Being digital is helping the businesses generate large amounts of data. However, this data will be of no purpose unless the company defines a clear strategy of what it wants to do with the data. And a data strategy helps an organization stay focused on its path to become a data driven organization.Today, businesses collect data not only from the traditional sources but also from a host of other sources, primary among them being social media, online interactions, market information and more. If collated well, this data could prove to be a game changer for the business.
With a similar objective and focus, to become a data driven business, Colt Technology Services, a modern telecommunications company has envisaged a five year long journey.
“We have an enormous amount of data that is spread across multiple functions, including marketing, finance, operations and sales teams. We also collect a lot of data from network usage as well as call data records which is largely an untapped area for us. The amount of data is massive and difficult to get our arms around, but we have action plans in place and the right focus to ensure we can,” said Ram Narasimhan, Director- Data Office, Colt Technology Services.
Colt is adopting a holistic data strategy that addresses all the data sources. The Company’s objective is to consolidate the business data across all functions, drive better insights to aid in and to keep track of strategy and at the same time try to bring it in order
“This is a three to five year journey for us. We understand that in order to ensure all elements are covered we have to be methodical about our approach. Our executive team are fully supportive and understand the upfront commitment that is required to drive longer term results,” he added.
Colt has based its strategy to be a data driven organisation on three broad pillars–Business Outcomes, Underlying foundation and governance, and Technology.
It’s important to look at what the business wants out of the data. The data strategy has to be aligned with the business vision. Narasimhan believes that if the data strategy’s vision is not in sync with the business vision, there’s no point in having a data driven organisation.
“The underlying foundation of data is equally important for a business. It is a hygiene factor, it is not visible but is essential. Things like data governance, master data management, data quality, data cataloging makes up the foundation of data strategy. People who input the data typically are not the ones who use the same data, so there can be a disconnect resulting in poor quality. So laying the foundations for building good data governance. We know where we want to get to and how to create an aligned master data and data cataloging.” he explained.
In addition, Narasimhan believes that in order to become a data driven organisation, every individual should know how to appreciate data more in their professional roles. The underlying data culture needs to transform. Therefore, to work on data literacy, Colt’s data office has partnered with their learning & development to develop a data literacy framework and intervention for learning and development of the employees.
Colt has divided the whole company into multiple personas. And for different personas, it has different learning modules depending on what they should know about data.
“We understand that different levels across our organisation have different learning requirements. For example, for the executive leadership, we want them to understand how they can consume data. For some functional leaders, we also want them to learn how to look at the data, or how to read it correctly, or how to be able to drive data decisions for their teams. But for the reporting teams, we want them to understand data science, data inputs, and data quality. As a result we have tailor-made the learning and development programmes to ensure we don’t result in information overloads and learning fatigue,” he said.
The third pillar is something which a lot of companies invest heavily on – technology. However, Colt’s aim is to ensure that the technology it adopts fits into its data strategy as well as the technology strategy.
“Technology needs to be flexible to adapt to the changing trends, the changes in the environment and must keep up with our needs. Instead of investing heavily in large landscapes, we are transforming use case by use case, allowing us the agility to pivot if need be and to respond to unforeseen events like the pandemic. At the end of the day, technology should be able to support our data strategy, deliver business outcomes and be adaptable to the needs of the key stakeholders,” he concluded.
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