Helzberg Executive Summit Showcases the Future of Data

Data is all around us, according to Mike Nill, ’86, executive vice president and chief operating officer at Kansas City-based health care tech company Cerner. Everything, from computer servers to soccer fields, offers measurable quantities. But companies have to know what to look for and how to use it.

Data is not new to the business world, as file cabinets of handwritten spreadsheets and graphs would attest. But as companies continue to explore ways that technology can assist in their growth, they are finding new ways to not only gather data, but to analyze it and use it to make decisions in ways they hadn’t dreamed of before.

Rockhurst University’s Helzberg School of Management, which launched a data science certificate program last year and a Master of Science degree in Business Intelligence and Analytics, hosted its first-ever Executive Summit in Business Intelligence and Analytics on Thursday, Oct. 29, to give business leaders a chance to talk frankly about the growth of data and its role in shaping their strategy. Cheryl McConnell, Ph.D., MBA, dean of the Helzberg School, said the summit grew out of ongoing conversations with area business leaders to help grow and shape Helzberg School business programs.

Throughout the day, executives from Black and Veatch, DST, AMC Theaters, Cobalt Talon, BIME Analytics and the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City shared perspectives on what data means for the ever-changing landscape of business innovation.

John Stephens, ’80, senior executive vice president and chief financial officer for AT&T, said currently 2.5 exabytes — 2.5 billion billion bytes — of data are being produced each day on the world’s data networks, ranging from private information to digital media content. The ever-increasing amount of available information means more ways to build solutions, but also more variables to consider when navigating challenges.

“Because there’s more data, there is more to understand and more to think about,” Stephens said. “But with the right data tools, the right data processes, you have a better chance of getting to the right answers.”

Stephens used examples from AT&T —his company has used data analytics to improve the maintenance schedule of its vehicle fleet and the reliability of its network — to illustrate that not only was it important for data to be able to solve existing problems, but, ultimately, to be able to use data to predict future behavior and solve problems before they arise.

And Stephens said it’s not just the corporate world — drawing on the Rockhurst value of service, he said processing those streams of information could be used to tackle social issues, as well.

In his afternoon presentation, Nill emphasized how advanced data analytics is critical not only to the tech-centric work that Cerner does on a daily basis, but feeds innovation at companies around the globe.

“Seeing the world as data and the ability to capture that info and use it is vital to your business,” he told the leaders in the audience. “If you don’t master this, you will not succeed in the future.”

Data-driven innovation has helped Cerner work toward the goal not only of digitizing health care records, but of creating a system where patients could easily access those records and that could aid providers in making the best care decisions for their patients.

Similar opportunities exist for companies and organizations in nearly every field. Nill nodded to the growing number of data analytics programs like those at Rockhurst, saying companies need employees at all levels who are familiar with the use of data to take advantage of those opportunities.

“There’s no doubt we need data scientists who can take the information and analyze it on a deep level,” he said. “But there’s another huge need for employees who can sit between those individuals and those who are trying to execute the process and who are able to engage and translate with the analytics.”