Having Data is Great but What am I Supposed to do With It All?
The old adage remains true and no one brought it to life quite like Heath Ledger did as the Joker in Christopher Nolan’s Batman movies: “I’m a dog chasing cars. I wouldn’t know what to do with one if I caught it!”
Like the dog in the old saying, far too many people spend far too much time chasing data without the slightest idea of what to do with it all once they’ve acquired it. They know they have access to quantities of data that their predecessors could only dream about. But, when it comes to putting that data to use, they run simple reports and call it a day. Sure, they may use a filter or two to try to drill down a little further. But, in the end they are getting a fraction out of their software that they could be.
Fleet managers are no different. Fleets generate information every minute of every day and the managers of those fleets can parse that data by the minute, day, week, or year. Those that are interested can push their fleet management software to its absolute limits. Those that aren’t can run their weekly reports and be done with it.
In many cases, however, it may be that the fleet manager simply doesn’t know what questions to ask in order to start putting this information into perspective. Flood someone with too much information and it can overload them. Break it down into smaller, more manageable parts though, and you start to see deeper into your business.
Like most things, parsing through your data starts with having a good plan. Ask yourself key questions about what it is that you’re trying to get out of the data in front of you. Start with a checklist of things that you want to know at the end of the exercise and then build your queries and strategies from there.
Knowing what you’re planning on measuring is, of course, the first place to start; but be specific. Don’t just assume that you want to know fuel costs. Rather, look at the question more granularly: isolate fuel costs for your trucks that are more than 5 years old and that have been repaired in the past year. Filter those results by driver. Be as specific in your initial query as possible so you have a path to your answer laid out in front of you from the start.
Once you know what you’re looking for, determine how you’re going to find it. What reports, either pre-configured or custom, are you going to utilize to start to sift through the information available to you? How are you going to verify that information? How cooperative are company employees in making sure that good, accurate information makes its way into the fleet management software? How much information are you going to have to chase versus the information that will be available and waiting for you?
Third, you’re going to want to know what ties all of this information together. Where are the intersections and what conclusions can be drawn from those intersections. Sometimes the secondary findings can be more significant than what you initially set out to discover in the first place.
And, finally, how will your findings be shared? What form does your report take once you’ve drawn your conclusions? Is this something that can simply be emailed or does it require a bit more polish and finesse? Do you need visualizations of the data or is a spreadsheet-style report and a quick summary good enough?
With a little bit of pre-planning, an exploration of the data from your fleet management software can yield fantastic results. But having a plan is paramount. The next time you need to run a report, think for a minute about how much more useful the information could be if you planned out a reporting strategy. Then, put a strategy together and amaze yourself, as well as other company decision makers, at the insight you are able to provide.