Tuesday- P&G

We had an INCREDIBLE presentation from P&G Asia in Singapore where they showed us their brand-new BI system.  Extensive data is currently collected 12 out of the 15 countries of the region.  It was beyond impressive! For example, they showed us from their Asia headquarters in Singapore they can drill to the level of a single distributor's figures for a single brand in rural China.  Using TIBCO Spotfire software, David Dickman (Director of BI for P&G Asia) demoed this drill down by clicking on portions of charts and infographics. One of the coolest infographics showed vertically integrated value and volume share.  The software also has predictive modeling capabilities, but he could not show us that information. The most amazing takeaway from this presentation was that Mr. Dickman shared that just one year ago, all of this information was shared in paper reports.  He credits P&G Asia's ability to do implement this massive project as a combination of the right technology finally becoming available as well as Global CEO Bob McDonald's vision to "digitize the organization from end to end."  The rest of P&G's global operations' data remains separate, and this project was paid for using regional funds.  It was also interesting that corporate in Cincinnati has limited access to the data, as the BI director said they did not want them to get bogged down in a certain level of detail that is reserved for analysts.  The intricacies of Business Intelligence at work!

Since my group has focused on P&G since January for our project, this was an incredible opportunity to also meet with members of the marketing team.  We looked at trends for Asia, which P&G coins "Older, Urben, Richer, Smaller."  The product portfolio and distribution strategy will change significantly moving forward. The BI capabilities I mentioned above are critical to remaining competitive.  It's all about data!