I was fortunate to participate in the SAS Power Series event that was held in Minneapolis recently. This event brought together seasoned analytic users from a variety of companies to share their experiences, successes and challenges as they strive to leverage analytics to help drive their business.

Although the business value delivered by analytics was clear to this audience, I was struck by a common theme that many participants discussed: the need to communicate and prove the business value of analytics to the remainder of the organization.

Thornton May put a fine point on the value and necessity of analytics when he stated “Everyone from everywhere is competing for everything.” His statement emphasizes that companies need analytics to differentiate themselves in this day and age of hyper competition.

Attendees discussed how the value of analytics can be promoted more effectively if there is collaboration between the various constituents within the organization, not just simplistic collaboration between business and IT, but true collaboration from multiple disciplines often lumped into business and IT including statisticians, analysts, IT employees focused on data management tasks, data warehousing administrators, business analysts, data stewards, and the business consumers of the analytics output.

One forward-looking company discussed how they now have a VP of Business Analytics and Intelligence that is tasked with overseeing and promoting analytics throughout the organization. Perhaps most important, this position has a seat at the Executive Management table.

We’ll continue this conversation about business value at upcoming Executive Forums that are ideal for VP and C-levels in San Jose & New York or the Collaborative Forums that are ideal for senior managers through directors in San Francisco, Houston & Atlanta.

We are also initiating a community based Website where business analytic professionals can share their experiences at www.allanalytics.com. Please join us as we continue this dialog about how leading companies are driving real competitive differentiation using business analytics.