We are living in a really unique time where we have access to texts, calls, emails, photos, videos, a world’s worth of information, and music all on one tiny device. This mass amount of data we create every minute, multiplied by the world, makes data very valuable, especially because our phone company and many of our apps also have access to this data. And this is only one device. Our daily habits are also collected every time we buy groceries, go for a run, visit a doctor, go shopping, or order pizza.

‘Big data’ is the term used to describe the large volumes of data being collected by a variety of sources. The size of big data is beyond the ability of typical database software tools to capture, store, manage, and analyze. Collecting and analyzing this data is also evolving rapidly to keep pace with the increasing volume. What we called big data 10 years ago is not what we call big data now because the typical tools and technologies have changed. And what we call big data now may not be big data in five years.

The Five Vs

There is a framework for analyzing data as big data. The five most commonly defined V dimensions are volume, variety, velocity, veracity, and value. These five variables not only make data big data, but also present both possibilities and challenges.

These are the lines leaders must walk. How can they leverage the possibilities of big data to close the gap on their goals and increase sales? How can they protect company and customer data from being misused?

Big Data in Our Lives

Big data shows us, with patterns that are predictive, who talks to who, how happy you are, and when you are having a baby. And big data doesn’t just reflect what is going on online; it can also show us what you are doing in the real world and who you are meeting up with. Some research has even found that face-to-face interactions still matter in terms of persuading people to do things — and it’s digital data that tells us that.

These are big data trends that are so highly valuable to companies because they have the ability to identify and change customer patterns, increase access to the customer base and create competition, and affect the workforce.

The audiences affected by changing patterns, increased competition, and workforce shifts include customers and the workforce. Accessing, marketing to, and maintaining customers has dramatically changed in the past 20 years. Companies and organizations can leverage data to predict customer desires and offer support 24/7. They can also help their workforce to adapt to work alongside machines, and career shift when needed.

Big Data Impacts Organizations and Leadership

Having a well-thought-out brand strategy is a key contribution to a company’s success. A brand’s image is constantly shifting, and it is influenced by the decisions a company makes over time. Brand extensions are a frequently adopted strategy. Brand extensions are great expansion options for companies because they are usually quicker, cheaper, and less risky than creating a new brand. Some of the big data trends on the market today are impacting strategic brand extensions for many companies.

Today, companies are relying on household Alexas to connect with customers and allow them to order refills, play music, and even control the lights with the sound of their voices. Machine learning allows humans to train computers. Physical objects, like thermostats, cars, and Fitbits that are equipped with sensors provide companies new ways to connect with customers and feed data that provides a more customized experience. Physically connected objects equipped with sensors help to form the ‘Internet of Things’ (IoT). Analyzing data helps companies like Amazon to suggest your next purchase. If you purchased a printer, chances are you will need ink in a month. Layering and analyzing data helps machines to predict our next moves and purchases.

Big data goes beyond customers and the workforce. Data can be leveraged to improve financial performance, product market performance, social responsibility, and employee stewardship. When layered, things like smart technology can help have a big impact on society: like to add utility efficiencies, solve traffic jams, and optimize patient flow. Many leaders find themselves in a position where they need to learn more about data and technology to help their organization to perform better and make better decisions. The Master of Science in Organizational Leadership with an Emphasis in Technology and Data Analytics program at Excelsior University prepares leaders to manage change through a curriculum that supports a responsive, innovative, data-driven, and empowering approach to leadership. Leaders will learn about strategic technology innovation, data analytics, data visualization, and big data to provide them with the tools to expand their company vision and trajectory.

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Excelsior’s Graduate Certificate in Data Analytics provides you with the valuable skillset of collecting, analyzing, and visually representing data. The certificate prepares leaders with the technical acumen to conduct data analysis and visualization and the management skills needed to implement the insights gleaned from data analysis.

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The courses in this certificate are also part of the Master of Science in Organizational Leadership with an Emphasis in Technology and Data Analytics program, and students who complete the certificate can apply 9 credits toward the 30-credit program.

A bachelor’s degree is required for admission to this graduate certificate program.

Over the past several decades, our lives have dramatically changed with the emergence of technological innovations. Devices that connect us to a world’s worth of information and each other, being able to meet and work anywhere in the world, digital health records that all of our doctors can access, big data collection that improves traffic patterns through artificial intelligence, robotic limbs, and devices that recognize our voice when we ask to turn on our lights—these are just some of the many life-altering advances of our time.

The world’s many innovations all started with ideas. In some cases, ideas are spontaneous. They come to an innovator who knows how to develop it into a tangible product. Elon Musk, Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and Richard Branson are names that come to mind when many of us think of innovators and the innovative companies they created. Many have studied the ways of these innovators and imagined how they can harness collective imagination in their own company. Developing a process to conjure up and study ideas is a critical business process in such a rapidly changing world.

Twyla Tharp, a famed American choreographer and dancer, published a book called, “The Creative Habit.” In this book, she shares strategic steps anyone can use to create space and opportunities to manifest creativity. Tharp speaks about creating a ritual for creativity to emerge. Rather than the ritual being the creative act, she says her daily ritual involves setting the stage for the creative act to emerge. Just getting up and getting in the cab every morning triggers a daily schedule of activities that prepare her for the emergence of creativity. As Tharp argues, developing a creative habit creates more opportunities for creatives to create.

