What struck me most about watching the BBC’s Olympic coverage on the middle Sunday evening was not just the plethora of Gold medals that had been won by Team GB throughout the day at Rio 2016’(and the potential for even more to come) but what Sir Chris Hoy said about game changers.
When asked what he believes has been the biggest game changer in British cycling, Hoy said that advances in technology, particularly those around analysis have been essential. It has allowed the team to discover what is working and not working and optimising performances to fit – the evidence, it seems, validates this belief.
British cycling continues to be the envy of the sport, winning numerous medals and championships because of their consistent high standards and attention to detail. The Olympics in Rio is no exception. At the time of writing Team GB have already won 6 medals (4 Gold and 2 Silver) on the cycling track, putting them at the top of the medal table for the sport.
What is interesting is that Hoy sights measurement and analytics as the game changer, which in previous occasions has been overshadowed by our fascination with the ‘marginal gains’ philosophy. The bikes that Team GB are using are the most aerodynamic model the team has ever ridden, after having been through hundreds of hours of wind-tunnel analysis, stress testing and computer simulation. There is also analysis of the riders’ performance in terms of their speed, position, acceleration and weight on the bike. These elements can then be improved with the meticulous attention to detail that is built into the team through marginal gains, which has led to so much success. The medals won in 2016 show that this strategy of measurement and improvement is still working, and getting better in order to stay ahead of the competition.
Business leaders have been trying for many years to use marginal gains to their advantage to emulate the same winning formula. But what they are perhaps missing is exactly what Sir Chris Hoy is highlighting – the right metrics and measurements to know what to improve in performance.
It doesn’t take a stretch of the imagination to see how this idea fits in with SAP change and delivery, but you’ll probably be asking how can I measure the performance of my System Integrator or Dev team? It is a firm belief at Basis Technologies that in the digital economy, agility is fundamental and in order to be agile, you need to continually measure and improve. As with the British cycling team, we believe that analysis is the foundation upon which success can be built and that is why we created DevAnalytics.
DevAnalytics is our offering to the advancement of SAP change and delivery analysis, and it will help any business running SAP to accelerate into the future ahead of the competition. We believe that analysis of velocity, cycle times, rework and waste, work in progress and approval times will allow businesses to concentrate on making those detailed improvements to metrics.
DevAnalytics will help business leaders gain insight on what is working and what is not, where to save money and perhaps where to invest, all while still achieving world-class delivery. It is this tool that we see as our game changer, and we believe it can be yours too.
