Lavastorm Analytics Survey Skills Tools and Attitudes October 2013

Analytical Skills, Tools & Attitudes 2013Analytics capabilities needed now and in the future

October 2013

Research conducted and written by:

Lavastorm Analytics – a global analytics software company that enables a new, agile way to analyze, optimize, and control data and business processes.

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Table of Contents

I. Executive Summary.......................................................................................... 3

II. Methodology....................................................................................................... 3

III. Key Takeaways.................................................................................................... 4

IV. Survey Results.......................................................................... ……………………… 5

V. Description of Survey Respondents............................................................. 16

VI. About Lavastorm Analytics.............................................................................. 22

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Executive SummaryOrganizations continue to invest more in analytics, but increasingly there is recognition that a shortage of analytic talent is holding back even greater investment. Lavastorm Analytics polled more than 425 people in the analytics community about whether their organization needs more analytic resources or skills and which skills are valued most and are most urgently needed.

Survey respondents included business analysts, technologists, data analytics professionals, managers, and C-level executives across a broad variety of industries. The top findings were:

According to the survey respondents, a lack of skills/training/education is the biggest factor holding back organizations from using analytics more.

Skills most urgently needed in their organizations are Statistics, math or other quantitative skills; Analytic tool training; and Critical thinking.

Lack of funding or resources, however, also has a significant impact on adoption of analytics to drive day-to-day decisions. Lesser factors also include inadequate support from executives and data that is not integrated.

MethodologyIn order to gain the most accurate insight into the market, we conducted our research within major analytic communities, including LinkedIn’s Lavastorm Analytics Community Group, Data Science Central and KDNuggets. These communities have a global reach of over 100,000 analysts that offer a diverse membership of analytic professionals across a variety of vertical markets.

This survey was conducted online using an electronic survey tool. More than 425 business analysts, technologists, data analytics professionals, managers and C-level professionals were polled across a broad variety of industries—including financial services, telecommunications, healthcare and software & internet. After the survey data was collected, the data was analyzed using the Lavastorm Analytics Engine to identify variances among different demographic groups. Every survey participant was encouraged to answer every question.

http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Lavastorm-Analytics-Community-Group-3875000?home=&gid=3875000&trk=anet_ug_hm

http://www.datasciencecentral.com/

http://www.kdnuggets.com/

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Key Takeaways:1. Nearly 83% of respondents indicated that analytics is critical to their organizations

and their organization uses analytics to drive day-to-day decisions more than past experiences, intuition and gut feel.

2. The biggest factors holding organizations from using analytics more are:

Lack of skills/training/education (18.75%)

Lack of funding or resources (17.82%)

Inadequate support from executives (9.7%)

Data is not integrated (8.8%)

3. Skills most urgently needed in their organizations are:

Statistics, math or other quantitative skills (47.7%)

Analytics tool training (40.3%)

Critical thinking (28.2%)

4. Statistics, math or other quantitative skills and critical thinking/questioning were the skills mentioned most often as necessary for the respondent to be successful in their role. Database or query language, analytics tool training, and business/presentation skills were also highly valued skills.

5. The most common organizational structure related to analytics is that business departments and IT both have analytic resources and they function independently.

6. Requirements gathering continues to take a significant amount of time. People spend just as much time gathering requirements as they do in analysis/data mining.

7. Though education is needed, ongoing education for analytics is largely not tied to external, analyst-related organizations. The overwhelming majority of respondents, regardless of industry and population group, have no organization they rely on for ongoing education and networking.

8. Tool-related improvements, including improvement to self-service tools, the data warehouse, and BI platforms, were cited as the changes that would make respondents’ job easier and more valuable (23.3% of respondents). Other changes mentioned often included changes related to the following categories:

More resources and funding (13.3%)

Increased awareness of the opportunities to apply analytics, including the use of Big Data (13%)

Data integration improvements (12.6%)

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Survey ResultsSelect the response that best describes your reaction to the following statement, “Analytics is critical to my organization’s business strategy and drives our day-to-day decisions more than past experiences, intuition, and gut feel.”

427 Survey ResponsesDemographic analysis:

Overall, all industries and all groups have a positive outlook on their organization’s use of analytics. Healthcare is the most skeptical industry – 12% either disagreed or strongly disagreed with the statement.

