Kuva: Bronto Skyliftin mediapankista
Bronto Skylift is one of the world’s largest manufacturers of truck-mounted aerial platforms. Lifting solutions facilitate safe working at heights and in fire and rescue operations. Bronto Skylift wanted to revise its data platform and enhance data management, analysis and reporting. The data project creates a data-driven operating culture and improves the quality and speed of decision-making.
Bronto Skylift decided to invest in modernising its data platform and data management because the data required for business decision-making and daily work was scattered across the databases of different systems. Reports compiling data from different sources and visualising the data were found challenging. For these reasons, users’ confidence in the quality and availability of data varied in different situations.
"We had a reporting system with hundreds of reports, but some of the reports were no longer updated and some had been forgotten. Therefore, when making decisions, they could never be certain about the quality of the data. In our data project, we wanted to start by thinking about what information we really need and use for decision-making," says Tarja Järvinen, VP Business Transformation at Bronto Skylift.
Already previously, when working as CFO at Bronto Skylift, Järvinen repeatedly encountered data challenges caused by overdue development needs.
"For example, the management received the financial report once a month and it looked at the past. Different parts of the organisation also had different operating models, which has made it difficult to obtain comparable data. So our organisation has done a tremendous amount of Excel work. Previously, reporting was also Finland-oriented. We are now doing development work to streamline and automate the flow of information and to get real-time data throughout the organisation and subsidiaries. It is important that we receive up-to-date information about what is happening in different customer projects. At the same time, we get a global perspective on the overall situation and the development of financial key figures. We are also creating new forecast reports that allow us to have a better impact on future results and take the necessary actions in time," says Järvinen summarising the reasons for the major upgrade project and the benefits it will bring.
In the new strategy prepared by Bronto Skylift in 2024, one of the main goals is to create a data-driven culture. Bronto Skylift's data project has taken into account the needs of change management to strengthen a data-driven culture and develop data literacy. Järvinen guides this development work in the organisation. Of the potential partners, the decision-makers of Bronto Skylift were convinced of Loihde’s expertise, as Loihde experts actively expressed their views and understood the challenges of development work already at the tender stage.
"We started the upgrade work with workshops where people from different parts of the organisation identified and worked to solve the observed data-related problems. After this, we surveyed the information needs related to data-driven management and prioritised our needs. At the same time, Loihde experts created data models for us, which were used to harmonise data from different systems. All attributes and information from data sources to documentation: what the figure means, where it comes from and how it is calculated. When you look at a report prepared in accordance with the new operating model, it is clear where the figure comes from and the information can be trusted," says Järvinen, describing the impacts of the groundwork on the quality of data.
"If successful, creating a data-driven culture increases transparency and reduces the personal ties between reporting and data collection. We support the goals being shared throughout the organisation and we also create a common vocabulary and uniform operating models. This avoids ambiguities and information gaps, which is important when we strive to improve quality," says Kenneth Ståhl, consultant for data-driven management at Loihde.
What lessons have you learned and would share with organisations that are considering starting a similar transformation?
"In all change, it is important that the entire management team is behind the change. Otherwise, the efforts will remain futile. The strategic intent of what you want to achieve has to be clear. Data-driven management is only possible if time and money are invested in data work. This must be seen as an investment in the future, and the benefits are visible in the reduction of unnecessary manual work and faster decision-making when reliable data is easily available. Change management plays a major role in development work. New modes of operation can raise resistance and even fear that automations will take work from people. However, learning new things offers a lot of opportunities for developing job descriptions," says Järvinen, summarising the lessons learned.
How has the cooperation with Loihde gone and what have you gained from it?
"The goals that were already stated at the tender stage have been achieved and we have been satisfied with the cooperation. The groundwork was carried out thoroughly and many learned new operating models from that. The fact that the users themselves have had the opportunity to influence the content of the reports also commits them to their use and further development. Being in the security business, we also appreciate the fact that where testing was inadequate in our previous system, data testing and validation is now carried out properly. Our information security has improved with regard to data solutions, and we can also utilise this basic work of data processing when reflecting on our operations in relation to cyber security regulations," says Järvinen, who is delighted that the work has also sparked ideas for further development.
"We intend to develop management tools according to both the overall view and role-specific needs. We are also thinking about the possibilities offered by the new data platform for customer-project-specific data use. Now that we have good data management practices, we can also add new data sources as needed. And, of course, good data will also facilitate the use of AI solutions in the future," says Järvinen