Why Data is very important to Business in Nigeria

The term Data is the new oil has been very much been emphasized during the last decade, and many businesses have either taken steps or implemented projects to drive this emphasis! Data in any form can be harnessed to drive revenue, innovation and improve efficiency! From the many spreadsheets, ERP systems, databases, businesses in Nigeria have some form of the mentioned to store, manage and analyse their businesses. Data can be used either by Software Developers, Database Managers or Business Managers or Business executives to make some form of advanced report or management report to make decisions.

The new year brings a lot of opportunities and at the same time new rules, regulations, competitions to every business in the country and around the world. From new tax policies, financial acts, industry standards etc, Every business must prepare itself via numerous planning, budgeting and strategic session to carve out a road map to success.

The pandemic is not going away just yet and it also plays its impact on the success or failure of businesses. By now a business that cannot operate a hybrid of WFH or remote operations may really need to rethink how to start to automate some of its operations.

Therefore it’s very important that these planning, budgeting and strategic road maps need to be monitored consistently and not just at the end of a year or a quarter but to at least monthly, weekly and if possible daily.
Businesses will have to use Business Analysis and Business Intelligence to really drive their planning, budgeting and strategic road maps. From simple concepts such as Balance scorecards, businesses can easily and quickly spot where work has to be done and improved upon. This means doing things more deliberately. Also, it gives the opportunity to Businesses to quickly notice the impact of its strategies either positive or negative to quickly make adjustments without waiting till the end of the quarter or year.

See a sample snapshot of some Business roadmaps.

Balanced Scorecard

Source: http://bi-insider.com/

Each of the perspectives has its unique items or KPI’s that can be measured through various means of systems but in place such as financial accounting system (e.g Quickbooks etc), customer relationship management (e.g Zoho, Zendesk etc), Inventory management (e.g SAP) to Payroll and Administration systems or as simple as a spreadsheet can be used capture and track all of the unique items. But to achieve one single view dashboard that encompasses all the above items will require some simple to sophisticated BI platform.

The platforms or tools to use are available and can vary from usage scenarios. From the most simple and available to the most advanced tools can be used to drive and automate reporting to track business roadmaps plans, budgets and ideas. 

I will mention a few and some use cases. Spreadsheets such as Microsoft Excel, Google Sheets can be used as simple forms to capture data and also analyze data as well. Google sheets use AppSheet for instance can be used to even create simple mobile apps that can be used to capture data and connect to data on the go with little to no coding required at all! Microsoft also has its Power App to connect and capture data on the go with little to no coding required as well! So Businesses do not have to wait until they have the financial capability to invest in some more robust financial and ERP systems.

To the more advanced platforms such as TableauQliksensePower BI and numerous BI systems. This takes the whole analysis and visualization to a whole new level. More advanced tools like R and Python can be used in areas of data science to do some predictions as well.

In the coming weeks, we will be looking at how any of the above-mentioned tools can be used easily in ensuring your business data can be turned into actionable insights!

Here’s to wishing everyone a happy new year 2022 and compliments of the new season! 

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