Globalization: a definition and impact as it relates to data and the digitization of all things business

Globalization is the ever increasing interconnectivity and interdependency of finance, politics, culture, the environment, language, currency, trade, industry, technology, social networks, travel, disease, thought, research, collaboration, information, know how, expertise, and business, across local, national, and international boundaries.
Factories are becoming virtual. Engineering and design centers have nothing but human thought and computers to capture the works into digitized form. Factory scheduling, supply inventory, demand planning -- all done using algorithms, computers, and data.

What does this mean for business as it relates to data? Everything! Because your data has become more relevant in more ways to more users across more boundaries than ever before. Your good data is returning more and more value every day, and your bad data is becoming toxic, viral, distracting, and negatively impacting your business, every day, every year, every time it is used. Bad data is a disease to business.

How is globalization affecting your business? How is your data enabling these effects? Is it crippling you? Does your data affect those connected to you as well? Can you measure these effects? Quantitatively? Qualitatively?
What if BP did not know there were worn out parts, poor maintenance scheduling, bad supplier contracts, and sub par safety manuals, procedures and tracking (presuming these combined may have had a hand in their disaster); could better data have prevented the Gulf oil spill catastrophe?

Maybe! But, only if BP also had the culture, processes, and reporting necessary to know there was a problem and also to then act to resolve the problem on time!
Sometimes it's the simple purchase orders that always seem to ship the wrong part to the wrong place - and it costs you time and money to redo the order, restock the item, reship another part, not to mention that it may have been only a $10 part, but the production line went off-line for two days! What did that cost you? Maybe you have thousands of purchase orders that never seem to be correct, that's man-years of effort being wasted.

It is time to begin thinking about implications, impact, costs, and how these are affecting your competitiveness when the global economy has become so intertwined.

You may think of your data as fuel for your business, and your business processes as the engine, and management as the driver - without good fuel, you won't go far. If your competition has high octane fuel, and an F-1 super car engine, he may beat you to the finish line. Even the best drivers in the world cannot win races with bad fuel or bad engines.

Good, clean, relevant, complete, correct, current data is the new "Holy Grail" of business. Your business is (or may be) ready for success, but is your data?

Source: Utopia Inc