Live Your Purpose | Time Is Now
Enterprises are failing because data has drowned their purpose.
75% of organizations will have established a data and analytics center of excellence by 2024 to prevent enterprise failure.
Today’s data management approaches have caused a lack of alignment, silos, and conflicting and competing agendas in organizations. Varying investments by selective functions and people to deal with data is furthering this divide. Most commonly, the push for innovation to drive profits is eroding the focus on customer and product. Business investments in centers of excellence and data-driven culture are center-stage focus and priority, especially since they use traditional approaches and operating models that have the worst success ratio. These management decisions, followed by business transformation plans that promise innovation as the driver of profits, are eroding the focus on business purpose.
Companies fail to recognize the value of their purpose. The value of their vision. They digress from their core purpose, strengths, and differentiators. Purpose is why a company is in business, how their products and services improve customers and stakeholders, how the company should act. Out of purpose comes the vision and mission.
Is the purpose of an organization to bring new technologies into the company? Not unless it’s a technology company. Organizations today are tempted by a desire to lead in building technological innovations. They need to ask the fundamental question: How will this improve our customers’ lives? Companies are busy investing in building innovative technologies, not innovative products, and innovative ways of reaching and serving their customers. They invest in tools, technologies, talent, and then training the talent to build their own capabilities.
Creating and retaining customers is the true purpose of business.
Serving this vision is the purpose of an organization. Nike’s vision is to “Bring inspiration and innovation to every athlete* in the world. *If you have a body, you are an athlete.” Does Nike need cognitive technologies to inspire athletes? Yes. Does Nike need to be a leader in cognitive technologies to inspire athletes? No.
Companies are failing because data tsunamis have overwhelmed their purpose.
50% increase in overall analytics adoption, by 2023, will be driven by vertical- and domain-specific augmented analytics
Companies must develop the ability to contain and harness the potential of data. Since the investment in containing data is a significant one, building and marketing centers of technological excellence is not in a company’s best interest. Companies must know when to invest in emerging technologies to harness data potential. Does it make sense to invest in mature products or solutions that solve their technology problems? There is a smarter way to go.
Many disruptive business models have emerged in the past 5 years because idea people saw the technology gaps that needed to be filled. Startups in Fin-tech, Reg-tech, Health-tech, Insure-tech, Edu-tech, and every new business model ending with (-)tech, have built skeletal systems to take new products and services to market, to displace existing businesses. However, these are niche solutions with limited success and limited readiness to be scalable, to serve all companies in specific industry verticals.
Is there readiness to be successful across every business domain? No. Across every industry? No. Until organizations commit to contain and manage data, companies cannot nor should invest in emerging technology products and solutions.
We all want recommendation engines and decision support systems. Cross Sell & Up Sell. Can technology today inform whom to sell? What to sell? When to sell? Yes. Yes. Yes. Can technology sell? No. No. No. Passionate marketers and sales professionals know and learn from the pulse of customers. They own each moment when they connect with customers. They know the “how” of selling. And know when not to sell. They operate with emotional intelligence to recognize an opportunity and re-purpose their pitch to convert a sale.
Companies need the intelligence to recognize changing customer behaviors, to learn from the evolving patterns and make better decisions. Intelligence that can be applied in business. Intelligence that serves their purpose.
Companies need scalable and sustainable solutions that empower them to live their purpose.
Resources are scarce.
Time is limited. This is THE second chance because there is no third chance.
Time Is Now. We must move forward and continue Rising Ahead.
Author | Rahul Arora
Stats | Gartner Predictions 2021
