You are currently viewing The Dangers of Siloed Data in Decision-Making

The Dangers of Siloed Data in Decision-Making

Most of us know what DDDM (Data-driven decision making) is and understand the importance of it as well. For those who don’t, DDDM, put simply, is making decisions based on insight gained from data. If the data used is inaccurate, incomplete or contains errors, the decisions made based on that data will not lead to the outcomes or goals the decision maker had in mind. When it comes to data, there is always a chance of this occurring, however, when siloed platforms are used, the chances of this increase exponentially. The article below explores the implications of having and relying on siloed data.

Siloed data is data or information that is confined to a specific area, whether it be within a department, within a team or within a system. Isolating data in this way prevents it from being shared and accessed across the organisation and while the initial intention behind contracting siloed platforms might be to boost efficiency, the unfortunate reality is that these siloed platforms create barriers within the organisation and end up decreasing efficiency rather than boosting it.

The Consequences:

Incorrect decisions being made. Organisational decisions need to be made using all data relevant to the topic in question. If only one portion of the relevant data is being accessed and considered, the decisions made based on this data are almost guaranteed to be skewed.

Increased risk. While we are now aware that siloed data leads to poor decision making, let’s take it a step further and consider how this increases organisational risk. When departments and teams operate in isolation there is no sharing / minimal sharing of compliance requirements, security measures or organisational vulnerabilities, potentially putting the organisation in a position where requirements aren’t met or security measures aren’t followed.

Missed Opportunities. When cross-department collaboration is lacking or non-existent, it is incredibly difficult for different teams to collaborate with one another and to see opportunities that another department / team maybe have missed. Rather than multiple departments working together to boost the entire organisation forward, you’ll find single departments taking individual steps forward that are miniscule when looking at the progression of the organisation as a whole.

As we continue on this journey of becoming a more data-rich society, organisations have to breakdown the walls that siloed platforms are causing if they want to continue to progress forward. Fragmented data can no longer be ignored and prioritising data integration over data isolation will allow for a culture of cross-departmental and platform collaboration within organisations.

Strategies to Break Down Silos

1. Move all existing siloed platforms or a large portion of them to a single platform.

2. Choose a master platform that has the ability to either replace multiple of your siloed platforms OR has the ability to integrate into your multiple siloed platforms leaving you with a single structured view into all the information available on those siloed platforms by only logging into the 1 master platform.

Contact us to help, we have industry leading platforms that go above and beyond and can be tailored to your organisations’ needs.