Are you ready for decision intelligence?

What are your best business decisions? And your worst? Reflecting on these choices, you’ll likely notice a pattern. The best decisions were informed by reliable data, while the worst were made with incomplete or misleading information. Fast and specific business decisions increasingly depend on data. But while data is critical, the human element remains strong. Decision-making requires the right mix of accurate information and human experience, so how does decision intelligence (DI) enhance the decision-making process?

What is decision intelligence?

Decision intelligence is a new(ish) application of artificial intelligence (AI) into business intelligence (BI) systems, enabling business people to leverage advanced analytics for more nuanced and actionable insights. Unlike traditional BI, which focuses on aggregating and visualizing data to provide insights, DI takes it a step further by using AI algorithms to predict outcomes and suggest how the user should act.

Gartner defines decision intelligence as a practical discipline that advances decision making by explicitly understanding and engineering how decisions are made and how outcomes are evaluated, managed and improved through feedback.

Phocas Analytics was an early leader in incorporating AI into our BI platform, but with a focus on empowering users further rather than replacing them. Unlike many DI solutions that promise to automate every decision, Phocas integrates AI to support human judgment, not to override it. This approach ensures that business people can use the power of AI while maintaining the flexibility and creativity of human experience.

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Decision intelligence and the human factor

There’s a misconception that AI-driven decision-making removes the need for human input. At Phocas, we believe that decision intelligence is most effective when it works alongside human expertise. For instance, teamwork and building relationships with customers and suppliers require emotional intelligence, a quality no AI bots or agents can currently replicate.

Nobel-prize winning economist Daniel Kahneman highlights the pitfalls of relying solely on human judgment, such as mental biases and heuristics. He is also interested in people not being aware of information that they don’t have – this is called availability heuristic or WYSIATI ‘what you see is all there is’. The idea is to take the information you have and create the best story possible from it – often at the expense of overlooking critical gaps.

Similarly, Edward de Bono’s “6 thinking hats” theory illustrates how personal perspectives influence decision-making. From the emotional, instinct-driven red hat to the cautious black hat, individual tendencies shape outcomes in different ways.

These decision-making insights emphasize the importance of combining unbiased, comprehensive data with human experience and emotional intelligence to mitigate errors and enhance human judgement.

The role of data integration and consolidation

Trustworthy data is the backbone of analytics, BI and DI. Garbage in, garbage out remains a basic truth in data analysis and the efficacy of AI. For business people to make reliable decisions, they need a robust data infrastructure that ensures accuracy, consistency and real-time updates of all their business data.

Phocas began with our foundational Analytics product many years ago as we knew data was the backbone to business success and fast, accurate decisions making. The importance of data has grown exponentially since then just like our product offering. While connected budgeting, building a data-driven culture, management reporting and company-wide decision-making are now all possible – these business processes all stem from our foundational Analytics product.

Phocas effectively integrates and consolidates customers data helping to solve one of the most significant challenges businesses face which is fragmented data or data silos. Many organizations store information across multiple systems, making it difficult to bring them all together to get a complete and accurate picture. Phocas has worked for years to streamline this process by integrating with over 200 data sources, including ERP systems that dominate manufacturing, distribution and retail. All customers’ relevant databases in Phocas update automatically whenever the source data updates thanks to established processes and human checks. This ongoing integration means business people are always working with up-to-date information.

But data consolidation isn’t just about aggregation, it’s also about data quality. Phocas uses rigorous data cleaning processes to eliminate duplicates and standardize formats, ensuring consistency and reliability every day. This commitment to data accuracy is rare in the BI world but means that our customers can trust their insights, leading to faster and more confident decision-making.

Watch out for the DI washing

As DI gains popularity, so does the risk of DI-washing. Many of these ‘instant’ DI platforms or ‘self-serve data integration’ capability offerings prioritize hype over foundational principles like detailed integration and data accuracy.

Without a solid data foundation, we don’t recommend going all-in on DI. Phocas opts for a measured approach to DI and our focus on data integrity sets Phocas apart in the manufacturing, distribution and retail markets.

We also encourage you to consider your readiness for DI – just as we do when people start using BI. Before diving into DI, ask yourself these questions. Is your data ready? Are your systems integrated? What’s your process for balancing data-driven insights with on-the-job experience? Consider these fundamentals before you launch into a decision intelligence platform, where your team or your provider needs skills in data science (Python, R, SQL), decision modelling, technological integration, behavioral sciences, collaboration and ethics. Phocas has all these skills internally which are used to build, enhance and maintain our BI and Financial Planning & Analysis (FP&A) platform.

Empowering decision-making across your business

Data-driven decision-making isn’t just for a select few. It is necessary for everyone in the organization, from sales teams to finance departments. Phocas’ user-friendly platform makes it easy for people of all skill levels to access and understand data, then be able to turn the necessary information into action. It’s a successful process helping customers address important areas of their work with practical information to help them address managing margins, growing sales or to review pricing decisions.

As we all continue to trial AI, the importance of trustworthy data will only grow. Our commitment to data quality and decision-making empowerment ensures that business people can use AI in BI to its fullest potential so everyone can make clear and accurate decisions.