Bad Data is Impacting Business Operations

Big data has grown in big proportions over the last decade. More companies are relying on the information they gather about their customers to make decisions, set goals, and find their competitive edge in the market. With a giant amount of data, however, comes a giant amount of responsibility. Having strong privacy and security procedures and standards becomes paramount.

When a company has multiple departments, data siloing can occur, which should be a huge no-no for most companies. Someone in a sales department is entering essential data into their own records on a customer, for example, but the marketing department, who should be relying on that information in their decision-making for future advertising techniques, has no idea how and why this customer is buying their products. Instead, the marketing department might budget a large amount of money on research to understand customers’ behaviour, when that data is already present in the sales department.

At the organisational level, lapses in data can lead to dire consequences, including lost revenue and even irreversible damage to the brand’s reputation. In fact, global research and advisory firm Gartner, estimates that poor data quality costs organisations an average of S$12.9 million (approximately AUD13.4 million) a year. Apart from the immediate impact on revenue, over the long-term, poor-quality data increases the complexity of data ecosystems and leads to poor decision making.

Organisations with a proactive approach to ensuring data quality can minimise business risks or losses and are in a better position to uncover opportunities that improve business outcomes.

For example, if a company has inconsistent data on its supplier payment terms, and payment is made in 30 days instead of the stipulated 60 days, it can lead to missed opportunities to improve the company’s working capital. By adopting a proactive approach to managing its data, the company can free up an enormous amount of working capital, especially if it has hundreds of suppliers.

Data has to be treated as a company’s core asset and it needs to be of top quality, so that right decisions can be made timely. It is through the refinement process of cleansing, validation, de-duplication and continuous auditing that data can become valuable.

“Organisations are faced with an increasing volume of data coming in from many different sources daily, and with no signs of abating,” says Mr Gordon Lam, President for Asia Pacific & Japan at Syniti. “However, the true value of this data can only be realised when it is harmonised and used to drive specific business outcomes.”

Harnessing Data for Business Growth

As a leader in Enterprise Data Management, Syniti drives data quality, data governance and data management for businesses. Syniti’s team of data experts support enterprise businesses on their data journey using the Syniti Knowledge Platform, which is a state-of-the-art solution for data quality improvements, master data management, data migration & replication, and more.

As organisations embark on digital transformation and adopt new technologies such as automation, artificial intelligence and machine learning, whether they succeed in future is largely dependent on getting their data management processes right.

For data to be useful in decision making, it has to be accurate, consistent, complete, valid, timely, accessible and compliant. Yet, maintaining data quality is a challenge for many companies where much of the data entry is done manually across different systems, often resulting in inaccuracies and data duplication.

Gordon adds, “Organisations may already have data analytics software, but the critical question remains whether the data itself is accurate and relevant to provide reliable insights for effective decision making. Poor quality data results in poor quality decisions. Having the right data management platform that takes care of underlying data quality will turbocharge insights from existing data analytics software.”

The Syniti Knowledge Platform helps to ensure that the data is correct right from the start. The moment any data enters a system, it is important to ensure that the same data from various systems is not duplicated. This gives organisations a “single source of truth” ⁠— a single system of records and data that can be used by various business functions to confidently make decisions.

“The quality of data has a direct impact on business performance,” says Marcus Scott, Vice President of Sales for Australia and New Zealand at Syniti. “When data is managed well, companies are able to increase revenue, optimise costs and reduce business risks.”

Accelerating Data Transformation for Australia and New Zealand businesses

Syniti has been crucial in providing end-to-end data management to accelerate business transformation for organisations in Australia and New Zealand.

One of Australia’s largest and oldest food and beverage companies accumulated 500 legacy software applications as it grew rapidly over the years. Most of the applications were more than 30 years old and ran across various business functions, with data, including supplier and finance data, stored in separate systems. It became challenging to access data across the silos which impacted business operations.

To remain competitive in a rapidly evolving market, the company engaged Syniti to bring together all the 500 applications onto one cloud-based platform and implement a master data management system for its supplier and finance data. This has helped to remove data inconsistencies, minimise the need for double entry of data, and ensure that the quality of data is maintained. By streamlining key business processes, including supply chain reporting and customer claims processing, the company is now able to respond quicker to changes in the market.

Australia with its 100% data-focused team continues to support businesses in Australia and New Zealand and has previously reported an 800% software growth in the region for the first half of 2021, as organisations continue to accelerate digital transformation plans.

Driving Business Outcomes

Beyond ensuring the quality and efficient management of an organisation’s data, Syniti supports data migration, a crucial process that is time-consuming and carries the risk of data loss. With a focused, data-driven approach, unique methodology and data management software like the Syniti Knowledge Platform, Syniti has helped more than 4,000 businesses resolve their data challenges. In addition, according to an IDC report, our solutions have helped businesses and operations reduce unplanned system downtime by 98%, data migration costs by 38% and time to complete data migration projects by 46%.

Syniti is a platinum partner of SAP which is one of the world’s leading producers of software for the management of business processes. Syniti’s software is resold by SAP as SAP Advanced Data Migration, by Syniti. Many of the largest global system integrators also resell and depend on Syniti as their enterprise data migration platform and partner of choice.

We also previously announced Syniti’s collaboration with SAP to Provide Smooth SAP S/4HANA Deployments as a premier service offering for customer migration to SAP S/4HANA. In doing so, Syniti is further deepening its strategic collaboration with SAP Data Management and Landscape Transformation (DMLT) Services for customers moving to SAP S/4HANA via Selective Data Transition (SDT).

In a recent study, market research firm IDC found that Syniti and SAP customers that leveraged the Syniti Knowledge Platform to migrate and integrate their data for their SAP workloads significantly benefited in terms of their investment and reduction in operating expenses — reference figure 1.

Figure 1: Source: A Business Value Snapshot by IDC, sponsored by Syniti

Marcus adds, “All industries face common data challenges. Smarter, better, and more efficient methods of doing things should be driven by software. With only 30 percent of digital transformation initiatives in ANZ succeeding in 2020, there is a significant opportunity for Syniti to help organisations harness the true value of their data.”

Top image credit: iStock.com/NicoElNino