Data and analytics no longer optional for business: Deloitte

Generating insights from data is no longer optional, according to Deloitte’s director of data, analytics and AI Angela Kim, its mandatory.

Kim told Digital Nation Australia that investing in data does not set you apart as a leading business.

“How well you do it is a key differentiator and how timely the manner you can do that is really the game changer,” she said.

Businesses that utilise relevant data, for the right touch point at the right time, are leading in the space and especially those who are bringing the c-suite and director level into data driven decisions.

While in the past, data and analytics was owned by the chief data officer, or the CIO, according to Kim, all c-suite leaders are required to establish foundational data literacy.

“Whether you are CRO, CIO, or CCO (chief compliance officer), or CMO even, as a c-suite leader, it's almost impossible to talk about your strategy without data. So that means everyone has to be data fluent and tech fluent and to a certain degree, AI as well.”

In order for leaders to make timely decisions, Kim notes the importance of integration, including open source language tools and cross platforms integration skills.

“The more business organisation or tech providers can really mesh the data coming from all different sources in a well, and serve up to the customers or the business organisation to make a really timely decision is key,” said Kim.

And just as the data is being brought together into integrated platform, the roles of data scientists and data engineers are also merging, she said.

“The way its going is kind of blurred, in terms of data scientists who can do data engineering component as well. So you can’t say that a data scientist is doing just data science work and data engineers are doing just the data engineering work. It’s coming together in a hybrid role."

According to Kim, the high demand for data science and data engineering skills has lead to the merging of the disciplines.