It’s one thing to stock a server farm with strong in-memory processors and costly analytics software. It’s quite another to have employees and executives who comprehend all of the intricate models.
What Exactly Is Data Literacy?
The capacity to absorb analytical principles and apply them to data processing and decision-making is referred to as data literacy.
Data literacy is the basis upon which a corporation may establish a data-driven organization. Data literacy is required to achieve this aim. It must be understood and used as a second language within the organization.
Data assets are viewed as assets by modern businesses. The issue is that firms aren’t getting as much value out of these assets because of a lack of data management standards, an inability to commercialize them, and a lack of data literacy.
Uncut diamonds are data architects, cleaners, data literacy consultant, modelers, and models. It is impossible to determine the full worth of data without them.
Data literacy will soon become a critical component of company success. It will be less about whether a business should embrace information literacy and more about how quickly a business will perish if it does not.
Knowledge Of Data Is Power
Data may now be collected in astonishing ways that were not feasible even a decade ago. Smartphones and social media platforms may be used to acquire sensitive information about individuals and businesses.
To integrate behaviour with individuals, the capacity to detect facial, emotional and even gait patterns is utilised. This enables the generation of massive new data sets containing extremely useful psychometric information. These data may be collected and analysed utilising analytical software and big data. However, this will not be viable until the workforce is data-literate.
Increasing Data Literacy
There are several suggestions for businesses that wish to become data-driven.
- Assist with employee training.
- Teach others data skills.
- Using actual examples, you may establish awareness campaigns to educate and invite people to utilise data efficiently.
- Incorporate data into critical decision-making areas inside the organisation.
It appears to be more complicated than it is. There are several data literacy training courses available, some of which are free, some of which are commercial, and others of which are developed by prominent universities and provide both free and paid versions, depending on whether or not you want a credential.
As is customary, it is preferable to favour quality above quantity. With so many educational and training alternatives available, establishing a supporting academy should be simple.
However, before diving in, organisations must carefully choose the data skills that their workforce requires and then develop a skills framework. Hotel data capabilities, for example, differ from those required by merchants.
Hotels and manufacturing demand have distinct data capabilities.
Many software suppliers will also be glad to talk about how their solutions could interact with your data. Many individuals have taken the citizen data scientist concept and developed GUI-based, drag-and-drop applications.
Conclusion
When studying data, data literacy should be treated as a second language. It might be tough to become fluent in a second language, but it is attainable with the correct education, consistent practice, and a sincere dedication to the educational process. These data skills may be leveraged to increase the value of employees to the firm and their consumers.
Learning data-speak as a common language will be a significant step forward for businesses. Companies now have two choices: let their data overwhelm them or learn to speak it as a common language. This will aid in reducing the troublesome Tower of Babel culture that afflicts so many firms.
