We at Analytics India Magazine have always tried to bring the community together and provide information about the industry that is not otherwise assessable to all. Supporting this initiative we bring to you what the leaders of Indian Analytics forecast about the industry for the next 1 year.

Analytics India Leaders outlook Survey reveal the perspectives of leaders in India on the analytics industry for next twelve months. We surveyed 45 individuals across the industry from the ranks of key decision makers for this study. Overall, the responses have been extremely positive and sentiment looked ‘up’ for the year ahead.

Here’s the profile of our respondents.

98% of respondent are confident that the demand of Analytics at their organization will increase in next 12 months.

We asked regarding their confidence about analytics being a key focus area for organizations globally over next 12 months –

• 36% respondent gave a 10/10 score
• Just 7% respondent gave a score of less than 7 out of 10.
• Average Confidence score was 8.6/10

We calculated the Net Sentiment Score (Calculated as difference of % with score of 10s & 9s and Score from 0 through 6s), at 49%. This is an exceptionally high sentiment score.

96% of decision makers plan to increase their analytics workforce in next 12 months. Only 4% believe that they have no hiring plan for the coming year. Across the industry medium to large organizations are trying to build analytics COE. Majority of them are new to this and are looking out to hire talent to fulfil their requirement.

67% decision makers believe that ‘Unavailability of Analytics Talent’ is the major challenge that they face. This is in line with our earlier findings and is widely documented and spoken about. There is a huge demand for Analytics professionals across levels. The pool of resources is not sufficient to fulfil the current requirements. While the industry is collaborating with several institutes and organizations to fulfil these demands, the quality of professionals and experience still remains challenge.

What’s came out as an interesting outcome is that 58% of leaders believe that ‘Little knowledge of analytics among customers’ is a major challenge for them. Obviously, we have not done enough to propagate analytics understanding to a wider audience in the market. While Analytics and big data has been a buzz word around the network, very few understand how they can encash on it. And even fewer can identify the key areas within their business to apply it to.

Few leaders are wary of competition, just 18% believe it’s a challenge for them. Only 20% believe that analytics demand has peaked. The number of key players is still limited. While we have quite a few start-ups coming up, the demand for expertise to fulfil the current industry requirement is quite high.

‘Digital/ online/ Mobile/ Social’ is considered as a top area of growth in analytics by 62% of respondent. ‘HR/ Talent/ People’ is considered as a growth area by just 13% respondent. Obviously, the adoption of analytics in this is slow, that might change over time when real benefits begin to emerge.