Modern Analytics Platforms

Chapter 5. Takeaways for Your Journey

J.P. Morgan’s 2021 Business Leaders Outlook found that 61% of midsize business leaders named economic uncertainty their top challenge in 2021.¹ To stay agile in such an uncertain business environment, all organizations must put continuous efforts into their data strategies. This chapter closes with practices that any can adopt or evolve to improve their analytics capabilities and, in turn, their agility.

Analytics Center of Excellence

According to Gartner, centers of excellence (COEs) exist to “concentrate existing expertise and resources in a discipline or capability to attain and sustain world-class performance and value.”² In Chapter 3, you saw that lines between technical and nontechnical users tend to blur in converged analytics. A shared analytics COE can help promote this shared ownership across business units. The COE shifts the mindset of analytics architecture from one-off implementation handled by the experts to continuously evolving integration, involving everyone in the organization.

Data Literacy Initiatives

A closely related goal of the COE is to develop analytics learning and growth opportunities to attract and retain talent. Establishing formalized analytics training programs and communities of practice for all roles and levels serves to institutionalize data literacy in an organization. With this shared knowledge basis, cross-functional teams are better able to use data together. McKinsey Quarterly illustrates examples ...