Companies that work with a data analytics consulting service can gain a massive competitive advantage.
But change is hard. And, setting up a data analytics strategy and workflow is a challenging task that often overwhelms companies and wastes resources. But that doesn’t have to be the case. Data analytics consultants can apply their software and business development expertise to help your organization make informed data-driven decisions.
Keep in mind: Not all data analytics companies are created equal.
As a result, this post will take you through the qualities of great data analytics consulting companies, what you can expect from the consulting process, and how working with external experts can benefit your business.
Not sure where to start? Jump on a free call for help.
Contents
- What You Can Expect From Great Data Analytics Consulting Services
- Data Analytics Consulting Definition & Process
- Responsibilities of an Analytics Consultant
- Data Analytics Consulting Benefits
- What Hakkōda’s Data Analytics Services Can Do For You
- Improve Data Quality and Performance
- Remove ‘Noise’
- Modern Business Intelligence
- Scalable Teams
- Why Choose Hakkōda?
What You Can Expect From Great Data Analytics Consulting Services
Analytics consulting services provide data professionals with expertise in data architecture, reporting, and ad hoc analytics.
The most impactful data analytics consultants do more than load data and create reports. They also offer guidance on:
- Data governance, quality, and security
- MLOps: Machine learning at scale
- Data apps and embedded analytics
- Data sharing
Data Analytics Consulting Definition & Process
Data analytics consulting helps organizations establish the processes and content for analyzing their business.
The key to becoming data-driven is more than building reports and dashboards. It’s about understanding an organization’s analytical pathways, delivering the right information at the right time, and providing the context required to make good decisions. For example, companies have thousands of reports and queries used by various people to run their business. This is a case where quality matters more than quantity. This reporting detritus has built up over years. Many go unused, become outdated, and contribute to noise that obscures the signals.
Experienced data analytics consultants seek to:
- Understand the organization, its silos, data landscape, and aspirations
- Drive alignment between the business and IT
- Create consistency and quality in the data assets
- Help a business look at any domain subject area and map out the data needed to generate the insights that inform decisions
Great data analytics consulting firms are skilled at looking at things at a macro (executive level) and also at a practical, operational level. They know that ‘less is more’ and what information is needed and when. What decisions are machine-driven (low latency, high data context), and which require human intervention.
Creating alignment and consistency
Good data analytics consultants prevent people from showing up to meetings with two different data sets. They also help align thinking, creating a consistency that enables continuous improvement. Many organizations run into situations where a user requests a report, leaves the company, and someone new comes in and requests a different report. Now, two reports represent the same thing, with different conclusions, making it unclear which is “right.”
Unfortunately, the processes around reporting aren’t automated (or instrumented) in these cases. Therefore, sometimes you have people who are naturally good at analyzing a business, but they leave, leading to a breakdown in critical business intelligence.
“Data analytics is changing because it has to. For Hakkōda, we’ve seen success in helping companies look holistically at their information flow. They need to understand how the organization is making decisions, with what data, and what are the common pathways of analysis they want to establish. Data analytics is moving from portals of reports to data storytelling and analytics embedded directly into the operational workflow and applications.” — Erik Duffield, CEO, Hakkōda
The Consulting Process
Step 1: Data analytics consultants will take the time to learn what an organization’s goals are first. What and where do organizations think their opportunities exist? Data analytics consultants also investigate:
- Where is the organization today?
- What is the legacy that has been built over time?
Step 2: Next, the data analytics consultant creates a roadmap to help the organization achieve its aspirations over time.
What sets Hakkōda apart from traditional data analytics consulting firms is that we don’t spend much time describing what we’re going to do. Instead, we focus on quick assessments and understanding your pain points and goals. We then start building towards your goal in sequences designed to drive measurable impact sooner.
“How do you eat a whale? One bite at a time.” — Erin Napier, Hometown
We map out your vision (the whale in this metaphor) and build incrementally towards your goals to avoid analysis paralysis or overspending on strategy.
Want to learn more about data analytics consulting services? Hop on a free consultation call with us.
Responsibilities of an Analytics Consultant
Responsibility 1: Experience
How much experience does the analytics consultant have with your technology?