People from the Software & Internet industry were the most optimistic – 62% strongly agreed with the statement.

Data Scientists and Executives/Managers disagree most with 17% and 9% respectively responding with either strongly disagree and disagree.

Data scientists were the most skeptical population segment– 17% either disagree or strongly disagree.

Strongly Agree42.7%

Agree40.1%

Neither Agree nor Disagree 10.0%

Disagree 6.0%

Strongly Disagree 1.2%

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What is the biggest factor holding your organization back from using analytics to drive more day-to-day decisions?

427 Survey Responses

Other includes: Time

Politics/people afraid of redundancy

Fast changing environment

Demographic analysis:

By company size

Small Companies most often selected lack of funding or resources as a factor (26%). It was also the segment that most often indicated Inadequate Support from Executives (12%).

Large (19%) and Medium Companies (24%) most often reported a lack of skills/training/education as a factor.

By industry

Lack of skills/training/education was the most often mentioned factor for both the Financial Services and Software & Internet industry.

Lack of funding or resources was the most often mentioned factor for both the Business Services and Telecommunications industry.

In the Healthcare and Pharmaceutical industry, inadequate support from executives was the most often mentioned factor.

By population group

Twenty-three percent (23%) of Executives/Managers thought that lack of funding was a major factor.

IT developers (35%) most commonly mention lack of skills/training as a major factor.

Compared to Business Analysts, Data Scientists more often mentioned inadequate support from the business (9% vs 3%) and software and tools are under-powered (9% vs 5%).

Business Analysts struggle with data integration more than Data Scientists (11% to 2%).

Lack of funding or resources 17.6%

Lack of skills/training/education (either for specific analytic

techniques or specific tools) 18.8%

Inadequate support from executives 9.7%

Software and tools are too complicated 2.1%

Insufficient data/information presented in reports 1.6%

Inadequate means to present analytic insights to executives in ways they can trust 3.0%

Inadequate access to data 5.1%

Data is not integrated 8.8%Poor data quality 6.0%

None - no factor is holding us back 11.1%

Other (please specify) 3.0%

Inadequate support from the business organization 5.1%

Software and tools are under-powered 3.9%

Inadequate support from IT 3.9%

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Select the response that best describes your organizational structure related to analytics.


Other includes:

We are a very small company wholly focused on analytics - 3 full time people

Chaos

Sporadic analytics resources in departments, none in IT


More than 60% of respondents say their organizational structure for analytics places analytic resources in both business departments and in IT.

Regardless of company size, the organizational structure used is most often one where business and IT groups function independently. However, large Companies are more likely to have independently-functioning business and IT groups as their model (44%) than Small Companies (28%). In addition, Small Companies are most likely to have analytics centralized within IT (19% compared to 7% for Large Companies).

Analytic resources are centralized within IT 14.9%

Analytic resources are centralized outside of IT

19.5%

Business departments and IT both have analytic resources and they function independently 36.4%

Business departments and IT both have analytic resources and they function collaboratively 26.0%

Other (please specify) 3.3%

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Do you agree with the following statement? “My organization has a shortage of people with the skills to analyze and glean insights from data.”



While most people thought they are doing a good job of using analytics to drive decision making, 66% either agree or strongly agree that they have a shortage of people with the skills to analyze and glean insights from the data. Financial Services and Healthcare (73% and 77%, respectively) had the highest percentage of people agreeing that there is a shortage of talent.

Telecommunications (24% either strongly disagree or disagree) and Business Services (21% either strongly disagree or disagree) thought that they were in the best shape.

Agree39.2%

Strongly Agree26.2%

Neither Agree nor Disagree

17.4%

Disagree 13.7%

Strongly Disagree 3.5%

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What analytic skills does your organization most urgently need to increase? Select no more than 3.


Other includes:

Modern big data technologies

Programming skills

Requirement gathering and commercial orientation

Suitable software - related skills


The most urgently needed skills for Medium Companies were statistics, math or other quantitative skills, database query, and tool training as needed skills.

Small Companies (23%) were more than twice as likely as Large Companies (10%) to need organizational/planning skills.

Data scientists and Executives/Managers mentioned statistics, math or other quantitative skills as an urgent need more than other groups (64% and 52%, respectively).

