What can I do to transform my company’s data from overwhelming to actionable information? This article was first published on Quora, where you can acquire and share knowledge that allows users to learn from each other and better understand the world around them.
Answer by Ben Gitenstein, Vice President of Product Management at Qumulo, on Quora:
The primary step is knowing what you want to gain from your information. What are the questions you’d like to address? What are your business goals seeking to get? Consider what your objectives are and what data-driven insights can aid you in achieving these goals. This is the basis of the data plan you are planning. For instance, a financial institution might wish to increase its capacity to streamline home loans, which means it must collect data about default risk.
When you’ve got a clear idea of what you would like your data to accomplish for you, it’s time to begin to put it to work. This is when you need to put the proper data infrastructure that can provide 1.) adequate storage capacity to keep all your data in order and) machines and analytics that will uncover insights from the data.
The appearance of this will vary based on the type of data your company works with. That’s the reason we began by determining the problem you’re trying to solve. For instance, if trying to process a large number of images, you’ll be unable to use a data platform that works only using structured information. If you’re a business that is growing its data at a rapid rate (which is the case for most of us today!), ensure that your infrastructure can grow as necessary.
No matter what platform you choose to use, you need to be aware that The last thing you want in your life is more complex. I would advise anyone working with vast volumes of data to collect all of the information into one source of truth instead of fragmenting it into different sections. Select a simple platform that makes it simple to access all your data at one location and draw information from it. Watch your data grow from being inaccessible to valuable.
