It's not hard to see that yet-another enterprise IT wave is bearing down upon us quickly: and that's big data.
If you need a quick intro, you might be interested in this recent piece in Bloomberg Business week, this short intro video from our own Scott Yara, or perhaps some of the other posts I've done on the subject.
Unlike most IT waves, big data is best seen as an opportunity instead of a challenge: it's a relatively new way of generating value from massive amounts of information.
The value chain is new as well: data scientists amass mountains of data from multiple sources, internally and externally, work diligently to unlock key insights, and then do it all over again.
Huge and compelling value can result. But relatively few IT organizations are equipped to make a massive kick-start investment in these new capabilities: time, people and money.
As I meet with IT leaders, I'm now routinely probing them a bit as to how they see the situation, and what they're thinking of doing.
And -- surprise -- many folks are being amazingly pragmatic in their responses.
Business Motivations vs. IT Motivations
Most business leaders I know want data and insight: fresh, meaningful and actionable. Better insights mean better decisions made faster. Hard to argue with the value proposition here.
The goal of big data is to expand that core value proposition by orders of magnitude. Start with vastly more data -- from multiple sources inside and outside the company. It's not only real-time data, but long histories as well in many cases.
Add data scientists who use a dizzying variety of tools to unlock key insights. Give them a powerful self-service environment that lets them get at the data in flexible and unique ways. Create collaborative processes and workflows that speed the time from insight to advantage.
To an IT traditionalist, this might look like a field-of-dreams chock full of fairies, unicorms and rainbows.
Where is the business case? The project plan? The exact sizing and performance requirements? The specific applications that will be used?
You wonder how they reacted to the internet when it came along. Cognitive dissonance results on both sides.
From One Extreme To Another
If you follow me, you know I have a lot of interesting discussions with larger IT users. And, when it comes to this topic, I can easily put them on a continuum.
When you meet a mature and proficient "big data" shop, you'll sometimes find that the supporting IT function is entirely funded by the analytics team -- and often reports directly to them. It's not just another thing that the IT guys do; it's why they are employed in the first place.
Alignment between business need and IT response is, well, rather brutally clear.
At the other far end, you'll sometimes find a rather regressive point of view that all these people analyzing and using data to make business decisions is a "serious problem" -- too many databases, too many resources being used -- and, that somehow, IT should get all those business users to stop creating so many databases, and start consolidating towards an uber-datamart designed and delivered by a yet-unnamed and unproven internal IT function.
Sure, standardization and rationalization is generally a good thing, but at the expense of people getting things done? I don't think so.
Any IT function that believes their role in life is to be independently responsible for rationing IT consumption by knowledgeable business professionals is heading for an unhappy event down the road ...
If those are the extremes, what's in the middle? And what are smart IT leaders doing to move their organizations along the path?
Gradual Enablement Vs. Big Bang
When I meet with a very proficient big data shop, I always am curious -- how did you get where you are today? And you'll usually hear a story of modest beginnings, a few initial breakthroughs, followed by a growing appetite for what big data can do, and -- naturally -- progressively more investment in the supporting IT function.
But how did it *really* get started? -- I ask.
Usually, it boiled down to a named business leader or two who had a few really bright data junkies, and a smattering of IT resources to start the party. It was the seed in fertile soil that grew over time.
And that's a pattern a smart IT leader can look for -- and enable -- without betting the farm or going to war with finance.
The Good News
Just about every IT leader I meet acknowledges that big data -- in all its forms -- is becoming more important to the business (or research!) users over time. That's not a hard insight to arrive at.
What I'm starting to see, though, is more progressive IT leaders doing what they can to foster and nurture any promising big analytics or big content initiatives bubbling out of their user community.
They don't force the same justification for their needs as say, an SAP upgrade. They try to make the resources flexible and easy to use. They don't enforce draconian corporate standards on data sources, or use of analytical tools. They don't use standard project methodologies and mindsets.
If they've got a bit more leeway, they'll create a supporting environment that doesn't look like it's still 1998 -- modern data management tools, self-service environments, sort of an analytics-as-a-service or massive-data-as-service for the business users. They sometimes assign someone to look after this group's needs and do the best possible with the resources available.
In essence, they're creating the fertile soil that these promising new initiatives need to blossom and grow.
A Bigger Perspective?
Just about everybody in IT sees the potential for their role to be perceived as a value-generator instead of just another cost center. I believe that big data -- in all its forms -- represents one of those opportunities to move from one side of the ledger to the other.
But the real world has complex constraints: budget, resources, politics, competing priorities. It can be so easy for IT managers to simply lay back and wait for a Really Big And Important Project to be tossed over the wall.
What makes me optimistic is that I see clear signs of many IT leaders not waiting for this to happen.
They realize that there's a new source of value generation looming on the horizon. They're teaming up with the early business advocates, and creating modest capabilities that gives the organization the opportunity to learn and expand over time.
I hope to see more of it before long.
By: Chuck Hollis
