Many companies feel they have been flying blind through this recent crisis, not knowing what is coming next, how to adapt or how to take advantage of constantly changing circumstances. There has been so much hype about building data-enabled business models and AI-enabled decision making it prompts the question – can analytics really help you improve your company’s resilience?
See AI and Analytics for what they really are
It’s important for us to see analytics for what it really is – a tool for leaders to use in their decision making. How so? For starters, let’s clear up some confusion: statistics is for testing a hypothesis, whereas analytics helps you formulate the right hypothesis. You need to ensure you are asking the right questions and identifying the right data to track. This comes down to knowing what story you want to tell for when you implement new initiatives, and knowing the key information that is relevant to your priorities and decision making. To be relevant, you need to be able to demonstrate your impact and also keep stakeholders updated on the risks and issues they care about.
When it comes to AI, keep in mind what it actually does: it is an automated analysis of patterns that will tell you when situations change. Because of all the hype around AI, there is a risk of overrating the application of AI to risk data in order to follow trends and do analysis. This can lead to underrating the value of an individuals’ ability to interpret abnormalities and changes. AI models use past data to predict the future – this can mean they overlook outliers and miss the changing nature of situations on the ground.
Preparing for an uncertain future and building resilience
Building an analytics capability before the next crisis hits cannot be done in a short amount of time. This is particularly true if a crisis arises out of an “unknown unknown”, an “unknown known”, or even security risks where the modus operandi involves a human adversary.
To build resilience and leverage analytics to the fullest extent you need to wear two hats: you have to understand your company’s market and the security environment, as well as have the business acumen of an analyst to ask the right questions, scan the horizon and challenge assumptions. It’s critical to have a sector-specific tool that knows the industry and knows what needs to be analyzed, particularly the questions you are asking and the hypotheses you’re testing. Historical data won’t necessarily be valuable if you are navigating unchartered territory – like our current new normal. In that situation, you need to find new sources of information, and new ways of using it that will suit your situation.
Where Analytics fits in
You don’t have the time and the resources anymore to keep pushing through with manual tasks that can be automated thanks to a plethora of new digital tools. So, look into dashboard and analytics programs that will gather and deliver timely information to help your organization learn and adapt. Keeping up-to-date is now better suited to a computer than an individual. Use your team’s brainpower to focus on asking the right questions and scanning the horizon for abnormalities, deviations and new situations.
This post was inspired by Cassie Kozyrkov’s article in HBR. We’ve adapted the information to make it more relevant for Security Managers.
