Commentary

Our approach to overcoming the talent shortage in data and analytics

Data and analytics play an important part in the corporate real estate (CRE) industry and will only become more pivotal in the next couple of years.

March 16, 2017

  A study by JLL—which evaluates the extent to which the adoption of data and analytics within the CRE function can support overarching goals—found that companies need a comprehensive focus on the people, process, and technology aspects of CRE data and analytics to achieve substantial CRE improvements.

Despite understanding the undisputable role of data and analytics in achieving business success, one challenge most of us face is finding suitable talent to improve data and analytics collection and application. We can purchase all the latest technologies to provide infrastructure for our data and analytics strategies, but the potential of these technological platforms will not be fully maximized without the right people to interpret the data and bring meaningful insights to business leaders.

To overcome the talent shortage in CRE data and analytics, you may consider taking the same approach that our teams at JLL have taken.

1. Build multidisciplinary teams. For example, our Business Intelligence Center Of Exellence (BI COE) team is made up of data governance, sales, consulting, leadership, business technology and BI specific team members. By building a team of different experts, your team members can learn from one another and will eventually pick up skills in other areas too. They may not be the subject matter experts, but having more than one person who is able to do a specific task is always a plus.

2. Train your people. Drive specific training initiatives across your organization to support your programs and BI tools—as we discussed earlier, what good are all these without anyone to operate them? Begin socializing the importance of technology and bring the whole organization on a journey to adopt technology, especially tools crucial to your business.

3. Look beyond your industry for talent. At JLL, we’ve looked beyond the borders of the real estate industry to bring external talent in—doing so gives us fresh perspective on real estate data and, in turn, drives innovation and new insights for our clients. You can do the same—bring in a fresh set of eyes! Who knows? You may gain value in ways you have not imagined possible.