IT Developers were the only group to list analytic tool training as their top choice.

Respondents in the Telecommunications industry (16%) mentioned Excel skills and experience more often than other industries.

Respondents from the Healthcare (38%) and Software & Internet (40%) industries mentioned critical thinking more often than other industries.

Critical thinking

Statistics, math or other quantitative skills

Database or query language skills and experience

47.8%

40.4%

31.8%

28.1%

16.2%

None - at the moment we do not need to increasethe analytic skills of our organization

11.6%

11.1%

10.2%

7.2%

5.1%

4.9%

3.3%

Analytics tool training

Business communication/presentation skills

ETL skills and experience

Industry certification in Business Analysis

Industry experience

Organizational/planning skills

Excel skills and experience

Prior business analyst experience

Negotiation skills

Other (please specify)

15.5%

15.3%

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What are the 3 analytic skills or experiences that are most necessary for you to be successful in your current role? Select no more than 3.

Critical thinking/questioning

Statistics, math or other quantitative skills

Database or query language skills and experience

43.6%

41.7%

32.3%

31.4%

26.9%

Design skills for user interfaces and reports

20.8%

17.8%

17.3%

15.0%

13.8%

9.1%

8.9%

7.3%

1.2%

Analytics tool training

Business communication/presentation skills

Programming skills

ETL or data integration skills and experience

Industry experience

Organizational/planning skills

Excel skills and experience

Prior business analyst experience

Negotiation skills

Other (please specify )


Other includes:

Conceptual modeling

Lower level e.g. Unix scripting skills

Experience of the business

Time management

Sales


Large Companies (34%) were less likely than Small (47%) and Medium (42%) Companies to select statistics, math or other quantitative skills as an important skill.

Large Companies (27%) value industry experience more than Small and Medium Companies (both 19%).

Negotiation was twice as important in Small Companies (12%) than Large Companies (only 6%).

Respondents from the Telecommunications and Business Services industries mentioned tool training more often than other industries (39% and 36%, respectively).

Data scientists thought statistics, math or quantitative skills (74%) were their most important skills.

Business analysts thought that database or query language skills (39%) and critical thinking/questioning (38%) were their most important skills.

Executives/Managers thought critical thinking (52%) was the most important skill.

IT thought statistics, math or quantitative skills (50%) as well as analytic tool training (50%) were their most important skills.

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How did you spend your time over the past year? Indicate the percentage of time you dedicated to the activities below. Your answers should add up to 100% and account for 100% of your time over the past year.



Respondents from the Telecommunications, Financial Services, and Software & Internet industries spent more time gathering requirements than any other task.

Respondents from the Business Services industry spend more of their time presenting results (16%). Respondents from the Healthcare industry also spend a significant amount of time presenting results (14%).

Business analysts spend the highest percentage of their time on requirements gathering and data analysis (17%).

Data scientists spend most of their time on data analysis/mining (19%), data modeling (14%), and data transformations and integration (14%). They spend much less time on requirements gathering than Business Analysts, Executives/Managers, and IT.

As expected, Executives/Managers spend most of their time on planning/strategy meetings, requirements gathering, and data analysis.

Data analysis/mining

Requirements gathering

Preparing or presenting results/reports

14.1%

13.4%

10.5%

9.1%

8.3%

Training others to use results/reports

7.4%

7.1%

6.5%

4.8%

4.3%

4.0%

3.0%

2.2%

5.2%

Planning/strategy meetings with others

Filtering and organizing data

Administrative activities

Data modeling

Data transformation and integration

Making business decisions based onanalytic insights

Infrastructure design and implementation

Testing and tuning processes

Other (analysis related)

Other (not analysis related)

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Related to data access, what do you believe hurts or prevents your access to data? (Check all that apply)


Other includes: Business Analyst does not have access to DataWarehouse for mining Lack of integration Operational data systems not designed to retrieve/report/analyze information Poor data quality Lack of understanding the data No problems


By company size

Data governance policies by IT was more often mentioned as a factor in Large (44%) and Medium (40%) Companies than Small Companies (30%).

Inadequate self-service tools/report was more often mentioned as a factor in Large (42%) and Medium (44%) Companies than Small Companies (28%).

