Companies need to have the best technology and the top talent in order to beat out the competition. However, gaining these elements can be a long, arduous and expensive process if not handled properly. There are various tools that can help expedite the acquisition of these factors, including internal promotions and sales performance management techniques. Analyzing the way current operations are handled, creating patterns from that data and applying it to future scenarios is an emerging and popular trend in corporate leadership.

The emergence of intelligence
According to eWeek, a Gartner study revealed that business intelligence (BI) and analytics are going to be the biggest investment points for CFOs and enterprise leaders in 2014. The source stated that these initiatives will help organizations make better decisions and improve internal communication. Reports generated through BI and analytics grant organizations a great deal of insight into how their operations are running, allowing them to communicate more effectively with people and departments that might be impeding success. Instead of simply saying that a problem exists within a section of the company, BI tools allow managers to address specific core issues that are resulting in missed sales goals or increased communications latency, among other significant problems.

Part of what's assisting with this rapid expansion of BI tools are big data resources in the business environment. Companies are facing an ever-expanding horizon of information they need to deal with, as daily file loads at organizations of all sizes continue to increase. These records consist of regular activity logs, financial information, customer reviews and employee performance reports that are full of secondary analytic data, if businesses know how to tap into them. B-eye Network wrote that implementing big data in the BI environment helps sales managers target better goals, create more intuitive plans and facilitate heightened performances from their staff through the use of advanced metrics.

The intelligence wall
Harnessing the insight and projecting powers of BI and analytics reports can help promote better sales performance management. Integrating regular employee reviews based on actual performance metrics, rather than perceived work results or infrequent check-ins from management, will create a more seamless relationship between personnel at all levels, as well as improve overall workflow by directly targeting the problems that staff members are encountering. This process will become easier as BI and big data continue to emerge in the corporate environment.