January2024 - Journal-No PN Final WEB - Flipbook - Page 10
Business
Turning Data into Information takes both
ANALYSIS AND PERSPECTIVE
Carrie Pollard
Senior Data Analyst
Pipestone Business
Carrie Pollard grew up on a 200-sow farrow-to-昀椀nish farm in western
Illinois. She has a BS and MS in Animal Science from the University of
Illinois and spent considerable time on notable wean-to-昀椀nish research
projects. She joined PIPESTONE in 2017 and currently serves as a Senior
Data Analyst for FarmStats.
Data analysis is the process of inspecting, cleansing, transforming, and modeling data with the goal of
discovering useful information. However, without proper data analysis, you may draw the wrong conclusion.
Without perspective, you may think things are going really poorly, when in reality, they are not; or the reverse
may be true. You need both proper data analysis and proper perspective to make informed decisions for your
business. One closeout is an observation, two is a line, and three create a trend. It is dif昀椀cult to make decisions
without context for what is good or bad.
Benchmarks Matter
Take a look at this graph of average
daily gain (ADG). Having access to your
own historical information is valuable,
as you can evaluate your performance
over time. Comparing within a site
or a 昀氀ow can certainly be helpful, but
without perspective on how similar
operations are performing, you are
missing a crucial piece of the puzzle.
This improvement in ADG is
laudable, but when looking at a larger
benchmark (below), it shows that this
producer still has a long way to go to be competitive.
Without the perspective of the other benchmarks, this producer might be content with the improvement and
quit striving and reaching; when they need to continue to make gain a focus.
10 | PIPESTONE JOURNAL
