The Future of Analytics — It's automated and delightful
Imagine a world where analytical systems don't just show you what happened but reveal the why, illuminate what's next, and guide you to the optimal path forward. This is where analytics is headed: away from simply enabling faster data access, and toward an experience of uncovering insights that are deep, automated, and delightful.
Beyond Dashboards
For over three decades, since I first immersed myself in the world of data, I’ve envisioned a future where analytical systems evolve far beyond basic dashboards and static reports. I’ve always believed that the day would arrive when nearly every aspect of analysis could be fully automated.
Why such conviction? Because I believe the world operates on discoverable principles. Just as Newton's laws delineate motion, Maxwell's equations illuminate light, and Navier-Stokes governs fluid flow with such simplicity, isn't it logical to imagine that growth, engagement, and monetization are similarly underpinned by elegant, discoverable relationships?
Our purpose should be to uncover these fundamental truths and empower machines to render them usable through governing equations and intricate relationship graphs.
From Artisan to AI
To truly grasp our destination, it's essential to reflect on our journey:
The Artisanal Age: Analytics began as a painstaking craft: manual spreadsheets, bespoke SQL queries, and charts painstakingly built by hand. Insight was a slow, fragile endeavor, accessible only to the patient and technically adept.
The Dashboard Age: Then came the surge of BI tools, self-service dashboards, and embedded analytics. For the first time, non-technical users could explore their data. Yet, a significant burden remained: framing the right questions, piecing together context, and interpreting results still fell squarely on the user's shoulders.
The AI Age: A new era is unfolding. With the rise of AI and agentic automation, we’re shifting from manual analysis to intelligent, reasoning-driven playbooks. Static dashboards are giving way to dynamic reports that explore multiple analytical paths simultaneously. These playbooks can now answer complex questions, like why ARR changed last week, by exploring seasonality, metric drivers, dimensional relationships, and synthesizing these like a human analyst would. Deep investigations that once took days can now be completed by autonomous agents in minutes.
This automation age is coming!
Unlocking Deep Analysis
Realizing this vision demands the integration of AI with deeply opinionated expert systems. This entails embedding foundational, discoverable principles; developing robust scientific algorithms such as churn prediction and forecasting; constructing and integrating richer semantic layers; and enhancing reasoning and synthesis capabilities. All of this must be supported by a scalable, modern infrastructure, coherently orchestrated through the power of AI.
Rich and Opinionated semantic layers - Systems that merely react, without inherent beliefs about data structure, intent, or the underlying mechanics of a system, are fundamentally limited in their ability to generate deep insights. Platforms built on shallow semantics are confined to surface-level responses, such as simply retrieving data. They lack the rich context and accumulated understanding necessary to construct deeper, more meaningful explanations. Being opinionated about these semantic layers will be key to unearthing deeper insights.
Modeling Metric Tree — Deeper analysis like why revenue has dipped, what levers will impact the next quarter, or how your strategy measures against historical patterns, hinges on platforms that seamlessly integrate governing equations and relationship graphs into their very foundations. Analytical systems should be informed by principled models of how businesses truly operate: how acquisition flows work, how retention impacts engagement, how pricing shapes behavior etc. These become the governing equations of the business and the relationship graphs that intricately map one lever to another providing the necessary structure for informed decision-making.
Without this foundational shift, we will continue to remain in a world of thousands of static dashboards.
Reimagining Storytelling
Over the years, I’ve come to believe that the true power of analytics isn’t just in the brilliance of deep analysis, but in its ability to shape decisions, shift mindsets, and catalyze change. Great analysis alone isn’t enough — it needs a voice that compels, a form that fits, and a message that lands.
Over the years, I’ve come to understand that how we present data profoundly shapes the decisions it drives. We need to work toward a future where insights can be drawn from data with both depth and speed. But even the most sophisticated analysis means little if it can’t be clearly communicated. We believe that the power of insight lies in its ability to resonate. That’s why future work needs to center on giving the data-informed stories pulse and presence, through engaging, intuitive, and personalized forms. Whether that means a compelling slide deck, a New York Times-style narrative, an interactive animation, or a data-dense table, we envision world when each story is to the decision-maker it’s meant for. And crucially, all of this must evolve dynamically. As the analysis evolves, the story evolves with it.
Because in the end, the goal isn’t just to inform. It’s to influence and create impact. And when that happens, analysis becomes more powerful than ever before.
A New Chapter
We are entering a transformative era, one where analytical systems evolve from passive data retrieval tools into active agents of insight . These systems will not only interpret data but also anticipate needs, offer precise recommendations, and bridge the gap between information and intelligent action with remarkable ease.
As we turn this page, I’ve never felt more inspired about the future of data, analytics, storytelling, and decision-making. Realizing this vision will require weaving dynamic storytelling with deep analysis, intelligently orchestrated by AI.
