Unhiding Operational Sharks with Data Analytics

During a beach party at Dusk on Amity Island, New England, a young woman goes skinny dipping in the ocean. While treading water, she is violently pulled under. The next day, her partial remains are found on shore. The medical examiner's ruling that the death was due to shark attack leads police chief Martin Brody to close the beaches.

Impossible anyone who has never watched Jaws. One of the greatest classics of all time, it begins the bloody script with a warning of what we will soon find in his first scene, even without introducing us to the great villain of the movie, the shark.

However, even without the concrete visualization of the great danger the beach offered, our dear Martin Brody, played by Roy Scheder, made the decision to mitigate the imminent risk that the sea offered.

Interpreting facts and data to make decisions on them, is an arduous task in any industry.

How many times have we encountered alerts (minor leaks, fire principles, short circuits, operational incidents, etc.), but we let go because we either do not believe in the real risk or we put a potential financial risk in front of us - productive capacity, for example.

Following the scenes, Spielberg presents us with the second option. Mayor Larry Vaughn overrules the decision, fearing that the town's summer economy will be ruined. The coroner now concurs with the major theory that the girl was killed in a boating accident. Brody reluctantly accepts their conclusion until another fatal shark attack occurs shortly thereafter.

Being aware of what you are dealing with, facilitates forecasting the consequences that the major risks your business is exposed to, and helps you look at the impacts on your decisions.

If the Mayor had more data to analyze, would he still make the same decision? Thinking that, not only more deaths could happen, but also an economic crisis due to the closing of the beach (image reputation).

Most part of the companies have a much more complete database than Larry had in the film to make his decision.

So why are companies still so vulnerable to shark attacks, like the recent incidents in California at Pacific Gas & Electric, and in Brumadinho at Vale?

In short, even in the Industry 4.0 century, the experience with data analytics shows us that:

1. For the most part, data is managed in silos. That is, the industry keeps track of the main indicators in each of the areas (operations, maintenance, supply, human resources, etc) in different platforms that do not connect at the end of the day.
2. There is no integrated decision making considering all the facts and data. That is, while the sales team is in the middle of a promotion to reach the goals of the first half of the year, the operation seeks to increase its productive capacity even without knowledge of the qualification of its operators or the integrity of assets managed by the maintenance, for example.

Soon, we returned to Jaws, where Brody and a team of fishermen set out on a boat, the Orca, to hunt the shark. Without warning, it appears behind the boat. The first reaction that the experienced sailorman has? Harpoons the shark with a line attached to a flotation barrel.

Why? He wants to be clear about exactly where his major risk lies. This is where your Data Analytics program can certainly and must help.

Integrate operational data to make a conscious management of your business by considering and connecting all areas that enhance and mitigate risks within your operation to make a better data-driven decision.

An interconnected data management, through single platforms, facilitates visualization of operational relationships, generating managerial insights and increasing the resilience of its operation to possible “shark attacks”.

Important to remember, there are no zero risk operations. From the moment, you put your boat to float you are subject to sharks, or even iceberg collisions.

If you want to know more about industry intelligence, feel free to reach me at [email protected]