Data to Everything Makes Sense – Futurum Tech Podcast Interview Series

In this special edition of the Futurum Tech Podcast – Interview Series host Daniel Newman welcomed Doug Merritt, CEO of Splunk to discuss how data applies to everything — even in the fight against COVID-19, business continuity, and what Splunk is doing outside of the COVID-19 realm.  

Looking at Data Differently

At the foundation of digital transformation is data. About five weeks ago, Splunk created a series of free dashboards hosted in the cloud that showed data about the spread of the virus and a myriad of characteristics around it. Companies can easily download these free dashboards and apply the data amassed by Splunk directly to their own data sets in order to help them make better sense of what is happening and plan accordingly.

Splunk is also working on a set of healthcare applications designed to offer better visibility to the healthcare supply chain ecosystem. Using these applications, healthcare organizations will have a better idea of bed availability, necessary PPE stock, and critical care staff and their availability.

Splunk is also working with companies in a variety of industries to fight fraud, as instances of hacking have really ramped up amid the massive distraction caused by coronavirus COVID-19. Companies have been collecting data on their networks, at endpoints, and back at data centers for other uses, but now Splunk has been able to come in and help these companies retool the data to work through these new issues. Most companies aren’t collecting new data, but by adding Splunk they are able to look at the data through a different lens to solve a different problem.

Business Continuity in the Age of COVID-19

One difficult thing many businesses are facing right now is the business of remote work, and companies very quickly moving to a completely virtual workforce — including the team at Splunk! Doug praised his team for being incredibly agile and fast tracking everything needed to get themselves, and their clients, set up so the company could continue to support their clients without much disruption. If there’s one thing that we all will learn from this pandemic, it’s the importance of agility and having the right technology in place to handle a massive, unpredictable shift in how we operate.

Doug also shared a little about his own message to his employees during this time, which focused on being calm and trying to just roll with things as they come. He has counseled his employees on the importance of taking breaks, allowing for distractions, not getting stressed by a dog barking or needing to help a child with homework. He reminds his team, and our listeners, that this is a marathon and a team sport. We all need to come together to help each other be effective and still find a balance between work and home life. If we do it right, we will all come out stronger in the end — a bold and helpful leadership message.

Data to Everything

Beyond the fight against COVID-19, Splunk is helping companies bring data to everything. The Splunk platform allows companies to take non-structured data and put it into storage format allowing the structure to emerge as you ask questions and interact with it. The problem with most data tools is you take one point of view on the data before you’ve ever interacted with it and you don’t get the full picture. Splunk allows the data to speak for itself through whatever questions or problems are thrown at it.

In the last three years, Splunk has pivoted to bring streaming data into the analysis mix. Data is flying around now rapidly, and companies are needing to analyze that data, in real-time, to make fast decisions. Splunk evolved and delivered, providing real-time streaming, real-time interrogation, and real-time contextual capabilities. Data to everything, while maybe grammatically confusing, makes perfect sense in the business world and has helped many of Splunk’s customers be successful.

Want to learn more about Splunk’s Data to Everything platform or check out the free dashboards that Splunk developed to help companies help in the fight against COVID-19? There’s also probably not a better time to learn more about why customers chose Splunk, and how they can help your company act faster and accelerate innovation, amplify the impact of your data, and scale without the stress. Listen to the full podcast here, and while you’re at it, be sure to subscribe to the Futurum Tech Podcast so that you never miss an episode.

This podcast is part of a special series focused around what leaders and companies are doing to help employees and customers deal with COVID-19. Be sure to subscribe so that you don’t miss out on amazing insights.