Today, every organization must become a more data-driven business. While most understand that this is important, they might not know how to do it. Here we share insights and learning from energy-giant Shell on how to prioritize data-driven operations.

1. Data Is The New Oil:
How Shell Has Become
A Data-Driven And
AI-Enabled Business

2. © 2019 Bernard Marr, Bernard Marr & Co. All rights reserved
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IntroductionIntroduction
What does it take to become a more data-driven business? This is a question that every
organization, not just tech companies, needs to grapple with, or they will falter in the
future. One of my customers is Shell – a company that is doing a great job of becoming
more data-driven. One of the driving forces to make the company more data-driven is
Dan Jeavons, Data Science Manager at the global energy and petrochemical company.
With this article (and related videos), I
want to share the learning experiences they had as they prioritized
data-driven operations.
Data Is The New Oil: How Shell Has Become A
Data-Driven And AI-Enabled Business

3. © 2019 Bernard Marr, Bernard Marr & Co. All rights reserved
Why Must Organizations Become
Data-Driven?
Does growing 30 percent annually sound appealing? According to Forrester, that’s what
data-driven organizations can expect to achieve in addition to being profitable and
acquiring and retaining new customers. Most organizations realize data should be central
to decision-making; however, leaping from knowing to doing isn’t as straightforward.
Here are some best practices from Shell and other thoughts on how best to transition to a
data-driven business.

4. © 2019 Bernard Marr, Bernard Marr & Co. All rights reserved
Think Strategically about Data
The starting point for any data strategy must be to examine your business challenges—
what's your business strategy, overall business goals, your biggest challenges, and
unanswered questions.
Before jumping into investing in data infrastructure and data-driven decisions, take a step
back and determine how data can become relevant to the strategy of the business, this
will help you to determine what data you need.

5. © 2019 Bernard Marr, Bernard Marr & Co. All rights reserved
Think Strategically about Data
At Shell, Jeavons explained the value of a two-speed approach. "It's very easy to think
about culture and standards and technologies and try to get that all right, but at the same
time, we have to make it matter to the business. What we try to do is to think about
minimal viable products that are going to have a significant business impact immediately
and use that to inform the KPIs that really matter to the business. Then, line up to that,
which data really matters and how to invest in data quality, data standards, and
technology to support doing this at scale."
It's important to review the data you have access to and determine how you will acquire
data diversity, and what new sets of data must be acquired to solve your particular
business challenges.

6. © 2019 Bernard Marr, Bernard Marr & Co. All rights reserved
Learn from Tech Companies
Shell, and the entire oil and gas industry, has been incredibly data-intensive for a very long
time. However, with the cloud, digitalization, and new technologies emerging, the value
and importance of data have gone up.
Jeavons shared, “What we’ve been trying to think through is how do we use data
enterprise-wide. We recognize that some of the skills that cloud-based technology
companies have developed and the way in which they think of data are quite different
than the way we’ve thought about it historically, so we want to learn from them.”
Jeavons encourages organizations to leverage the best practices and learn from what’s
going on in the market to bring expertise to your organization.

7. © 2019 Bernard Marr, Bernard Marr & Co. All rights reserved
Data Technology and Discipline
Once you have determined data sources and know where to get the data you need, you
must look at the technology and some of the tools to help determine where to store the
data, how to analyze it, and turn it into insights. Technology is another key enabler to
becoming a more data-driven business.
Jeavon explained how Shell is disciplined about the data the company collects and stores,
and they "learned that when you start down this road, it's very easy to get tempted to go
after lots of data and then look for a problem. Our experience is that if you put all the data
in one place, it's harder to sift through."

