Statistical analysis is one of those things that lots of companies like the sound of but are yet to truly embrace as part of their business practices. Of course, we all use statistical analysis to some extent, but are we missing out on many of the benefits a data-driven approach can give us? By equipping yourself and your employees with the ability to understand data better, you can begin to eliminate some of the weaknesses of your company and focus on its strengths.
Define Your Organization
We all have a picture of our organization in our heads, but what if the picture we have doesn’t actually reflect how our organization works? What if the strengths we thought our company had aren’t really its strengths but its weaknesses?
Obviously, we have some idea of how our company works, what makes it profitable, what it stands for, but when you look into the data and use statistical analysis you can further define your organization and understand how to make it better.
Information is power, and we have so much information available to us today, we just need to understand how to interpret it. By understanding this data, we can understand the problems facing a business and then look to resolve them.
Measure Improvement
It is always suggested that try to make continuous improvement in business, but the question becomes, is continuous improvement worth it? It most definitely is! Once you have defined an area to make improvements and put actions into place to carry out these improvements, then you need a way of measuring your progress. It’s hard to measure improvement if you don’t have a set plan for how to measure it, and even harder if you don’t have the personnel that can interpret the data. It’s important to have a system by which you can measure improvements and continue to eliminate inefficiencies.
Analyze the Results
Data is an extremely valuable commodity in our world, but if you can’t understand the data, then it’s not really that useful for you. When you have the ability to analyze data and understand the root causes of your problems then you can begin to implement solutions. Using a well-structured KPI selection guide can help you identify the most important metrics to track and results to analyze, ensuring your business stays focused on what truly drives performance and long-term success.
Improve
At the end of the day, we want to see improvements to our business’ performance and statistical analysis gives you the knowledge to make these improvements. The process of defining, measuring and analysing, using statistical analysis, gives you the ability to turn data into actionable ideas. You can enable your employees to better understand statistical analysis through courses such as a Yellow Belt Certification which can help your business eliminate inefficiencies in many areas. This can be applied to all areas of your business, allowing for slight improvements across the board to add up to big gains overall.
Control
Once you start reaching your targets, you want to ensure you continue to do so. There’s no point making improvements for six months only for them to be wiped out by the end of the year. When you successfully implement a methodology such as this one, you give yourself the ability to control key variables through established tools and keep building on your improvements.
