The future of business intelligence (BI) is becoming clear. IT leaders are pursuing better ways to integrate all data sources and democratize access to information across their organization, according to a new IDG survey.
The majority (53 percent) said they plan to upgrade or replace their existing BI tools in the next year. They’re doing so to increase business value by targeting outcomes such as improved customer experiences, productivity and decision-making capabilities. But first they must overcome some hurdles.
This paper examines the results of a global survey of 200 IT leaders at organizations of all sizes. The research explored how their users access data, their approaches to data exploration, the benefits and challenges of data integration, and the types of functionality being sought for a modern approach to BI. This paper delves into:
- Data strategy priorities
- The state of data integration
- The state of data exploration
- What a modern BI approach looks like
Data Strategy Priorities
It seems like a cliché, yet there’s data everywhere — and lots of it — in all organizations. Companies don’t lack for data. The challenge is bringing it all together and making sense of it. In other words, gaining the ability to distill actionable insights to drive business outcomes.
That’s a common refrain. Respondents to the IDG survey reported trying to achieve a wide variety of business objectives from their data strategy.
On the other hand, they’re less likely to prioritize the need to reduce the time to insights, breaking down data silos or uncovering new revenue opportunities. That’s surprising, given that:
- 88 percent of the respondents said their data is not being used to its fullest extent.
- 83 percent agree that data silos are a challenge for their organization.
“It could be that the correlation between making better use of data and achieving business value hasn’t yet been fully recognized,” says John Mellor, chief strategy officer at Domo. “IT leaders clearly see the alignment of data with objectives. Now they need to think about ways to make data work faster for them, such as through improved integration of sources.”
Click here to download the entire white paper.