8. © 2019 Bernard Marr, Bernard Marr & Co. All rights reserved
Data Technology and Discipline
Shell built a phenomenal data set—likely the largest curated set of data on the planet
Jevon asserts. “At the same time, we’re focused on not pulling all sets of data, but only
sets of data that will drive business,” he said.
Data is an asset but also a potential liability. It's important for organizations to only
aggregate and integrate the data that is known to be of value, and that can be controlled.
Your organization needs to be clear on why you're collecting data and the benefit you will
drive from it. How can you envision that data being used in the future? How are you going
to control access to that data in such a way that you deal with it in a secure, reliable, and
well-managed fashion? When someone gains access to that data, how will they know what
they're looking at?

9. © 2019 Bernard Marr, Bernard Marr & Co. All rights reserved
Skills and Organizational Culture
It's important to make sure that people in your organization have the skills to use the data
and the ability to access the data, know how to use it, and gain insights. The
organizational culture needs to support fact-based, data-driven decision-making, and
make sure it's encouraged and the norm.
At Shell, Jeavon explained, they invested in professionalizing the core work of data
scientists and others who would spend all their time working on the most complex
problems the company had. They developed tailored training programs and aligned these
roles with other disciplines in the company and made data science as important as
petrophysics, as an example.

10. © 2019 Bernard Marr, Bernard Marr & Co. All rights reserved
Skills and Organizational Culture
Then, for the citizen data scientists—people who are in the business who need to use the
data to solve their own problems—Shell had to make sure they understood how to access
the data, develop their own algorithms and work with the data.
Another group, called the Shell AI community, that numbers roughly 2,000 people, is
learning about what it means to use data in new ways to drive their own business
performance. This is an area where there is a lot of excitement and real traction. People
are starting to adopt this at scale and learning how to better use data in their areas of
expertise. Shell schedules hackathons between data specialists and this AI community
where they collaborate to develop small-scale rapid solutions in a very, very short
timescale.

11. © 2019 Bernard Marr, Bernard Marr & Co. All rights reserved
Skills and Organizational Culture
Finally, another essential role in the data-driven business culture of Shell spans the
business and data communities. These business translators can speak the language of
business as well as data technology. These roles are absolutely crucial. Shell invested
heavily in training these people and worked with them to define ways in which the
company can translate what they need in terms of a business outcome perspective into a
valuable piece of work data scientists can do. These are essential personnel, and they tend
to self-identify from the business world and have a key interest in using technology and
applying it to solve business issues.

12. © 2019 Bernard Marr, Bernard Marr & Co. All rights reserved
Data Governance
The last component of becoming a data-driven business regards data governance. Every
organization needs to make sure the data that's collected is treated and stored securely,
the right legal framework is established, and it is known who has access to the data and
who can use it.

13. © 2017 Bernard Marr , Bernard Marr & Co. All rights reserved
© 2018 Bernard Marr, Bernard Marr & Co. All rights reserved
Bernard Marr is an internationally best-selling author, popular keynote speaker, futurist, and a
strategic business & technology advisor to governments and companies. He helps
organisations improve their business performance, use data more intelligently, and
understand the implications of new technologies such as artificial intelligence, big data,
blockchains, and the Internet of Things.
LinkedIn has ranked Bernard as one of the world’s top 5 business influencers. He is a frequent
contributor to the World Economic Forum and writes a regular column for Forbes. Every day
Bernard actively engages his 1.5 million social media followers and shares content that
reaches millions of readers.
Visit The
Website
© 2017 Bernard Marr , Bernard Marr & Co. All rights reserved
© 2019 Bernard Marr, Bernard Marr & Co. All rights reserved
Bernard Marr is an internationally best-selling author, popular keynote speaker, futurist, and a
strategic business & technology advisor to governments and companies. He helps
organisations improve their business performance, use data more intelligently, and
understand the implications of new technologies such as artificial intelligence, big data,
blockchains, and the Internet of Things.
LinkedIn has ranked Bernard as one of the world’s top 5 business influencers. He is a frequent
contributor to the World Economic Forum and writes a regular column for Forbes. Every day
Bernard actively engages his 1.5 million social media followers and shares content that
reaches millions of readers.
Visit The
Website

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