Collecting Data

We went over how businesses and organizations inheriently have data within them. But they can also start collecting data. By adding data collection to their routines then buildup a valuable resource which they can later use to drive action. You can add sensor readings, metric trackers and user/employee submited forms.

What you can Collect

This depends onthe indsutry, but using our information about different types of data, and reading through the current data that diferrent businesse have we can start to get a picture about what we can collect. We will go through each of the data types and show examples of ways we could implement collection.

Sensory Data

For every action that we take, data can be recorded. If we have a meeting and talk about a plan of action that can be turend into data by instead writing it down. It can be done manually or done using a speech to text program. By writing it down we save this data into something which can be used later. Much of what we write down is already data, we just need to organize it and make it available to use later.

The easist thing you can do to collect data is directly ask users and clients. By using forms and surveys you can direclty request data from the people who have it. Add a link to a form which asks them what they think you can improve on and what is causing them issues. Add embedded feedback forms as part of the process for simple actions. When someone completes a process end it by asking them to rate how it went on a scale and provide any textual feedback they have.

You should also implmenet automated data collection practices and sensors in physical applications. Sensors can be added for detecting issues and faults in assembly processes. Phsycial data can be collected in farming like soil temperature

What shouldn't you collect?

Collecting unecessary data can also be a negative. If the collection of the data costs time or energy from employees or customers it can be a detriment. You should always analyze what the cost to collect the data is, if it is legal and how you will store or process it. Excess data can often find a usecase far after it's collected but it's still important to understand the cost.

Example: A new business has started implementing more data collection. They sent a form out to their users and got a great response about what their pain points were in the product. So given this positive momentum they started to add data collection everywhere. The business owner now wanted every employee to track how they spent their time. Each hour they would get pinged and write a quick summary of what they had done. But there's an issue. The employees start to get annoyed with this. It inturrupts them when they are focusing on hard tasks. They start filling it out with short meaningless sentences. Some people turn off the notificaiton alltogether and stop answering it. When the manager reminds people to fill it out it makes them mad. There is a noticable increase in employee churn as people get annoyed with these new systems.

Analysis: The data collected (what employees were doing) may have been valuable, but the cost (impacting employees attention and taking too much time) was not worth it. The data was ruined through noncompliance with the system and poor responses. Instead it could have looked sometihng like this: Start of the day, employee writes down a list of the 10 most important things they think need to get done with a time estimation for each. End of the day: the employee writes if they did or didn't do those and why. Reason: This still collects the data while instead providing value to the employee, it doesn't interrupt focus sessions and should drive better results. Isntead: implement employee analytics software that collects time spent in different tasks and

Examples

We will go through our exmaples from the last section and show how these businesses could start collecting data that they may not be currently.

1. Timber Company (Forestry/Tree Management)

Power Company

The power company is doing fine but they have had some issues keeping up with demand. People have been recently buying electric cars so the demand in certain areas has increased a lot. To stay ahead of this, the power company has stared collecting data by sending out surveys. For every survey filled out they give people a special gift. The surveys go over if people curently have electric cars and how liklely they are to get one in the future. They also add some other useful questions, how likley is this person to get solar for their house, if they have experienced any blackouts recently and if they are happy with their service. By collecting this data the power company can get a better idea of how the base load will change over time.

mining company

A mining company has been experiencing some break downs that are costly. Every time a machine is out of service it has to be towed into the shop or repaired in the field costing time and money. Currently if a machine is having problems the operator tells his manager who tells the repairmen to look at it. Right now this process is prone to loss as people forget things. The mining company instead decieded to collect data. Each week the operators take pictures of their machine, they then write down and categorize any issues that they have experienced. By doing this the companies has been able to save money by making sure the mechanics work on the correct things before they go out into the field.

Creative Studio

A creative studio has been producing video and images. Currently once the artwork is done they submit it to their central file storage. The other day one of the artists was talking about how he was going to go one way with a piece but once he started sketching it he decieded he would rather go another way. The other person really liked the orignal idea so asked for the sketch but it wasn't saved. The team tehn decieded to store sketches and revisions so that they could look back at these ideas later and get insipiration

Insurance Company

Right now the insurance company gets a lot of phone calls asking quetsions about policies and other differnet questions. The calls usualy end in the person either buying or not buying insurance. If the person was interested but needed more time the call rep would right down their name and number. But a rep noticed that he kept getting many of the same questions and would have to go through and lookup the answers in their system over and over. Instead they implmeneted a policy where they would record each call and after each call would write down the different questions eached person asked. They put this data into a spreadsheet and added links direclty to the answers. They ranked them by most common to least common and added a search box so they could find them quickly. Now they noticed that they were quicker with their responses and had better data so people bought the insurance more frequently.

A Vacationers Hotel

A hotel owner went out of town one weekend and was sitting at a bar. He started a conversation with a group of people and it turns out one of them had stayed at his bar. They said it was nice but their was a bit of a noise coming from the air conditioner and there was a stain on the wall. He asked if they told someone and they said they didn't go through the front desk on the way out so they didn't tell anyone. The owner knew this was an issue as these are problems he would have sovled right away had he known about them. So he decieded to send out a survey through email and text after someone stayed at his hotel. He asked them if their were any problems and gave them a 5% discount coupon for a future stay if they completed it. This way many people were able to tell him about issues after the fact without going out of their way to talk to staff. Now he can quickly solve the issues and make a better experience for all the people who stay at his hotel.