Internet of Things (IoT) Does Not Equal Productivity
Michael R. Neece
Business Executive, Product Dev. Leader, and Board Member, Delivering Next-Gen AI+XR+Blockchain powered SaaS Solutions ~ Instrument-Rated Pilot
The Internet of Things (IoT) is the networking of sensors in physical objects that measure temperature, flow rate, pressure, humidity, vibration, and many other variables. The path from IoT data to productivity is not direct, as the marketing hype suggests. IoT sensor data and analytics alone do not yield the productivity improvements and industrial efficiencies promised.
More Data Has Not Worked
Data is just data, no matter how “big” or heterogeneous the data streams might be. It is just data. Analytics are just reports on the data, no matter how insightful the reports might be. More data has yielded little productivity increases. Productivity has remained flat (±1%) since 2010, while IoT data has grown exponentially to 23B devices in 2016.
More Data Sharing & Apps Have Not Worked
More data sharing has not worked either. File sharing (Dropbox, Box.com, shared drives, Google Drive, SharePoint, etc.), instant messaging (Slack, MS Lync, Google Hangouts, etc.) and purpose-specific apps continue to fragment data and force knowledge-workers to waste 20% to 30% of their time searching for data and coordinating tasks (according to research by McKinsey, Interact, and IDC).
We've become addicted to data and apps, that has left us overwhelmed. And we've overlooked the most important factor that makes productivity improvements possible.
Productivity = IoT Analytics + ________
Productivity gains are a direct result of us, the humans, using IoT analytics and other information sources, to make decisions and launch business processes that improve operations, reduce costs, eliminate errors and avoid unscheduled downtime.
To coordinate business processes and information across networks of people, leading organizations are using next generation "Work Management" platforms to achieve productivity gains of +10%. It's not the "Things" of the Internet that matter most. It's the "Internet of People" that make productivity gains a reality.
What do you think about the link between IoT and productivity?