Recommendation for Designing and Executing a Business Analytics Project

To:       Candice Fleming, CIO, Montclair State University

From:  Jennifer Mackson

Date:   August 8, 2016

Re:       Recommendation for Designing and Executing a Business Analytics Project

Montclair State University’s (“MSU”) short-term goal, is to grow from 300+ students to over 500 students in the next 3-5 years.  To accomplish this MSU would like to increase its attractiveness and appeal to prospective students.   MSU would like to explore the possibility of utilizing the approach suggested in Drs. Merchand an Peppard’s article “Why IT Fumbles Analytics.”

To assist with understanding how MSU can accomplish this, F.A.M. Consultants presented the five guidelines for successfully implementing an analytics project in accordance with Drs. Merchand an Peppard’s article:

1.      Place People at the Heart of the Initiative

2.      Emphasize Information Use as the Way to Unlock Value from IT

3.      Equip IT Project Teams with Cognitive and Behavioral Scientists

4.      Focus on Learning

5.      Worry More About Solving Business Problems than About Deploying Technology

The idea is to take a more analytical approach with IT projects that will exploit data in new ways and figuring out how to use the information generated to make better decisions or gain deeper insights into key aspects of the business.*  F.A.M. believes that this approach will have several impacts.  One of the impacts is an increase focus on students – current and prospective.  This focus enables MSU to identify information such as why students are considering leaving the program and what the program needs to do to minimize that.  Another is better financial performance from increased enrollment and then being able to manage costs.  Having the ability to monitor the decision making of finances provides a way for MSU to make more informed decisions concerning the allocation of funds.  Finally, statistical analysis will help determine a customer and market type that MSU should target to increase its enrollment.

The disadvantage to the suggested approach is that utilizing all five guidelines may yield the most optimal results but is not a one size fits all approach.  Applying all guidelines can become tedious, costly and/or unnecessary. 

Asked the question of which guideline would best suit MSU’s goal, I would recommend ‘Emphasize Information Use as the Way to Unlock Value from IT’.  This initiative encourages challenging and improving the way information is used, questions are answered and decisions are made.* This initiative has three approaches:  1) Ask second-order questions; 2) Discover what data you do and do not have and 3) Give IT project teams the freedom to reframe business problems.  Utilizing these three approaches will allow MSU to understand the information it needs to accomplish its goal, gather the information it needs, organize it and eventually interpret it.  From this information MSU can put together a plan and an IT strategy that will accomplish the institution’s goal of increasing its enrollment by 200+ students in the next 3-5 years.

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* Marchand, Donald A. and Peppard, Joe.  Why IT Fumbles.  Case Study.  Harvard Business Review, 2013.  Print. January-February 2013.