A study conducted by Robert Boice, a former professor of psychology at Stony Brook University, concurs that habit creates an opportunity for creatives of another nature: writers. Boice studied a small sample of college professors who were placed into groups and assigned different writing techniques: abstinence (forbidden from using non-emergency writing), spontaneous (writing on 50 occasions when they felt inspired), and contingency management (50 writing occasions where they were forced to write regardless of spontaneous ideas). The outcomes variables were the number of pages written each day and the number of days between creative ideas. The results were outstanding. Those assigned to the contingency management group not only wrote 3.5 times more than those in the spontaneous group, they wrote 16 times more than those in the abstinence group. In addition, the number of days between creative ideas was around one day for those in the contingency management group, but two to five days for those in the other two groups. This study shows that habit breeds progress and creativity.

From Creativity to Habit

If creativity can come from habit, can innovation also come from habit?

At first glance, artists and innovators may seem like different breeds. One with a yearning for expression, another with the drive for solutions and profit, but ideation underpins both of their mediums. Ideas form their missions.

In her book, Tharp describes some strategies she uses to discover and collect ideas. The first is scratching. Like a lottery ticket, she scratches at everything that crosses her path hoping it will spark an idea to dance to. Another strategy is a box she creates for every project that becomes filled with clippings, videos, music, and books. The box documents her research and represents her commitment.

The strategies that Tharp follows form her framework for conjuring ideas. In some cases, practice sparks synthesis as ideas. In other cases, practice sparks new ideas. The act of practicing a framework is really what is important. It is the act of seeking, versus waiting. Tharp also emphasizes that the framework only works with consistency. Without consistency, one gets rusty, and the framework takes longer to get going. It’s like writing. When one first sits down to write after a long period of not doing so, words take longer to appear on the page. It can be argued that the most important part of a project is consistently working through your framework.

Developing an innovation routine is a concept Peter F. Drucker, the famed management consultant and business visionary, agrees with. In his book, “Innovation and Entrepreneurship: Practice and Principles,” he says innovative opportunities can be “systematically analyzed and studied.” With new knowledge, businesses must act swiftly. Their search and study must be organized and done on a systematic basis. “Entrepreneurial businesses,” he says, “treat entrepreneurship as a duty; they are disciplined about it, they work at it, they practice it.”

An entrepreneurial practice is the ritual of entrepreneurial businesses. Without a diligent entrepreneurial practice, innovators can get caught in the act of carrying out the everyday tasks of their business and miss valuable opportunities to ideate. Innovators are like creatives, and need time to think. Time must be set aside to consider new possibilities. Ideas must be sought.

Drucker says innovators are entrepreneurial: always searching for change so they can respond to it and exploit it as an opportunity. This decade emphasized a push for more businesses and organizations to be entrepreneurial and for more leaders to develop an entrepreneurial mindset. One way to do this is to make innovation systematic. Systematic innovation requires companies to proactively look for changes and opportunities.

Systematic Innovation Practices

A large part of systematic innovation is creating the right mindset for it, including considering how an organization is run and how people are encouraged to be innovative. Managerial vision should be focused on opportunity. Operating reports should have two sections: what is wrong and what is right. Drucker claims for everything going right, those units should be celebrated and asked to share their practices.

No one should be restricted from sharing their ideas in a company. No leader can know all the problems that exist in their organization. Relying on employees at all levels to share solutions is a practice that can assist all organizations.

Innovation is much more than product creation and improvement. A large majority of the innovation definition should be about the process. Innovating the way we do things on a daily basis can save time, money, and lead to new markets. Shifting from a “call and order” to online ordering allows customers to order at any time.

Focusing on Key Ideas

In the limited time an entrepreneurial business has to spend, where should they be focusing their energy? There are pockets of possibilities inside every company: unexpected successes or failures, disconnects between what is and what is perceived to be, sudden shifts in the industry or society, or new knowledge.

Consider the data. Sudden industry or societal shifts can be discovered today through data. Algorithms and analytics comb vast amounts of data to uncover possible meaning. Analyzing demographic shifts, for example, might tell a company a new market has opened up and how to market to them. One example of a possible shift always overlooked is age and cultural distributions. Very few organizations are prepared for such shifts because they aren’t studying them.

Focus on simple solutions. Another key approach is to focus on simple, tangible products or processes. “For an innovation to be effective, it has to be simple and it has to be focused,” Drucker says. Otherwise, it will be hard to appeal to the masses. In one sentence, what is your innovation and what can it do?

Enhance and invent. Innovation is often seen as a starting process, rather than part of a continuous loop. Just as society evolves, so should businesses evolve their products. This doesn’t always mean creating new product lines, but it can. Simply adding features to existing products can help the consumer immensely. For example, copy machines and printers still serve the same purpose as they always have, but their speed, quality, and accessibility have been greatly improved over time. Most recently, Wi-Fi capability allows printers to be activated and sent instructions from any mobile device, allowing people to send instructions to the printer and print from anywhere in their home.

Developing rituals and frameworks for creativity has been a successful strategy for many creatives. If creativity can come from habit, innovation can also come from habit. Leaders can develop routines that create space for systematic innovation practices that encourage idea generation in their organizations. Strengthening these practices with a focus on key ideas will help them to align ideation and productivity toward organization goals.

Looking to Advance Your Education in Organizational Leadership and Innovation Management?

Excelsior University’s online Master of Science in Organizational Leadership with an Emphasis in Technology and Data Analytics program gives you specialized knowledge in the strategic management of technology and innovation, leadership, and data analytics so that you can effectively lead an organization through transformational changes. You can gain practical knowledge you can use immediately as you develop your professional expertise through a curriculum emphasis on the effective use of technology and data analytics.

Earning a Master of Science in Organizational Leadership with an Emphasis in Technology and Data Analytics provides students with a proven pathway to playing an important role in organizational leadership. If you’re ready to earn your master’s degree online, contact an admissions counselor today.