Visualize it! The key to driving better business decisions.

• Author: Bailey, Robert
• Position: Book review

The Visual Organization: Data Visualization, Big Data, and the Quest for Better Decisions

Author: Phil Simon

Publisher: Wiley

Publication Date: 2014

Length: 240 pages

Price: $50

ISBN: 978-1-118-79438-8

Source: www.wiley.com

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The author of The Visual Organization, Phil Simon, indicates that it is not a book about how to do data visualization--or dataviz, as he calls it. Rather, it's a book about becoming a visual organization, one that is "composed of intelligent people who recognize the power of data" and who "routinely uses contemporary, powerful, and interactive dataviz tools to ask better questions and ultimately make better business decisions."

These interactive and robust tools allow an organization to analyze its data, records, and information, as well as their relationships, to discover trends, diagnose technical issues, and unearth valuable insights about its customers and services.

According to Simon, because every organization has data, all can benefit from data visualization, including to:

* Understand past events and why they happened

* Monitor current activities

* Generate insights and make more informed organizational decisions

* Discover and identify nuanced issues and ask better questions about existing processes

Profiles Visual Organizations

Simon writes that too many organizations "rely on old standbys [like] bar charts, simple graphs and the ubiquitous Excel spreadsheet. And their business decisions suffer as a result."

He explains clearly how visualization tools and strategies are being used successfully in organizations every day, featuring profiles of some of the organizations who get it--like Netflix, Autodesk, and eBay. For example, Netflix's data-centric mindset is captured in its three-part credo:

1. Data should be accessible, easy to discover and easy to process for everyone.

2. The longer you take to find the data, the less valuable it becomes.

3. Whether a dataset is large or small, being able to visualize it makes it easier to explain.

Parallels with RM

Netflix's credo is not much different from any good records manager's view. The important additional element of Netflix's formidable data capabilities is data visualization.

Simon also stresses metadata, or data about data, which records managers also recognize as critical to what I call the five rights: getting the right information to the...