Platform Analytics: A New Paradigm of Data Value Creation

The platform movement has taken the establishment by surprise, impulsively pervading every industry and rewriting the rules of engagement for business. The pace is being fueled by partnering with a previously untapped but high-yield resource: the talents and contributions of users and customers themselves. The concept of this business model revolves around the use of "technology to connect people, organizations, and resources in an interactive ecosystem in which amazing amounts of value can be created and exchanged" (Parker, Van Alstyne, & Choudary). Amazon draws in millions of consumers seduced by low prices, a fluid shopping experience, and door deliveries within a day or two. The abundance of buyers and the opportunity to make a buck then attracts more sellers, increasing product diversity and driving down prices even more as supply increases, which turns the heads of even more consumers. And the cycle continues as the network expands. Other platforms have been following the same model. Facebook users produce and post more content than any other collective body. App and software engineers continue creating a spectrum of both useful and time-wasting products for mobile phones and other hand-held devices, all for the development and distraction of society.

So, with technology as the primary vehicle and network effects as the engine, many consumers are now taking the wheel (quite literally with Uber) to become service providers and content creators, rather than simply loyal users. This recasting of the masses from bystander to benefactor has empowered them to create more value for humanity than ever thought possible under the old regime. The implications of using this same model when applied to analytics within business organizations will be powerful. Most companies have leaned heavily on technology departments and analytics functions to deliver curated data to the entire organization in finished form, usually as reports and dashboards. With demand for relevant real-time information increasing at break-neck speed, the data delivery channels within most organizations are not keeping up. And although the idea of "self-service analytics" is not new, many companies today still struggle to enact the vision. Tom Davenport and Jeanne Harris call the companies "sophisticated" today who "get users (rather than analytical professionals) to create" actionable intelligence. Self-service adoption is slow, however, and the mechanisms needed to proliferate and manage good data quickly to co-creators within the company are missing or sub-par. What's needed now is more time devoted by data stewards and business intelligence groups defining and delivering sanctioned data sets in a platform environment, rather than pumping out reports and dashboards. The right platform will allow the integration, reporting, and analyzing of information from all areas of the company to happen by enlisting the workforce as co-creators, expanding the intelligence and learning of the entire company...fast.

Imagine an environment when any employee from supply chain, for example, is capable of combining certified product unit sales data, product web page hits, social media insights, and product forecasts in a single view, all in a matter of minutes. In an age of artificial intelligence and machine learning, even this might seem antiquated and simple. But the blunt reality is, most companies haven't even come this far. The value of platform analytics comes from opening up currently unavailable and compartmentalized data into one reporting tool, and allowing every user to create and publish reports and dashboards. As valuable insights become readily available by these new contributors, the data consumers in the company can search for and "like" or subscribe to relevant content, which will then appear on their personal data "control tower." The more popular a visual, report, or entire dashboard is, the higher the scrutiny by users throughout the company and the more well-defined it becomes. Those who publish data insights are not only rewarded by the ability to make better decisions faster, but also intrinsically by votes or subscriptions to their "products," persuading them to publish more. Think of the accelerated learning that can happen in a company when the entire workforce is empowered to not only create reports, but share them with everyone in a collaborative system of data socialism.

"The largest, fastest growing, most profitable companies in 2050 will be companies that will have figured out how to harness aspects of sharing that are invisible and unappreciated today." -Kevin Kelly

Many companies are watching the platform model proliferate throughout their industries, while others are attempting to disrupt themselves and leverage this new paradigm. Businesses will progress at the speed at which they are capable of delivering well-defined and validated data elements to the masses, allowing employees within the business to create value and insights using a common data reporting platform to share information across the organization. Much like Amazon hiring out the "last mile" of delivery to the people, the last mile of data delivery can happen quickly and with more impact by encouraging participation from every employee who cares to join in. Kevin Kelly probably said it best: "The digital age is the age of non-bestsellers--the under-appreciated, the forgotten." Life before digital was different. Relying on sanctioned industry professionals for nearly everything created an unseen logjam of information and progress. With the promise of both tangible and intrinsic reward, platforms have emboldened the layman to become the new heroes of society. Employees in any visionary company are capable of the same heroics with data.

Davenport & Harris, Harvard Business Review Press, Competing On Analytics: The New Science of Winning, Boston, Massachusetts

Kelly, Kevin, 2016, Viking, The Inevitable: Understanding the 12 Technological Forces That Will Shape Our Future, New York, New York