Exploring big data’s strategic consequences

TLDR: In this article, the authors argue that big data qualitatively alters strategic processes by extending managerial possibilities for acting on both structured and unstructured information because the conceptually presumed linear links between corporate strategy, firm structure and information systems design no longer hold.

Abstract: Big data multiplies the potential of organizational data engagement and the shaping of enterprise strategy processes. The paper argues that big data qualitatively alters strategic processes by extending managerial possibilities for acting on both structured and unstructured information because the conceptually presumed linear links between corporate strategy, firm structure and information systems design no longer hold. Big data draws organizational information systems into a shifting dynamic of altered forms of information access and use as part of a wider complex loop of interventions and analyses. Big data analyses are for many firms becoming indispensable strategic ploys which themselves alter strategies that further mobilize big data consequences. The paper also argues that the use of big data for directing enterprise activities effects behavioural and political organizational consequences. The paper concludes

Full text

Alnoor Bhimani
Exploring big data’s strategic
consequences
Article (Accepted version)
(Refereed)
Original citation:
Bhimani, Alnoor (2015) Exploring big data’s strategic consequences. Journal of Information
Technology, 30 (1). pp. 66-69. ISSN 0268-3962
DOI: 10.1057/jit.2014.29
© 2015 JIT Palgrave Macmillan
This version available at: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/86632/
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Exploring Big Data’s Strategic Consequences
Alnoor Bhimani*
Forthcoming in: Journal of Information Technology
*Department of Accounting, London School of Economics, Houghton Street, London WC2A 2AE,
United Kingdom Email: a.bhimani@lse.ac.uk

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Exploring Big Data’s Strategic Consequences
Abstract
Big data multiplies the potential of organizational data engagement and the shaping
of enterprise strategy processes. The paper argues that big data qualitatively alters
strategic processes by extending managerial possibilities for acting on both structured
and unstructured information because the conceptually presumed linear links between
corporate strategy, firm structure and information systems design no longer hold. Big
data draws organizational information systems into a shifting dynamic of altered
forms of information access and use as part of a wider complex loop of interventions
and analyses. Big data analyses are for many firms becoming indispensable strategic
ploys which themselves alter strategies that further mobilize big data consequences.
The paper also argues that the use of big data for directing enterprise activities effects
behavioural and political organizational consequences. The paper concludes with a
discussion of wide level strategy issues tied to big data analytical shifts.
Keywords: Data and information, big data, strategy

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Introduction
Novel ways for enterprises to alter the speed of their operations, enhance the
flexibility of their decision making, change their strategic posture; and extend their
achievable economic efficiencies are continuously being advanced through
technological means. Virtually no dimension of modern enterprise activity today
remains untouched by digital technologies. These include ‘the internet of things’,
‘the internet of you’, immersive interfaces, social media, 3D printing, cloud
computing and networked mobile devices which have enabled the rise of new forms
of organizational intelligence through big data collection and analysis. Traditionally
information used by organizations in decision making has been produced by formal
systems whose architectures aligned with specified standards of retrieval and
presentation. Such information systems were designed to capture transactions, both
physical and economic, rather than reflect indications of possible consumer intent and
focused primarily on historical events rather than on real time changes. Big data now
poses a challenge to enterprises in that it arises from wider configurations of
information pools – past and present, structured and unstructured, formal and
informal, social and economic, and which constantly evolve in their content and
representation. Big data in effect multiplies the potential of organizational data
engagement and the shaping of enterprise strategy processes.
Big data is used by a growing number of organizations in combination with
established data sources impacting their managerial decisions and actions (Davenport
2014; Rifkin 2014). It is for many firms generating asset value both through the
storage of information whose potential grows by virtue of its volume as well as from
the consequences of its examination (Brynjolfsson and McAfee, 2014; Schmidt and
Cowen, 2013). Big data arguably adds an analytics dimension to existing
organizational capabilities unleashing a diversity of strategic re-orientation

