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Simplifying Data Management: The Key to Digital Transformation

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Breaking Down Data Silos Opens up the True Potential of the Data in Your Business

Data drives business. There’s no denying that. At the heart of every decision, problem, and the solution is data that has been generated and collected by your business. That’s why it’s important to make sure that data is available to those who need it. 

The problem is that when working groups within your organization are collecting data, you tend to end up with data silos. Data silos are barriers created by departments that make it hard, or impossible, to share the data that they’ve collected. 

Why Do Data Silos Exist?

Data silos just kind of happen. In the past, most departments within a company were responsible for the collection and storage of its data. Sales collected sales data. IT collected IT data. QA collected QA data. As a result of this, each department stored their data independently of all the other departments, meaning that the data was really only available to that department.

The problem with this is that it created a situation where literal gigabytes (if not terabytes) of data existed, but couldn’t be used by people outside of the department. Ultimately, this meant there were huge gaps in knowledge within any given organization that didn’t need to be there. The data existed, but it couldn’t be used. 

Consolidating Storage Infrastructure Can Simplify Your Data Management

Eliminating data silos within your business gives you the power to unlock the full potential of your business. Breaking down the barriers to data means that if sales have a question and marketing has the data that answers that question, sales can take advantage of that data. 

The idea is to make it as easy as possible to access everything, regardless of who collected the data by implementing a single tool that manages your data across the entire organization. While this doesn’t do anything with the fact everyone is storing their data in their own way, it does break that data out of its silo, especially if you’re using a platform-agnostic solution that doesn’t care where the data is stored. 

Make Data More Accessible and Improve Time to Monetization

As mentioned above, when you break down the data silos in your company, you make it possible to unlock the full potential of, well, everything. You’re no longer in a position where you have to beg for the data you need to test a theory. Better yet, you don’t have to test a theory that’s already been tested by another department to get the answers you’re looking for. 

What you get with a single management platform that breaks down silos is access to what you need, when you need it. And, because of that, you’re in a position to work faster and more efficiently. You’re not guessing because you have the answers, meaning you’re more likely to get it right the first time. You’re also not stuck trying to problem solve when dealing with gigabytes of data, you have the visibility you need to pinpoint any problems. 

Beyond that, you’re creating more secure data storage across the entire company. It’s no longer every department for themselves. It’s everyone working together using a security model that covers everyone. Not only does this better protect your data, but it also makes regulatory compliance easier because you can quickly scan all the data, rather than relying on each department to do it for you. This doesn’t really improve time to monetization, per se, but it potentially saves you millions in fines and protects your customers (and your reputation). 

How Breaking Down Silos Helps Digital Transformation

Similar to improving monetization, breaking down silos improves digital transformation by showing you the whole picture. You’re not guessing about what the needs of each department are, you can look them up. There’s no mystery around what the struggles are, the data you need to find the answers are right there. 

What happens with data silos is that instead of being able to look up what you need, you have to first ask for the data. Sometimes you’ll get an answer right away, but not likely. It can take days or weeks (or longer) to get access to the data, which slows down the entire transformation process. 

And, with many things in business, the more data you have access to, the more likely you have to make the right decisions. 

Qumulo can help

Want to learn more about how a single data management solution can help you break down data silos and speed up digital transformation? We can help. 

Qumulo offers a platform-independent data management tool that brings unparalleled access to the unstructured data in your business. Let us help you unlock the full potential of your business. Book a demo today.

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