74% of Executives and Leaders Face Strong Impact from Outdated or Disconnected Data - Why?
The industrial sector faces a range of challenges that impact the efficiency, reliability and long-term success of operations. Together, these factors create a complex environment for businesses to navigate. However, the issue at the core is quite simple – data.
Mis-managed or mis-maintained data can have significant consequences for many industrial organizations. This includes delayed project milestones, an inability to scale assets to meet demand and unplanned downtime.
But what are the key causes of this? This was the focus of our recent industry report ‘Data Connectivity and Visibility: The Competitive Edge in Industry.’ Let’s explore these findings further.
The Industry Study: Data Connectivity and Visibility: The Competitive Edge in Industry
To gain a snapshot into the most prevalent obstacles today, in our recent study on data connectivity and visibility, we spoke to 400 global C-suite executives and leaders across the manufacturing, power, oil and gas, and chemicals industries. These insights inform us about what challenges are taking the spotlight. We also share how improved data practices and technology can help organizations to overcome and thrive.
The Impact of Poor Data Integrity and Integration
The study confirmed that one major factor causing inefficiencies was unoptimized data. For example, out-of-date information and lacking data integration and connectivity. In fact, 73% of respondents cited the latter as a key factor for them. And 74% noted they experienced a strong impact from delayed or outdated information – making this the third top contributing factor behind the challenges faced by industrial businesses.
Aging infrastructure, technology and legacy systems are often to blame here. But so are outdated methodologies. All of which do not provide the data readiness needed to stay ahead amidst the rising pressures and demands of today.
The Impact of Manual Processes
The continued use of manual processes in industrial operations is also a major obstacle in data management. In many cases, legacy systems lie at the heart of this issue. Manual processes took second place in our survey of the top factors contributing to challenges – with 74% of participants noting that this caused a strong or severe impact. Experts surveyed also indicated that “As a priority, legacy systems need to be addressed.”
It is not surprising that this challenge remains strong, considering 66% commented that paper-based information is still frequently being used. This only compounds the difficulties with data integration and visibility. The more siloed the data, the more inefficient operations become.
Bilal Alani, group head of IT and data and CIO for R&D at food manufacturer Danone, highlights the impact of the difficulties of legacy systems. Alani comments that “Across different factories, legacy systems can have different processes and different data models. From a global view, this means we can have a gap in the reconciliation of data for dashboarding to make decisions.”
Solutions Available
So, what is the solution? Businesses are rapidly increasing investment into the number and caliber of digital tools and technologies. These are often specialized in helping organizations to increase their visibility into assets and key processes.
Visualization dashboards, for example, have entered the toolkits of 76% of organizations, and have become the most utilized innovation, alongside digital twin technology in second place. Dan Everest, fleet information systems manager at train operator Greater Anglia, explains how the company uses an enterprise asset management solution for data visualization. “It’s our single source of truth for everything from work orders and maintenance schedules to inspections and so on... It brings together our data sources and turns it into intelligence, which is really exciting.” It’s our single source of truth for everything from work orders and maintenance schedules to inspections and so on... It brings together our data sources and turns it into intelligence, which is really exciting.”
Yet, technology solutions are not always enough to solve key business challenges. Best practices such as change management and addressing legacy systems also play a large role. In fact, 56% of the report’s respondents say that their organization’s digitalization efforts are not yet returning the expected value. In the report, we explore further why this may be.
Looking Ahead
So, the way forward? Organizations are looking for tools that can capture, hold and share data more efficiently and reliably. For many businesses, the adoption of such technologies and solutions forms a larger digital transformation or digitalization strategy to lift the digital maturity of the company.
The result? More market competitive, future-ready operations that can scale more easily as business goals and demands grow. Equipped with more intelligent, actionable data, industrial organizations are empowered to overcome common challenges in their way – from delays and downtime to difficult-to-reach project milestones.
To learn more insights about the most current data connectivity and management trends, read our full report here.