Ever notice that once you become aware of something new you start to notice it - sometimes often?
Early this year I was asked to do a keynote speech to the Electric Utilities Cost Group in Anaheim, CA. The theme of the conference was "Energy Information for the Future". Suspecting that it was all about data collection, manipulation and decision making support I decided to talk about a problem that I've noticed with many of my clients and others. Since delivering my keynote address to the EUCG in late March 2006 the number of times this same problem has come up has astounded me.
I collaborated with another respected consulting firm in the US earlier this year on a project to examine electric utility failure data from a number of utilities. We were looking for failure patterns with an eye to forecasting life expectancy (or at least to find a way to predict it) for key components. We wanted to do that so that utilities can more easily forecast their future financing needs for replacement of their extensive and aging infrastructure. We had data from several large and respected utilities and none of it was able to provide the sort of information we needed to make informed decisions. Oh yes, we could make a few inferences from the data using some PhD level analysts, but little else. The big conclusion - more study needed. My conclusion was that a lot of work is needed on understanding what decisions are really needed by the business and then work back to understand what data must be used to feed them.
I've attended a couple of conferences recently, one here near home and one half way around the globe in Iran. At both the old problem with data arose, time and again. It was most poignant at the last conference - it was a software user group event. We heard speaker after speaker speak about where information technology and of course their particular version of it is headed. The stuff you can do with IT is truly amazing!
One speaker from ARC Advisory Group - the keynote on the first day of the conference talked about the progression from CMMS (years ago) to CALM (collaborative asset life cycle management) that is emerging today. Later, I spoke and noted that although IT seems to be progressing towards CALM many of the users I encounter are still struggling with basics of CMMS and getting some sort of value from their systems (new or old). In fact, many are still struggling with basic maintenance practices like managing work and their backlogs, let alone managing data to feed some future use by a non-existent reliability engineer that they might have seen in their dreams! OK - I didn't use exactly those words, but you get the picture. Several delegates (including the keynote speaker) later told me that I really nailed that one.
Technology has indeed exceeded our ability to use it effectively. Can we catch up with it? Hmmm - probably not, all the best brains are busily moving IT ahead faster and faster while many of us still lag and struggle.
In my keynote back in March I challenged the EUCG delegates, many of them senior executives and managers, to consider what they want to do with the data before they worry about its collection. You can read a newswire posting reporting on my talk here:
http://finance.7online.com/abc?ID=3264978&Account=wabc&Page=NewsRead Anyway, I argued (and many agreed) that before we can be effective at data collection we need to know what it's to be used for. It's my IT version of the 1st habit, "begin with the end in mind". Wisdom comes from making wise choices - those that steer us in the direction we'd like to go. The awareness that feeds those decisions comes from knowledge, informed analysis, educated guesses and gut feel. Not all of that can be supplied by our IT, but some can. Some of that knowledge amounts to conclusions drawn from the examination of information (facts). Those facts are sometimes fed by the data we collect. The numbers don't lie to us, but of course our analysis of them can.
How many truly start with the end in mind? From the reactions I got from many at the EUCG conference in March, from those of people I spoke with at the recent user group conference, from the keynote speaker at that very same conference and from many others - my conclusion is that very few begin with the end in mind.
It's easy to start at the "wrong" point of course. We are bombarded by sales pitches from the IT world that suggest that their "solution" will solve our problems. In all fairness, they know that it takes a lot more than just their software to do that, but they do tend to gloss that over and get on with the job of selling software licenses. Why not? That's how they make a living. Let the buyer beware!
Think through what it is you want to do
and then decide what information and data is required to feed those intended decisions. We are capable of making excellent fact-based (or evidence-based) decisions provided we have the right facts that come from collecting the right data.
For those who lament not being able to collect data accurately or in a timely manner I bring bad news. It is very likely that you also have another problem with data. You are also probably collecting the wrong data - at least until you've thought through what it is you want to do with it. If you want some help with this just ask.
