In this podcast we talk about some of the trends that CIOs should be looking at during the course of 2017, including Ransomware, Blockchain & Smart Contracts, Big Information, Data Protection, and Efficiency & Innovation.
There is growing awareness of a skills shortage in Security and Resiliency. 41% of CIO’s define Big Data, along with the increased probability of a Cyber-attack, as a critical priority for them
Big Data is definitely a 21st Century buzzword, and as is the case with buzzwords they are used and misused in equal amounts. Wikipedia defines Big Data as: “an all-encompassing term for any collection of data sets so large and complex that it becomes difficult to process using on-hand data management tools or traditional data processing applications”. So depending on the scale of your data, and its complexity, you’re likely to be able to regard what we’re talking about as big data or certainly your organization’s path to understanding it. So what does that path look like?
The insurance sector manages a mountain of data. Since the earliest beginnings of insurance, data has been recognized as a vital and valuable asset. Insurance companies have recognized the benefits offered by computing often becoming early adopters of technology.
Business Intelligence, Management Information, Data Analytics and Data Warehousing have been business buzzwords for some time but more and more organisations are recognising the value and opportunities that exist in the data that they already have or already collect. This does however have to be done sensitively, particularly when using personal information (a powerful example of this need is the example of how US retailer Target uses its data to identify pregnant women through their buying habits (New York Times Article). The old saying about gaining a single version of the truth is very much a driver for the implementation of a data warehouse…If you or others within your organisation are still saying things like “Well if I had the data to know then we could …”, or “Well those aren’t the figures that I have”, then you really need to look at your Business Intelligence Strategy.