Lack of skills/knowledge was more often mentioned as a factor in Large (32%) and Medium (32%) Companies than Small Companies (24%).

Lack of APIs was more often mentioned as a factor in Large (31%) Companies than in Medium (22%) and Small Companies (19%).

By industry

Respondents from the Business Services and Software & Internet industries report that incompatible formats/lack of data model (42%) is the factor that most hinders data access.

Respondents from the Healthcare industry report that inadequate self-service tools/reports is the factor that most hinders data access.

Respondents from the Financial Services and Telecom industries report that data governance policies by IT are the things that most hinder data access.

By population group

Business Analysts (45%) and Data Scientists (47%) said data governance is the major issue.

Executives said lack of self-service tools/reports (44%) is the major issue related to data access.

IT developers said data governance policies by IT (40%) is the factor that hurts or prevents data access.

Inadequate self-service tools/reports

Data governance policies by IT

IT does not have the data in the data warehouse

Incompatible formats/lack of data model

Lack of skills/knowledge to use the tools/reports that are available to me

Lack of APIs from operational systems


38.3%

38.0%

35.3%

34.8%

29.5%

23.7%

9.7%

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Select the option that best describes your reaction to the following statement, “Analyst related certifications/degrees have been very important to my initial education, ongoing education, and ultimate success in the field of analytics.”



Respondents from the Software & Internet (51%), Financial Services (49%), Business Services (45%), and Telecom (45%) agree most that analyst related certifications/degrees are important to their initial and ongoing education. But, many respondents weren’t sure whether they were a help or not.

IT Developers are the group that most agrees that certifications/degrees help them (70%) gain success in analytics.

Strongly agree 18.1%

Somewhat agree30.6%

Do not agree or disagree 27.8%

Somewhat disagree 13.2%

Strongly disagree10.2%

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What analyst related organizations, if any, do you rely on for ongoing education and networking to help you in your job? (select all that apply)


Other includes:

SAS certificates

American Statistical Association

INFORMS

Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs)

Coursera

University courses

Project Management Institute (PMI) Project Management Professional (PMP)

We educate our own people. Formal education is outdated.


Financial Services has the least reliance on analyst-related organizations for education and networking (69%).

Only 36% of Business Analysts carry a certification from the IIBA. But that is much greater than only 18% of Data Scientists.

IIBA Certification was more likely in Large Companies (15%) compared to Small (4%) and Medium Companies (5%).

More respondents from Small Companies (76%) than Large (58%) and Medium Companies (57%) said they did not rely on analyst-related organizations for ongoing education and networking.

None - I do not rely on any organization forongoing education and networking

Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) Certified Business Analyst

TDWI Certified Business Intelligence Professional (CBIP)

IIBA Certified Business Analysis Professional™ (CBAP)

IIBA Certification of Competency in Business Analysis™ (CCBA)

BSC (formerly ISEB) Certificate in Business Analysis Practice


63.6%

12.5%

12.3%

11.8%

7.2%

3.3%

9.7%

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What is the biggest change you would like to see in your organization to make your job easier or more valuable? Note - This survey question was open ended. Results were categorized by Lavastorm Analytics after the survey responses were collected.


Better tools/Self-service Tools/Warehouse/BI Tools/BI Platforms 23.3%

More Alignment of Resourcesand Funding 13.3%

Increased Awareness/Opportunities of Analytics/Big Data 13.0%

Data Models/Data Integration/Consistency in Data AcrossSystems 12.6%

Data-based Decisions/Data Governance/Data Ownership/Trusted Data 7.2%

Data Quality 4.9%

More Training 11.4%Collaboration/Communication/Process Flow/Strategy/Project Issues 11.2%

Need Change in Business Infrastructure 10.0%

Management/Executive Buy-in/Culture 8.4%

Data Access 7.4%

Need More Analytics/BI Professionals 4.9%

More Data Sources 2.3%

Agility/Flexibility/More Time for Analysis 1.4% Other 10.5%

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Description of Survey RespondentsWhich of the following best describes your role within your organization?


