Rajaram outlines a scope of skills that
decision professionals must rely upon in
knowing how to utilize available software
tools, knowledge of a customer’s industry and preferences, and interaction with
the customers themselves. Bringing this
vast and varied array of attributes to the
problem, analysts can provide true added-value in helping customers find new
ways to leverage available data.
Until Next Time
Decision-makers today continue to
face a range of decision types: from operational to strategic, from evidence-driven
to those that require the marriage of evidence with possibilities-based analysis.
As in previous years, the software packages listed in the 2014 survey largely reflect this range in uses and offer decision
professionals a true spectrum of toolsets
to provide their clients with decision advantage. In both those occasions where
the analysis of data itself can lead to decision insight and those where input from
decision-makers themselves must play a
role, software continues to evolve to meet
the needs of decision professionals.
Already there are indications that data-driven decision support has made inroads, albeit slowly. According to Harvard
Business Review in December 2013,
“those that consistently use data to guide
their decision making are few and far
a na l y t i c s
between. The exceptions, companies…
[with] a culture of evidence-based decision making.” [5]
The challenge remains for decision
professionals to expand the culture of
evidence-based decision-making to
more strategic applications, and to help
bring in the mind-sets and preferences
of key decision-makers to meet the data.
Where hard problems persist, this year