Building Bridges with Data - How to successfully close the Data Gap.

Mind the (data) gap - Part 2

In our recent Mend the Gap blog post, we looked at four prominent examples of data gaps to understand what organisations are dealing with and how to start building the right bridges. 

This time around we want to share real-world examples of how our customers have successfully bridged data gaps of varying shapes and sizes with the help of Tableau products and know-how. Of course, we won't be able to spill all the beans, but the information here will inspire you to take the next steps in your data journey.  Who knows, you may even find that the seemingly impossible suddenly appears within reach…

But enough intro, enough talk about gaps. Let’s talk about bridges and how successful companies build them:

Bridge 1: From expectation to reality

And we’ll start with a big one right away. This may well be the bridge that spans all the smaller gaps. And as such, there is no single ‘one thing’ to do here. As we have noted before, the general perception is often still that having all the data is enough to solve all problems. This is a misleading expectation. There are technological challenges and organisational hurdles to overcome, and a workforce to empower with access to the right skills, tools and data. 

One customer that stands out for doing all of these things methodically and successfully is the German science and technology company Merck KGaA, Darmstadt. A detailed account of their approach has been published over on tableau.com, but there are two aspects mentioned by Dr. Carsten Goepp, Analytics Center of Excellence Lead, that make Merck successful and are worth highlighting here: 

• Treat the implementation as culture change, not just as a technology rollout. 

• Promote a self-serve analytics mindset, bring people together, and establish a spirit of collaboration.

Using Tableau Blueprint to learn about best practices, having a clearly defined concept and engaging with stakeholders as early as possible will help to set and manage expectations - minimising friction along the way, especially if you plan on scaling to enterprise level.

Bridge 2: From silo to silo - single source of truth

Speaking of friction, when different teams are working with different data, they are bound to rub up against each other. The solution? Create a single source of truth that everyone can work from. Sounds simple enough.

But there are many ways to break down data silos. Some are more resource-intensive than others. Whether you have your data in data lakes, warehouses or networks, there are many considerations around cost, speed, usability, scalability and so on. The main challenges here are technological in nature - and technology moves FAST these days. Keeping up can be difficult even for data professionals, let alone business users. They just want to see and understand what to do next and why. How do I achieve goal X? What are other parts of the business doing that might help me?  How can I help them?

BMW Group Germany has answers to these questions, thanks to a consolidation effort that has created a 360-degree view of its business from more than 60 data sources spread across multiple databases, departments and in-house systems. A lot of work went into building a solid foundation on the back end to ensure that accurate and up-to-date data was fed into Tableau as the overarching visualisation platform. Saagar Weth, Data Analytics Team Leader, cites Tableau's automation capabilities as the key game-changer: "Once a dashboard is created, it never needs to be updated manually. New data is automatically pulled in from different data sources, so users can always analyse the latest information whenever they open it."

And BMW Group Asia is taking advantage of the same capabilities in no fewer than 14 markets. They turned to Billigence, one of Tableau's many partners around the world, to help them create dashboards that now save around 30% of reporting time and help mitigate retention risk and recurring warranty issues.

Bridge 3: From data steward to business user

What's a good way for your data experts to support the day-to-day data needs of your business users?  A ticket queue for reports generated in response to questions that pop up all over the place? Does this keep your data stewards happy and your business users empowered to make the best decisions? The short answer is - say it with me - NO!

So how do you move from the us-versus-them tug-of-war between reporting and decision-making to an empowering collaboration that allows everyone to make the best use of their time and talents? The Volkswagen Group has found a great way to connect its data stewards with those who ultimately use the data to drive business success - and make both sides feel like they are making a difference. Because they are.

Employees at VW AG have access to a central analytics support team that receives around 2,500 individual requests each year. With limited resources, however, only the most important requests can be fulfilled. So in the summer of 2021, Volkswagen launched a special project to enable self-service analytics:

With 44 purchasing specialists receiving an initial four half-days of training and ongoing support from professional coaches, it took just one month to implement 13 use cases that are still in use today. Participants and project leaders alike identified two key factors for the project's success

The selection of real use cases with an immediate impact on daily tasks led to an exceptionally high level of motivation among all those involved. Establishing a mentor/mentee relationship between data analysts and business users reduced barriers and bottlenecks. Of course, it didn't hurt that Tableau was an intuitive, easy-to-use and fun tool.

Bridge 4: From data democratisation to governance and security

Just as all proverbial roads lead to Rome, all data bridges lead through IT. More specifically, through IT departments. They are the ones who build the foundations and pillars on which your data bridges must stand. And while business users love the sound of 'easy to use' and 'intuitive', IT departments are far more likely to have 'secure' and 'authoritative' at the forefront of their minds. This is especially true in highly regulated or competitive industries such as financial services and automotive. 

The traditional approach to confidential data puts it firmly in the hands of those who can best keep it secure. And their perspective then informs all further interaction with it. To build a bridge to the democratisation of data - to put it in the hands of those who can best harness its power - that perspective needs to change.

JPMorgan Chase & Co. realised that its IT department would never be able to solve all the problems of its business units, and decided to build a platform that would empower users to find solutions themselves. But in a highly regulated environment, IT first had to work with Compliance, Audit and Risk to develop a governance solution that balanced data access and compliance. 

This move to a business-owned data and analytics platform changed the role of IT. They turned from overburdened problem solver and report factory into a strategic partner and enabler of quick wins for almost 30,000 people across the business.

In a similar vein, Jaguar Land Rover has moved away from confining data analysis to a central analytics team. Their aim is to give as many people as possible the skills, tools and confidence to explore and analyse their own data. Their Analytics Centre of Excellence has already delivered hundreds of millions of pounds of business value since 2017, by making it as easy as possible for people to collaborate around data and create value from it. In fact, they have been so successful that only a move from on-premises to cloud infrastructure provided the scalability required to meet business user demand.

With this came the realisation that dashboards were primarily shared and used by people the creator knew within their own functional unit. Seizing the opportunity, JLR created a new policy-driven security model that made it easier and safer for people to share insights more quickly. Within a month, collaboration across the organisation increased significantly, further improving innovation and business performance.

Bonus Bridge: From reading about (data) bridges to building your own

It's all very well reading about the successes others have had in identifying and bridging data gaps, but doesn't it make you want to go out and lay the foundations for your own arched wonder?

Read our free white paper to find out more about how to integrate data into your daily decisions to drive team alignment and agility. It's also a great way to introduce your colleagues to the topic of data-driven decision making in your day-to-day operations and making an impact with data.