The Art of Data Wrapping

Data is Everybody's Business

Understanding how to derive value from data has become a crucial aspect of modern business. Dr. Barbara Wixom, PhD., a principal research scientist at the MIT Center for Information Systems Research and author of the book Data is Everybody’s Business, has spent 25 years studying this question.

She found that companies primarily derive value from their data in three ways. Firstly, data can be used to improve internal processes, which has been in practice for a long time. Secondly, companies can monetize their data directly by selling it.

The third, perhaps the most intriguing method, is through 'data wrapping.' This involves integrating data with products and services to enhance their value. A tractor, for instance, can be 'wrapped' with a dashboard that monitors operational performance. Similarly, a bank account can be 'wrapped' with a budgeting tool and a cab trip with a fare estimator. These 'wraps' increase indirect value by boosting customer satisfaction and retention and potentially growing wallet share.

On the TPL podcast, Dr. Barb and Dr. Perry dive deep into how we are already using data and, in the future, automation with artificial intelligence to delight our customers, close care gaps, and improve margins.

One data use case was online appointments at Pediatrics@Nite in 2003, which allowed parents to make an appointment and enter their demographics, medical history, insurance information, and current problem obtaining an appointment that evening for their child.

Next week, Dr. Rogu will tape an audio blog on this most crucial topic for the pediatrician owner and leader. He will focus on the 4As

• Anticipate by intuiting customer needs. Anticipatory wraps offer predictive and proactive features.

• Advise through the use of evidence-based decision making. Wraps with advisory features provide data and insights that inform a customer’s decisions.

• Adapt by meeting customer needs in a tailored way across different environments and contexts.

• Act, which means that the wrap performs an action to benefit the customer. Wraps that act are integrated into customer processes or behaviors, or they trigger behavior automatically on the customer’s behalf. For example, a bank app that automatically transfers funds to help a customer avoid overdraft fees.

Stay tuned as we delve deeper into these steps and explore the art of data wrapping. It's time we understood how to leverage our data to create value rather than just adding cost to our products. #DataWrapping #BusinessValue #DataAnalytics.