Actionable Intelligence: A Guide to Delivering Business Results with Big Data Fast!

Four Steps of Actionable Intelligence

I know how valuable your time is, and I truly hope that the moments you spend with this book provide a significant return on investment —both now and in the future as you apply the model across business functions, processes, and roles, and as you share the model with colleagues and partners up, down, and across the chain.

If there is one thing that you take away and share with colleagues in all areas of your business ecosystem, it is the SWAT framework. Taking the time to work through those four simple yet highly effective steps will help your business cut through the big data complexity and hype to get to the heart of the matter: relevant, contextual, meaningful information that you can use to make strategic decisions.

S	Ask strategic business questions	What is the “burning platform” at my company?
W	Wrangle data	What is the strategic business question? Where can the data be found? What are the IT infrastructure tools and policies needed? Who in the company has the required skill set to analyze the data? How can this data wrangling be done in a cost-effective way?
A	Answer with visualization	What tools will help me best visualize the data? How will the answer be used? What report types/content are needed across business disciplines? How will standard operating procedures change? Are the right critical issues being highlighted for review?
T	Take action	What actions can we take right now? Can we capture the value saved ...