Today’s business environment is as competitive as ever. With digital and brick-and-mortar businesses coalescing to create a comprehensive ecosystem of goods and services, differentiation can be difficult.
Efficiency and accuracy are becoming the drivers of success.
To put it simply, making the right business decisions has never been more consequential.
At the same time, technological innovation and years of accumulated awareness of this priority have streamlined business decisions, making it possible for any organization to operate with pinpoint accuracy rather than feeling their way toward an eventual conclusion.
Even so, coming to the right conclusion continues to be a struggle, but it’s one that must be overcome if your business is going to flourish in today’s global economy.
Here are five tips for making better business decisions that increase revenue and efficiency while decreasing opportunity cost and waste.
#1 Harness the Potential of Big Data
In today’s data-saturated economy, businesses don’t have to wonder what will impress or entice their customers. They can know with near-exact accuracy what people want.
Of course, with 2.5 quintillion bytes of data being produced every day, the challenge isn’t finding data to analyze. Instead, companies are drinking from a veritable firehose of data, making meaningful insights challenging to come by.
Especially when it comes to data-driven decision-making, more isn’t always better. As Jim Schleckser, a consultant who helps CEOs make better decisions, notes, “too much data can actually slow you down to the point where you can become paralyzed. It’s the old saying about analysis paralysis.”
Therefore, rather than being overrun by information accessibility, harness the potential of big data by pursuing actionable insights.
Fortunately, there are already entire platforms dedicated to this priority. For instance, Endor, a data analytics platform that helps businesses make better decisions, allows users to enter search queries that produce data-driven results.
Often described as the Google for predictive analytics, Endor is an easy-to-use platform that can be deployed by any company to transform unmanageable data caches into meaningful insights that lead to better decision-making at every level.
#2 Embrace Next-Generation Technology
Blockchain technology is one of the most talked-about technologies available today, but it’s the ability to help your company make better decisions often goes unnoticed.
Indeed, blockchain technology is being used in virtually every industry to propel its decision-making apparatus.
For instance, companies running supply chains are using the blockchain’s inherent transparency and smart contract features to derive insights from every part of the supply chain. Deloitte found that “Businesses can improve their supply chain management through more transparent and accurate end-to-end tracking.”
In other words, better insights equip businesses to make more informed and timely decisions. With applications for everything from IoT to finance, there is almost no industry that can’t integrate decentralization into the decision-making process.
#3 Invite Multiple Perspectives
Of course, decentralized technology isn’t the only way to make better business decisions. Decentralizing the decision-making process at an organizational level carries many benefits, but, most importantly, it helps those charged with executing strategy do so with the most information possible.
As Mike Kappel, founder and CEO of Patriot Software, wrote in Forbes, “Employees often work more closely with customers, so they know what buyers need and request. Employees can also come up with revenue-generating and cost-saving ideas.”
Don’t constrain the decision-making apparatus to the C-suite. Get everyone involved and get better results.
#4 Analyze Customer Needs
Forrester estimates that ⅔ of customers won’t wait more than two minutes for customer service, which is leading many companies to turn to AI-powered chatbots to interact with their customers.
Salesforce found that 53% of service organizations plan to adopt chatbot capabilities in the next 18 months, and tens of thousands of websites already deploy this technology.
This is excellent news for decision-makers. AI chatbots produce a treasure-trove of insights into customer needs, allowing businesses to direct their attention toward their customers’ most significant needs, developing solutions before problems become hindrances.
By basing decision making on the customer needs, businesses ensure that they are addressing their cost critical constituency with every conclusion.
#5 Assess Employee Trends
Most companies are implementing some degree of employee monitoring software to oversee productivity and to protect customer data. At the same time, this software can provide companies with valuable insights into their employees that can help them make informed decisions about everything from workplace culture to production bottlenecks.
For instance, platforms like Teramind offer employers an opportunity to restrict their monitoring to data collection that informs decision-making. As The Wall Street Journal identified, “The technology shows companies how work actually gets accomplished.”
Ultimately, information is power. Whether that information is derived from big data or customer or employee interactions, it’s the impetus for better decision-making.
With today’s technology and our workplace culture attaining the right insights has never been easier. Now it’s time to improve the decision-making process, and that’s an easy choice to make.
