Leaders and Innovators

Afterword

By Bill Franks

Very few businesses today reject the idea that being data driven and making use of analytics is critical to success. However, many do a poor job of actually becoming data driven and developing the analytics required to do so. One reason for the difficulty is the complexity and scale of the data and analytic processing required to achieve success. It is no small task to successfully capture, analyze, and act upon all of the data available to inform business decisions today.

The methods that were widespread early in my career have proven to be insufficient in today's world. Without taking advantage of the latest tools, technologies, and analytic techniques, it simply won't be possible to realize the goal of being a truly data-driven company. That certainly sounds like an intimidating thing to say, but it needn't be. The fact is that many companies have already successfully adapted to, and implemented, today's best practices. It is also possible for you and your organization to do so as long as you take the time to educate yourself on the options. By reading this book, you've taken a good first step.

In the book, Tho Nguyen provided some very detailed descriptions of the life cycle of data, several key technological and architectural options for analyzing data, and how to tie them all together to achieve success. As Tho made clear, there is not a single “right” answer that covers every type of data, every analytic need, and every business problem. That is ...