If you have a consultant unfamiliar with your technology stack, they may not be able to provide the best advice, especially if you’re looking to modernize.
They may not understand how your specific technology will play with other systems, leading to unexpected complications.
Expert tip: Look for someone who specializes in your industry, or who has worked with an organization of your size and scale.
Responsibility 2: Understanding
A successful analytics program requires organizational understanding, change management, and the ability to simplify complex systems and processes.
It’s easy for someone to jump in and start building reports, but they’re adding to your legacy of technical debt, data chaos, and data sprawl.
Find an analytics consultant who can create logical progression and actionable (yet simple) plans to drive adoption, iteration, and evolution.
It’s not unlike the “teaching how to fish” metaphor. Instead of having a one-time report or unrepeatable process. A consultant needs to think about how to build now and at scale long-term, including answering:
- How do you maintain and support the organization so that you don’t create data sprawl?
- What can you do to keep track of data?
- How many reports do you have? Can you consolidate? Do the reports relate to each other?
In other words, adding reports will have a short-term impact. But a great data analytics consultant thinks about how your organization makes a decision and:
- The information it needs now and to scale
- When and where there is latency
- And how to deliver messages progressively
Responsibility 3: Creating clarity
Companies are overwhelmed with data. There is so much noise and data that they’re not getting the signals anymore.
Therefore, data analytics consultants are responsible for creating clarity about what an organization needs to be looking at— and how to interpret that data to take action. It’s beyond reporting; it’s about organizing the raw data to facilitate informed action in the moment.
Looking for experienced data analytics consultants? Reach out for a free consultation.
Data Analytics Consulting Benefits
Data analytics consulting services benefit companies in two key ways:
Benefit 1: An Outside-in Approach
Often, people in an organization can get too close to a problem in a business. Because they are actively experiencing the issue, they may get tunnel vision. Some may have blinders on because they are so focused on one issue that they miss the whole picture.
That’s why it’s critical to have external experts come in to analyze a problem or an opportunity.
Good data analytics consultants can help rationalize issues and cut across organizational silos more effectively.
Benefit 2: External Expertise for Modernization
In recent years, there has been a considerable modernization effort in technology. As a result, companies do things differently than just a few years ago.
Having external experts who work with a modern tech stack is critical for sharpening your organization’s competitive advantage and pursuing your big-picture aspirations.
What Hakkōda’s Data Analytics Services Can Do For You
We are a data consultancy specializing in accelerating innovation through data. Our team has deep expertise and alignment with Snowflake and other technologies for building a modern data stack.
Our data analytics services help you improve your data quality, tap into modern business intelligence, and scale with on-demand talent.
Improve Data Quality and Performance
We start by modernizing your data pipelines, embedding observability, and leveraging the capabilities of cloud-native solutions.
Remove ‘Noise’
Companies are plagued by data sprawl. Moreover, data and reports are everywhere, making it challenging to identify what’s being used and what’s valuable, not to mention the cost and inefficiency of supporting these legacy systems and processes. We help bring order, enable self-service, and still maintain data governance.
“Data is essential to the future of healthcare that is connected, intelligent, and efficient. Hakkōda’s industry expertise and guidance is valuable in advancing our organization towards becoming data-driven.” – Jim Robshaw, Private Health Management, CIO
Modern Business Intelligence
With our help, you can replace outdated technology with cloud-native solutions that work in concert to create a high-performance, simplified architecture.
Scalable Teams
Hakkōda supports your internal teams with additional capacity you can flex up and down as your backlog and budgets evolve. We have teams in the US and Costa Rica that can help you realize your goals.
Data for Good
Explore how Hakkoda partnered with MarViva to create more sustainable fishing practices using data and analytics. Learn More.
Why Choose Hakkōda?
Quality analytics engineering is more than building business intelligence reports.
For instance, our analytics engineers go beyond SQL and the semantic layer. We are trained in best practices in data engineering and can use that knowledge to build analytics products the right way. We also focus on building standard reusable assets and reducing the technical debt leading to data and reporting sprawl.
What sets us apart:
- 25 years of experience in data analytics consulting
- Modern data tools/processes — 100% SnowPro Certified
- Scalable, cost-effective teams in the US and Costa Rica
Learn more about our Data Modernization and Managed Services
