There is much commotion around the way in which organizations should shape their “real-time fact-based decision-making”, as we discuss in our latest report on Big Data. Getting good results requires more than merely implementing technology such as Hadoop, Oracle Exadata, SAP HANA, SAS Teradata or IBM BigInsights. To start with, there must be change at the top. Anyone aspiring to capitalize on the potential of Big Data will have to pull some strings at the executive level. Depending on the source, the new executive function will be filled by a Chief Data Officer, Chief Decision Officer or the all-embracing Chief Digital Officer. To generate good decision-making, business analysts must have various sorts of data at their disposal. Because we generally wish to examine the facts as closely as possible, less time remains for solid analysis. For this reason, it is advisable to deliberate seriously and to continually evaluate the design and delivery of effective next-generation B.I. Tools, datasets, knowledge and skills, and the right mindset in the organization are essential components of such structures. It is common to concentrate the new core expertise in a (next-generation) Business Intelligence Center of Excellence (B.I. CoE), also referred to as a Business Intelligence Competence Center (BICC), and to coordinate it from this source. There are four main variants that are applied with businessmen, IT people and data experts, either separately or in a certain combination for a fixed time: 1. An IT unit that reports to the CIO 2. A virtual CoE, present in different functional business units 3. An operating unit that reports to the COO 4. A distributed CoE, present in the divisions and the overarching corporate organization. It is self-evident that the virtual CoE and the distributed variant will report to the CDO. Of course there must be good connections with the CIO office, which may be formally established without there necessarily being two captains on one ship or any inevitable clashes. The CIO office will be more engaged with the backend of the information systems, while the CDO and the CMO and their staff will explicitly direct their efforts to the acquisition of value from data for the consumer and the organization. Read all about how you can unlock your Big Data Potential and deploy a Big Data strategy in your organization in our new report on Big Data. Download the report using the button below. We would also appreciate it if you used the share buttons: it will send a Twitter or LinkedIn status update (that you can edit if you like) saying you just downloaded the report and it also adds a downloadlink for your followers.