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possibilities (Galbraith 2014). So the suggestion that it implies new rules is not an
overstatement – indeed it is timely and appropriate to seek to expound on the
changing context of strategy and explore how it is qualitatively affected by big data
as Constantiou and Kallinikos (current issue) undertake to do.
Most of the data organizations collect, create and store is unstructured. Awareness
that the analysis of unstructured data can potentially engender decisions which
hitherto could not be posited via formal information outputs has been ample but the
means to accomplish this have only recently emerged. What is now coming to light
as large bases of data are retrieved, analysed and interpreted, is that consequent
decisions can be sufficiently significant as to alter the core of enterprise strategic
processes (Beath et al. 2012; Galbraith, 2014; Mayer-Schonberger and Cukier, 2013).
Although ‘technologising’ solutions for the codification of knowledge into
managerially useful forms dependent on ‘informating’ business activities (Willcocks
et al. 2014) continue to preoccupy enterprise information roles, more and more
technologies for data collection, storage and processing geared to addressing big data
issues are evolving and are influencing strategic processes. This paper considers
aspects of strategy process consequences of big data deployment to add to the view
that big data creates challenges to ‘established rules of strategy making’
(Constantinou and Kallinikos, current issue). The paper first considers how strategy
might be seen to be tied to information systems. Here, it discusses the traditional
links between enterprise strategy, structure and the information provision function
and how big data is affecting this dynamic. Second, the paper explores what
happens when the form information takes as an input into decisions, both operational
and strategic, alters. Information that is unstructured and derived from collection
objectives not established ex ante are argued to potentially influence strategic
processes in a variety of ways. Third, the paper identifies how big data analyses
affect strategies such as to further effect consequences for the analysis of big data.
The paper concludes with a discussion of wide level strategy issues tied to big data
analytical shifts.

Frequently asked questions

Q1. What contributions have the authors mentioned in the paper "Exploring big data’s strategic consequences" ?

The paper argues that big data qualitatively alters strategic processes by extending managerial possibilities for acting on both structured and unstructured information because the conceptually presumed linear links between corporate strategy, firm structure and information systems design no longer hold. The paper also argues that the use of big data for directing enterprise activities effects behavioural and political organizational consequences. The paper concludes with a discussion of wide level strategy issues tied to big data analytical shifts. Big data analyses are for many firms becoming indispensable strategic ploys which themselves alter strategies that further mobilize big data consequences. 

Q2. What is the role of the consumer in the design and customisation of products?

Consumers become involved in the design and customisation of products via enterprise platforms creating ‘prosumers’ who generate new orders and forms of data that reduce the usefulness of conventional information management mechanisms. 

Q3. What is the title of the paper?

The paper argues that big data qualitatively alters strategic processes by extending managerial possibilities for acting on both structured and unstructured information because the conceptually presumed linear links between corporate strategy, firm structure and information systems design no longer hold. 

Q4. What is the main argument that the information system is a key component of the enterprise?

novel technologies trigger new enterprise forms which rely on transformations of information assessments to create added corporate value. 

Q5. What is the main argument that big data is influencing strategic processes?

Information that is unstructured and derived from collection objectives not established ex ante are argued to potentially influence strategic processes in a variety of ways. 

Q6. What is the main argument in the paper?

The paper also argues that the use of big data for directing enterprise activities effects behavioural and political organizational consequences. 

Q7. What is the definition of a strategic pursuit?

If strategic pursuits can define appropriate enterprise structuring then information flows can be deemed to likely require conformant shaping. 

Q8. What is the role of information systems in the enterprise?

Information systems are involved in a shifting dynamic of altered forms of information access and use as part of a wider complex loop of interventions and analyses. 

Q9. What is the main argument that big data implies new rules of strategy making?

Big data arguably adds an analytics dimension to existing organizational capabilities unleashing a diversity of strategic re-orientationpossibilities (Galbraith 2014). 

Q10. What is the broad contention that information delineates?

The broad contention has been that information delineates the internally controlled domain of opportunities in which organizers can search for higher returns. 

Q11. What is the role of information intelligence in the evolution of business?

But new forms of information intelligence are driving the installation of defined enterprise structures as means of enabling the evolution of altered strategic aims. 

Q12. What is the foundational idea of the strategy structure-information system thesis?

Management thinkers have propounded the foundational idea that corporate strategy sets out long-term objectives, which provide a basis for delineating requisite action and resource requirements to achieve a firm’s goals (see HBR 2011). 

Q13. Why does the prospect of big data raise barriers to entry to challengers arise?

Big data thus offers the prospect of firms raising barriers to entry to challengers because they benefit from being able to act upon data insights before the competition. 

Q14. What is the main contention of LaValle et al.?

It is clear that for many enterprises ‘strategic information has started arriving through unstructured channels’ (LaValle et al. 2011 p. 29). 

Q15. What is the definition of data relevant to organizational intelligence?

Data relevant to organizational intelligence can be micro-level, defined and highly specific or more aggregate, raw and amorphous.