater speed and confidence than ever before because I know
my decisions are backed by a huge volume and variety of data and content from
sources I trust. I can find more answers and ask new questions using natural language and without concern of the underlying technology. I can use data and analysis to strengthen ideas and redefine existing data models or create business
models, so my colleagues and I can take action to monetize our insights. Together,
we are more right, more often.
DRIVE BUSINESS
OUTCOMES
CA S E S T U DY
Benco Dental
Benco Dental is one of the largest privately owned, full-service distributors of dental supplies, equipment and services in the United States. Unsure whether its current volume discount pricing model was
effective, the companys marketing team used IBM Watson Analytics to answer key questions, debunk
false assumptions and develop a more efficient, data-based pricing model.
Learn about predictive analytics and data exploration made easy for
business professionals with IBM Watson Analytics technology.
SECTION 3
A N A LY T I C S F O R C O G N I T I V E B U S I N E S S
DRIVE BUSINESS
OUTCOMES
Create a technology
roadmap that capitalizes on the newest
trends.
CA S E S T U DY
Learn about dashDB software, which offers a simple and performant data
warehouse with the scale and agility of the cloud.
SECTION 3
A N A LY T I C S F O R C O G N I T I V E B U S I N E S S
Data scientist
DRIVE BUSINESS
OUTCOMES
Iterate quickly on
models to identify
patterns and new
insights.
CA S E S T U DY
SECTION 3
A N A LY T I C S F O R C O G N I T I V E B U S I N E S S
Developer
DRIVE BUSINESS
OUTCOMES
CA S E S T U DY
SeniorAdvisor.com
One of the nations largest reviews and ratings websites for senior housing and care, SeniorAdvisor.com
is using the IBM Cloudant platform to manage a vast repository of unstructured reviews and rapidly
launch new, revenue-generating services. The robust, highly scalable platform allows the company to
focus on innovation that helps families make more informed and confident decisions.
Learn about the IBM Cloudant platform, a managed NoSQL database service
that moves application data closer to all the places it needs to be for uninterrupted data access, offline or online.
10
SECTION 3
A N A LY T I C S F O R C O G N I T I V E B U S I N E S S
Data engineer
Integrate systems of
Publish data, and
record and systems of make it available for
engagement where
self-service users.
data can be curated
and governed.
DRIVE BUSINESS
OUTCOMES
CA S E S T U DY
11
SECTION 4
A N A LY T I C S F O R C O G N I T I V E B U S I N E S S
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SECTION 4
A N A LY T I C S F O R C O G N I T I V E B U S I N E S S
13
SECTION 5
A N A LY T I C S F O R C O G N I T I V E B U S I N E S S
VA L U E
A pragmatic data and analytics strategy is a prerequisite to transform your organization and become a cognitive business, giving you the solid foundation you need
to build trust in your data and confidence in the data-driven decisions you make.
From this strategic groundwork, you can expand the depth and breadth of your
data sources through cognitive capabilities. IBM has developed a maturity model
to help you assess your current strategy based on the initiatives you have in place
and your overall approach to data within your organization. Understanding where
you are on this curve can help you evaluate how much business value your strategy
delivers now and how to evolve it to realize the full potential of cognitive business.
COST REDUCTION
OPERATIONS
MODERNIZATION
INSIGHT DRIVEN
TRANSFORMATION
SELF-SERVICE
ANALYTICS
NEW BUSINESS
MODELS
M AT U R I T Y
The business value of data increases as you become more sophisticated in your use of data
(storing transaction data versus using it to fuel a mobile app that generates real-time personalization offers for customers) and your approach to it (moving from siloed self-service
analytics to integrated self-service on a common data platform).
14
SECTION 5
A N A LY T I C S F O R C O G N I T I V E B U S I N E S S
15
FOOTNOTES
1 TechCrunch The Battle Is For The Customer Interface, Tom Goodwin, March 3, 2015, https://techcrunch.com/2015/03/03/in-the-ageof-disintermediation-the-battle-is-all-for-the-customer-interface/
2 IBM, Redefining Boundaries: Insights from the Global C-suite Study, November 2015.
3 Harvard Business Review, Competing in the Insight Economy, 2015.
4 Gartner press release: Gartner Says Its Not Just About Big Data; Its What You Do with It: Welcome to the Algorithmic Economy,
October 5, 2015, http://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/3142917
5 Harvard Business Review, Competing in the Insight Economy, 2015.
6 IBM Research
7 IBM, Growing up hybrid, February 2016.
8 Harvard Business Review, Competing in the Insight Economy, 2015.
9 Harvard Business Review, Competing in the Insight Economy, 2015.