Data analytics: do you really need to call in the experts?

While great data scientists are often adept at making the complex seem simple, the reality is that understanding data and analytics – and making sense of trends and extracting insights – is very technical work. Having an employee or team that can provide insights can be extremely beneficial - yet it’s also important that they’re qualified and able to interpret the data to the level you require. For this reason, it’s important to ensure you’re prepared to give your existing team the in-depth training they will need.

Also, according to this article, Garter and Robert Walters say the labour market for analytics professionals in Australia has grown increasingly tight, and it can take up to 18 months for an analyst to become value generating.

Investing in an internal data analytics solution, and team, can require a considerable investment. Employing a new data analytics team can also make it difficult to scale analytics initiatives up over time. Sometimes, relying on an outsourced expert partner – even to some degree – can be a more cost-effective option.

According to this article, internal analytics resources are also often time constrained and find it difficult to keep up with the ad-hoc reporting and analytics requests from the business.

Sometimes, data analytics initiatives will require very specific knowledge or skills. In these instances, it can be worth outsourcing to an external provider who can offer guidance and specific expertise.