Other includes:

Owner

Big data analyst

Data analyst

Market research

For demographic analysis, the following additional aggregations were used to analyze the survey responses:

Executives/Managers = sum of responses from Corporate Executive (CEO, CFO, COO, etc.); CIO or IT Executive; Department VP, Director or Manager; VP or Director of BI/Analytics

Corporate Executive (CEO, CFO, COO, etc.) 2.8%

CIO or IT Executive 2.1%

Department VP, Director or Manager

15.3%VP or Director of BI/Analytics

8.6%

Business Analyst22.0%

Data Scientist 10.9%

Business Systems Analyst 6.3%

Business Process Analyst 1.4%

IT Developer 4.6%

Consultant11.8%

Other (please specify)14.2%

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What education levels have you completed?


Doctoral degree (business or non-technical/quantitative major) 2.3%

None of the above 4.4%

2-year college degree (Associate’s) 4.4%

4-year college degree (technical /quantitative major) 26.7%

4-year college degree (business or non-technical /quantitative major) 18.6%

Master’s degree (technical/quantitative major) 23.9%

Master’s degree (business or non-technical/quantitative

major) 29.9%Doctoral degree (technical /quantitative major) 6.7%

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In your organization, to which department do you report?


Other includes:

President

Analytics

Board

Business unit

Risk

Finance8.6%

IT29.9%

Sales5.3%

Marketing10.4%

Operations16.7%

Other (please specify)29.0%

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How many total people work in your organization?

427 Survey ResponsesOther includes: For demographic analysis, the following additional aggregations were used to classify the survey responses:

Small Companies = sum of responses from Fewer than 100; 100 – 249 and 250 – 499

Medium Companies = sum of responses from 500 – 999 and 1,000 – 10,000

Large Companies = 10,000 +

Fewer than 10016.9%

100 – 2498.8%

250 - 4996.5%

500 – 99911.4%

1,000 – 10,00029.9%

10,000+26.5%

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How many business analysts or data scientists work in your organization?


What are the annual revenues of your organization?


Less than $50 million 17.6%

$50 million - $100 million 6.0%

$500 million - $1 billion 7.4%

$100 million - $500 million 9.1%

$1 billion+29.5%Unable to disclose

18.6%

Don’t know11.8%

03.9%

1 – 938.8%

10 – 2416.5%

25 – 499.3%

50 – 999.3%

100 – 49912.1%

500 – 1,0003.7%

1,000 +6.5%

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How long have you worked in the field of business analysis?


Less than one year6.0%

1 – 2 years8.1%

2 – 5 years21.4%

5 – 10 years29.0%

10+ years26.9%

I have never worked in the field of business analysis 8.6%

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Which of the following best describes your company’s primary industry?


Other includes:

Marketing

Consulting

Automotive

IT

Agriculture & Mining 0.9% Telecommunications 18.79%

Business Services 7.7%

Computers & Electronics 3.0%

Education 6.5%

Energy & Utilities 2.1%

Financial Services14.4%

Government 3.3%

Healthcare, Pharmaceuticals, & Biotech 9.1%

Manufacturing 2.3%

Media & Entertainment 1.6%

Non-Profit 1.2%

Real Estate & Construction 0.9%

Retail 3.0%

Software & Internet10.4%

Transportation & Storage 1.4%

Travel, Recreation & Leisure 0.7%

Wholesale & Distribution 0.7%

Consumer Services 1.2%

Other 10.9%

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About Lavastorm AnalyticsLavastorm Analytics is a global analytics software company that enables a new, agile way to analyze, optimize, and

control data and business processes. The company’s products provide analysts with programming powers previously

limited to IT to rapidly unify disparate data, easily construct complex analytics, and effectively deliver actionable insight

and results. Analytics built in Lavastorm can easily be deployed as persistent solutions and applications, providing

continuous analytic monitoring across multiple systems and complex, data-intensive processes. Lavastorm’s solutions

have identified business improvements worth billions of dollars for some of the largest corporations in the world.

For more information on Lavastorm Analytics or to download a desktop edition of the Lavastorm Analytics Engine,

our data analytics software for business analysts, please visit www.lavastorm.com or

www.lavastorm.com/resources/software-downloads-trials, respectively.

www.lavastorm.com

http://www.lavastorm.com/resources/software-downloads-trials

www.lavastorm.com

© Lavastorm Analytics, 2013. All rights reserved.

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Lavastorm Analytics Survey Skills Tools and Attitudes October 2013