With COVID-19’s ever-changing conditions – growing infection rates, shifting and new vaccine mandates, variant outbreaks and office closures and re-openings – HR has stepped up and taken on a significant role in helping organizations navigate every employee’s personal and work life needs. COVID-19 accelerated the evolution already underway in HR, with HR growing beyond being a policy and procedure hub into a strategic business partner.

Whether you are single, married, in a civil partnership, engaged or focusing on friendships, there is one relationship we all have in common that plays out daily in modern life – and that is our relationship with data.

My whole life I’ve been curious. You have to be, to become an entrepreneur. I’m curious about trends, about looking at data and finding patterns, which might show you where the next opportunity lies. And, as I discussed with Joe DosSantos in the latest episode of Data Brilliant, I’m a big believer in experimentation and learning by putting the data and analysis into practice.

When I began working at Qlik nearly seven years ago, it was fairly common for us to end our first meeting with a Federal agency with their team saying: “We need this.

Over the last year, perhaps unsurprisingly, increasing numbers of companies have made the jump to the cloud. It’s become a necessary move for so many businesses. But, as I discussed with Joe DosSantos on the latest episode of Data Brilliant – the rewards are abundant, but the journey is not always straight forward.

The manufacturing industry, like any other industry, is not immune to data challenges. Sourcing data, wrangling it and ensuring it’s being used in a governed, standardized way are not uncommon problems. Particularly in manufacturing, issues surface with inventory management, within the supply chain and with logistics.

We all know data is the new oil. Both data and oil are valuable resources and share a common quality; if unprocessed they cannot be used. Data and oil have to be broken down and built up again to create true value for the business. There is, however, one key difference. Whereas oil is tangible, data is not. This means that the flow of low-quality oil is traceable and will be noticed in the production process. But, what happens if there is a bad data flow in your organization?

The story of the last year+ is one of disruption and change across every aspect of our lives. As we all navigated a ‘new norm,’ businesses naturally had to pivot as well, with some sectors finding new opportunities while others scrambled to reimagine their entire go-to-market strategies.

“Data acumen” is a powerful new term. I heard it used recently in relation to a historically hard problem for the Department of Defense (DoD). The problem is the speed of data change. David Spirk, DoD’s Chief Data Officer, gave an historic keynote at GovCon Wire’s Data Innovation Forum, which was held in June 2021. He was joined by three key leaders in DoD data: Thomas Sasala (Navy), Eileen Vidrine (Air Force) and David Markowitz (Army).

Data and technology are often hailed as a magic ingredient that can help solve so many problems. But, as I discussed with Joe DosSantos on Data Brilliant – it’s just one piece of the puzzle. In order to truly navigate uncertainty, the key is widening your focus and opening up your information sources. It comes down to balancing breadth of perspective with depth of expertise.