Big Data is Bigger Than Ever

Originally posted by Bill Schmarzo on EMC.com

How big is Big Data?

Business users are increasingly turning to data management and advanced analytic technologies that enable organizations to uncover business insights. These insights can help them operate with more efficiency, build improved products, and provide more relevant services to their customers. However, to get the most benefit from these next-generation technologies, organizations must determine where and how they can best leverage Big Data to obtain the greatest value. This premise is the foundation of my recently published book Big Data: Understanding How Data Powers Big Business.

The book's working title was the "Big Data MBA." It's a hands-on, pragmatic handbook chock-full of practical advice for IT and business stakeholders alike as they progress in their journeys toward leveraging Big Data to drive business value. It's designed to help business users who have already grasped the organization's value creation processes, but lack a clear understanding of how to utilize the technologies that are going to allow them to harvest the greatest business benefits.

The concept behind the Big Data MBA is to seize and explore businesses opportunities that will lead to improved value creation processes, optimized key business processes, and the discovery of new monetization opportunities to drive all data, data management, and analytics-related technology decisions.

Sounds simple, right? While this concept may appear straightforward, the behind-the-scenes work required to strategize and execute a plan to derive value from Big Data is inherently complex. It requires laser focus, commitment, and a complete understanding of targeted business initiatives. In my new book, I outline how to go about creating and fine-tuning innovative strategies to better understand how to implement analytics in a way that will make the business users most effective.

Follow the link to my recent InFocus blog post where I have published a Readers Guide to highlight the most relevant chapters based on the most popular areas of interest. Although most of the chapters are valuable regardless of the reader's position in the organization, some chapters may be more interesting to those who are really looking to delve into the how-to details. I hope you enjoy it!