Dive Brief:

• Strong data and analytics are emerging as core pillars of a successful modern business. Having a clear strategy, good organizational design and talent-management helps turn insight into profit, according to a McKinsey study on data monetization.

• For technology companies, data and analytics practices significantly affect sales and marketing, R&D, supply chain/distribution, workplace management and other operations. Monetization through strong data and analytics helps companies drop traditional business models and gain a competitive edge.

• Strong leadership involvement was cited as the most important contributor to helping companies reach data and analytics goals. For companies leading in analytics, respondents were five times more likely to report that executive teams spent a significant amount of time — more than 20% — discussing the technology at high-level meetings.

Dive Insight:

Devices continuously collect and assimilate data — an estimated 2.5 quintillion bytes a day. This data helps companies predict trends and customer behavior, tailor interface experiences and drive business decisions.

Sometimes, people get nervous when they find out just how much data companies collect on them. For example, Netflix ruffled a few feathers in December when it poked fun at 53 users who watched "A Christmas Prince" daily for almost three weeks straight.

Marketing mishaps aside, the majority of collected data still goes unused by most companies, which loathe to get rid of non-critical or old data out of fear it could later be used for new insight. But when companies do figure out how to harness previously unmeasured data, so many possibilities arise. For example, the Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport tech team has translated data analytics to racetrack success. 

Companies and C-suites that take the time to set out a plan for how their companies will use as much of the data as they can will benefit down the line.