The ‘data trinity’ of successful data and digital transformation should be the aim of any company with modern data maturity goals.
The three key ingredients here are the data use cases that are important to the business, the data assets that power these use cases and the data and technology architecture that makes the assets accessible.
Unfortunately, most companies fail to meet their data maturity goals and undergo this successful transformation. The first step they should take is to bring together IT and business teams within a company to agree on a jointly defined North Star to secure the direction of this ‘data trinity’ – if they’re not aligned on shared goals then digital transformation will always be an uphill battle. Pursuing differing agendas in parallel results in slower, more costly transformation that ends in a loss of business, money and time.
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We need to encourage businesses to turn this strategy on its head – and successfully compete against rivals in new, unified way.
A lot can happen in 90 daysÂ
Taking a step back and defining a North Star to provide a clear path means that data and digital transformations will be accelerated, and the company will realize its business goals sooner. This can begin once your teams have understood what is needed.
Defining a North Star typically takes 60-90 days and is always time well spent. It adds value to your business and examines the organization’s broader digital ambitions as well as identifying the data trinity. In order to do this, companies need to map where various capabilities reside across the value chain and identify the use cases that these capabilities make possible. They must prioritize the use cases that will generate value quickly and over time. For example, with online retailers their focus is on data assets that are relevant to their use cases such as customer behavior data, order and stock data and product data.
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Companies must also to modernize their current tech stacks in order to break away from old-fashioned data architecture and utilize the speed, agility and lower costs of modern platforms. Old tech stacks become dangerous to the business and prohibit employees from carrying out their roles to the best of their ability, not to mention being costly and slow.
Assessing the architecture to match digital transformation goals
An organized and modernized tech stack is one which is more cost effective and more helpful to the company as a whole. But defining a North Star requires this to be updated and prioritized, a process that involves identifying and mapping the reference architecture needed to access and use the data assets. Following this is when comparisons between current and new strategies can be made.
Solving the common disconnect between IT and business teams will help both realize the end goal of the company and shift their strategies to begin working towards this as an end priority. Digital transformation goals and initiatives need to be coordinated far earlier than before and the North Star will align use cases, data projects and architecture to lead the company in the right direction. Define and develop a secured data and digital transformation and your business will rapidly accelerate and grow.
Watch it in actionÂ
Following a North Star on the journey to a new digital transformation strategy helps ensure that both your employees and your customers remain satisfied. This in turn means a higher levels of productivity, happiness and morale as well as an acceleration in achieving goals. Comparing current architecture with architecture necessary to achieve these digital and data transformation goals mean that critical gaps can be spotted and dealt with as soon as possible.
This effectively matures a company’s data capabilities by prioritizing data use cases and organizing data assets so an organization can be oriented towards a clear, shared goal.
[To share your insights with us, please write to sghosh@martechseries.com]
