It appears my last blog hit a nerve. Call it Big data if you like… wasn’t supposed to be too funny or controversial but that’s how it was taken. Interestingly, I received quite a lot of feedback all suggesting Big Data is ah… a bit silly.
This quote, from an old colleague who responded to me directly (and wishes to remain anonymous), sums up the response:
“There seems to be a lot of “mystification” in this business, which is why I enjoyed reading your blog post so much. The whole ‘Big Data’ thing is very Dilbertesque.”
Then I came across this article: Big Data is a Solution Looking for a Problem: Gartner – so Gartner feels the same way? I believe Forrester coined the term so perhaps that’s why Gartner feels this way.
So what does this mean? I think it means most people don’t think they have Big Data issues and think it’s all hype. The big V’s don’t apply to them. The people who do have Big Data issues don’t care what it’s called, in fact, they didn’t even know they were Big Data experts!
What most business analysts and executives are having issues with is the visibility of their organization. They ask questions like, “how did we go last month in that segment?” or “what if there’s an increase in production of this product and less of that?” and “what is the plan for the next 18 months?” or “what if we took that entity or cost centre out of that business unit – how do the numbers look?” and “what are the real costs once our allocations are done?” Good Business Intelligence gets answers to these questions fast (in moments) and that is a very important step to get right and comes well before Big Data.
What do you think?
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