4 Ways to Encourage Big Data Adoption in Your Business

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Big data is becoming increasingly influential in today’s business world, but that doesn’t mean employees have universally embraced it.

If you’re trying to stimulate interest in big data throughout your organization and get employees on board, keep reading. Encouraging adoption may not always be straightforward, but it’s a worthwhile endeavor.

1. Help Employees See How It Will Benefit Their Work

Some employees are naturally resistant to change, but resistance may be less likely to happen if you can present big data as something that will directly benefit your workers by helping them do their jobs better. Consider holding an informal lunch meeting where you order catered food and give a presentation that’s specifically targeted to employees’ duties and how big data will facilitate them.

If you’re part of a big company, or have many departments that each fulfill different tasks, it will be necessary to conduct several presentations geared toward groups of workers. Although that approach is more time-consuming, it should help employees discover why and how big data is truly relevant to them.

Besides, statistics from a 2015 survey conducted by the Economist Intelligence Unit revealed that three out of four of the executive respondents agreed their staff struggled to use data and were unable to effectively apply it to their decision-making processes.

If you take proactive steps to show employees why they really need to make an effort to utilize big data to the fullest, it should be easier to get them to warm up to the new technology. Be sure to frame your information so employees see how it offers personal advantages.

2. Give Your Team the Knowledge They Need to Succeed

Once you’ve explained to your staff how big data can help them, it’s time to give them access to excellent training. In addition to teaching the basics of whatever system you’re using, introduce techniques that are applicable to each person going through the educational process.

For the best results, you may want to recruit help training your team on any new tech they’ll need to use. For example, there are specialized training organizations that help teams in many different industries implement the kind of software they need to collect and analyze data that will make their businesses run more efficiently. Without someone to help them implement and customize this rather complicated software, many employees can become frustrated with the new process right out of the gate.

Professionals that specializes in helping companies implement big data can demonstrate valuable tips to your employees and help you customize the data system to match the organization’s needs. Giving your employees a good experience from the beginning of the new process is crucial to success in big data adoption.

3. Depend on Big Data to Monitor Employee Satisfaction

Many companies use big data to track customer-related metrics and see where there’s room for improvement. However, you can also do that to keep employees more content with their work environments. Some big data-driven programs track employee moods and let colleagues reward each other for doing good work. This kind of technology could give HR managers better insight than annual reviews.

To make workers more likely to input data into a system that monitors how they’re feeling, position the program as something that’s part of a company priority to value employees. When workers realize you’re using big data to help them feel better about their jobs, they should be more motivated to participate.

If you’re still encountering some unwillingness, temporarily introduce incentive programs where employees get put into drawings for gift cards or free meals if they enter their data into the system for a full month, or another span of time you deem appropriate.

4. Listen to Feedback

Employees may resent big data if they feel their voices aren’t being heard as they give feedback about their experiences with the technology. Have a well-formed plan in place for receiving and evaluating feedback, then make adjustments based on that input, when warranted.

Inform employees about the channels through which they should give their thoughts, and let them know what to expect after doing so. Then, prior to putting these recommended changes into effect, announce your intentions well in advance so employees have time to adjust.

As this list of ideas should prove, it’s not hard to urge your employees to familiarize themselves with big data and eagerly use the associated technological platforms while at work. Your goal is to show employees why it’s advantageous for them to do so, and that it won’t just benefit the company at large.

kayla-matthewsContributed by: Kayla Matthews, a technology writer and blogger covering big data topics for websites like Productivity Bytes, CloudTweaks, SandHill and VMblog.

 

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