European companies should invest more in big data and analytics

According to the survey, a large majority (74%) expect that knowledge gained from big data will have a positive impact on their return on investment (ROI) within twelve months of implementation. More than half of the participating companies (56%) are already seeing business benefits from big data.

On behalf of Xerox, Forrester Consulting conducted a survey of 330 top-level business leaders in five Western European countries. This study revealed that it is mostly poor data quality and a lack of data literacy that stand in the way of potential business transformation using big data. "While business leaders understand that rooting out data-driven knowledge holds great potential for the business, the ground is still pretty rocky," says Craig Saunders, Director, Analytics Resource Center, Xerox Consulting and Analytics Services. "The ecosystem is full of challenges."

The study sheds light on the current state of big data in today's companies based on three important trends:

- Big data is the key to many decisions in 2015: three-fifths (61 percent) of the companies surveyed say that decisions made over the next year will be based on data-driven knowledge rather than on factors such as gut feeling, opinion and experience.

- Inaccurate data can be expensive: 70 percent of organizations are still dealing with inaccurate data records in their systems. 46 percent are of the opinion that these sometimes unusable data records have a negative impact on their business and urgently need to be revised.

- Data security and data protection: 37 percent of respondents stated that data security and data protection are one of the biggest challenges when implementing big data strategies.

"Although there are still challenges, the vast majority of companies are driving technology to make better use of big data in many different use cases," says Saunders. "Of course, there is still a wide range of issues that keep managers up late at night."
Challenges that influence the potential future success of big data strategies vary from country to country:

- 48 percent of German companies have problems with data quality - more than the European average of 34 percent

- Data security and privacy are also much more of a focus in Germany than in other European countries (47 percent compared to the average of 37 percent)

- In Belgium, the main concerns are a lack of user training (39 percent) and a lack of support from management (36 percent)

- In France, the lack of access to customer data and third-party data is an important issue (39 percent)

- 36 percent of respondents from the UK believe that a lack of user training is an obstacle to the successful implementation of a big data strategy

- In the Netherlands, the lack of access to internal data due to technical obstacles is the biggest challenge at 36 percent

"Datarati" set themselves apart

The study shows that only 20 percent of respondents demonstrate a high level of expertise in dealing with big data. Forrester calls these the "Datarati". In contrast, 31 percent clearly fall short of their expectations ("data laggards"). Most, namely 49 percent, are in between these two groups and are defined as "data discoverers". There is a clear difference between the data discoverers and the data laggards when it comes to data quality. Almost two-fifths (38%) of Datarati say that they never or almost never find incorrect or inaccurate information in their data, while only around one-fifth (19%) of Data Stragglers say the same. A third (33 percent) of datarati rely completely on big data analytics to make important business decisions. Only 17 percent of data laggards do this.

Partnerships help to overcome hurdles

Despite imprecise data, companies' goals with regard to big data remain high. By and large, companies expect big data solutions to change their business. This change can mean closer collaboration with customers (55%), an improvement in teamwork (54%) and better support for employee productivity (54%). "The majority of managing directors expect a return on investment after a short time. However, they are also aware that they need to break through many organizational silos to achieve this vision," says Saunders. More than half (55 percent) of respondents say that the processes needed for really good data quality are not yet advanced enough. To this end, 33 percent of respondents plan to hire more data officers in the next two years. 30 percent also plan to hire data governance developers and scientists who deal exclusively with the topic of data.

Some managing directors hope to make the desired progress by working with external experts. The study shows that 30 percent of participants want to work with external providers to accelerate their big data projects in the coming year. Three-fifths (59%) of the study participants would like to work with two different service providers, one of which would have the necessary in-depth industry knowledge, while the other would act as a specialist in data analysis.

"To make the most of the many opportunities that big data and data analytics offer, organizations need to make the right investments in their big data ecosystem - for example, in people, culture, systems and processes, or in the right choice of partners," says Saunders. "We're seeing this particularly well with many companies in industries as diverse as transportation and customer care that are using solutions based on Xerox data analytics research. They can access information in real time, understand complex data relationships and better predict future developments based on existing data."

About the study:

You can download the Xerox report on the study here download (english)