How are you developing the data literacy of your organisation, including the skills of your data teams and of your business stakeholders?
For me the key thing for developing data fluency and a data culture in organisations has been to partner with the business on delivering business outcomes and solving problems (often without mentioning data at all). It might only be afterwards that they realise that they have learned several data concepts and are able to use them when thinking about future projects and ideas. Learning through doing has been key to the business, actively pulling the data team into collaborating on more projects. This works at an executive level all the way down through the business, but benefits from selling a business transformation vision (powered by data) as well, of course. Getting the level just right can be tricky but linking it to business outcomes and showing what the day in the life at all levels would be has been useful in making it tangible for people. In terms of internal team skills development, it is also driven from a data strategy that supports and extends our business strategy. This suggests what capabilities are needed and a gap analysis can be done for planning purposes. However, by focusing each step on business problems, opportunities, and solutions it was possible to bootstrap the learning and functional development processes with delivering business value on the way. Lastly there is also regular horizon scanning to see if there are new tools or techniques that might give a substantial advantage that we should pivot to – this makes us nimble and adaptable. Media is very fast-paced and changeable.