The Ultimate Guide To People And Company Alternative Data
Tags: datascience, analytics, bigdata
Published: 2022-10-03 23:52:24

**TABLE OF CONTENTS**

-What is Data? 
-Why People & Company Data? 
-Data Collection Technologies 
-People & Company Data Analytics 
-Understanding Data Privacy Legislation


**What Is Data**? 

Data is collected either by observation or measurements and can be either qualitative or quantitative, which implies data can be in the form of texts, figures/numbers or even multimedia. Data can be video or audio recordings, photos, documents, etc. It is retrieved, reviewed and analysed, shared, and is sold or bought to and from agencies and organisations. Data itself is meaningless until it is passed through phases of intensive analytics with softwares where it is processed and interpreted to be understood and its significant patterns communicated effectively as information.
 
The key challenge for many companies, agencies and/or organisations is transforming data into meaningful information. The power of data lies in its transformation or conversion and this tells us why some of the largest companies like Facebook, Amazon and other corporations have so
much interest in data and value it greatly to the extent of regularly fetching consumers’ personal data without consumer authorisation or approval. 

**Why People & Company Data**? 

People and Company data may be publicly available or privately permitted information about human behaviors and activities online as well as a company’s interests, business information and confidential data which may be of workers, company’s website engagements, etc. When this data is analyzed and processed, it generates statistics which identifies or has the possibility 
of identifying trends or patterns within those activities. Someone may ask, what are companies doing with my data? Below are some of the reasons 

● Analytics on Consumer Interactions/Behavior. - Statistical results processed from data obtained as a result of the collection of user behavior and subjected to softwares to 
generate algorithms are used by companies to align their sales and redefine their marketing techniques and strategies. In the long run, consumer’s are lured into using services offered by one company over the other. That’s one aptitude of data.

● Companies use data to predict the market and align it with their future business goals. Analytics software Companies like ‘Simply Get Results’ owned by Simon Haines harnesses the value of data to improve their financial results. In huge corporations, it’s impossible to know what people are doing everyday, let alone what they’re capable of doing. Big businesses are complex and people can be unpredictable: this leaves a huge hole in every business - a productivity gap. Only data can answer the questions on how people drive business performance. 

● Companies use data as means of generating revenue; by converting it into cash. - Personal data are routinely sought after and are bought/sold by companies. Such trades are facilitated by data brokers. Data brokers are data providers. These brokers buy and sell consumer or customer information. Data brokers are not the only data contributors. Insiders and analysts also form part of the data contribution sector. 

**Data Collection Technologies**

The digital revolutionization of industries continues to make data one of the most valuable resources. Companies set up API in their businesses and this is why: many tasks are made simpler by computers, particularly those that require gathering and processing through large amounts of data. Imagine you were interested in learning how frequently a specific business 
partner sent invoices to your organization. If your company's invoice database has an API set up, you could theoretically access the invoice records, scan the "from" data input, and print each invoice separately for your audit. 

Three components make up APIs: 

**The user**: is the one who submits a request. 

**The Client**: the machine that requests something from the server. 

**The Server**: the computer that replies to requests.

The server will be constructed initially because it collects and stores data. Once that server is operational, programmers post documentation that includes the endpoints for particular data. This documentation explains the server's data's structure to outside programmers. The data on the server can then be queried (or searched) by an outside user, or you can create a program that searches the database and converts the results into a new, useful format.
 
An API may do the following four sorts of actions: 

**GET**: asks a server for information, such as a state or specifics (like last name).
 
**POST**: This method adds data to the server, much as creating a new entry, by sending modifications from the client to the server. 

**PUT**: updates or adds to information already present 

**DELETE**: removes data that already exists. 

You can search or edit any information that is readily available over an API when you combine the endpoints with these actions. Since each of these actions is distinct, you'll need to consult the API documentation to learn how to write them. 
These are the various methods you can submit a request to a server: 
● By using the JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) and XML (Extensive MarkUp Language) programming languages. And this involves passing fetched data through these sets of codes to be able to conceptualize the feedback from the server. 

● URL method - By putting in the URL of a source in a browser. This stands to be the easiest way of accessing data.

**People & Company Data Analytics**

The Importance Of People In Organizations 

People are fundamental to creating value in organizations. The knowledge, skills and experience of the workforce is what helps many organizations to remain aggressive. This tells how HR professionals are important in helping businesses to flourish. Think about any company, have a look at their values, have a look at what’s actually important and most of them will say people are their most important asset. The more information you have about your people, the better you are going to be able to get the best out of them and make the best use of that resource. 
You need basic information on people; what their age profile is, what the gender mix is, what the qualification mix is, how long people are staying employed by you as an employer, why your employers leave, how good your statistics are around health and safety in the workplace, corporate reports, web pages, conference calls etc. It is important to have information about how people feel about themselves in their workplace, and how engaged they are.

This is where companies have competitive advantages over other companies because of the use of certain softwares, machine learning and artificial intelligence in retrieving such information about people. 
What people analytics does is to deliver facts. And with expert advice, these facts are transformed into actionable insights, each helping you to optimize your business strategy and nurture developing talents. When starting a people analytics scheme, a few key points should come to mind. 

● Start with a business in mind. Think about what business questioning you’re trying to solve. 

● Another key point is to ask yourself what is scalable. Is the piece of analysis you’re working on or product you are working on be used by another company/business another time? Some fully-fledged companies are at a point right now when they think about GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation), when they think about data privacy, when they think about people analytics, they are at a unique inflexion point possibly, of bringing those things together and creating a truly unique dialogue with their employees where they can share what they are planning on doing and allow them a voice in that as well. It helps direct their work. This is a very promising opportunity in a promising moment where companies create a different type of relationship with their employees and analytics crew. 

**Understanding Data Privacy Legislation**

What is Publicly and Privately Available Personal Information? 
Publicly Available Personal Data is information about a person that is disclosed to the general public while Private Personal Data is information that is confidential. Personal information is
available to the general public if it is contained in an official document(s) of public interest or it is related to public officials or if the information comprises the source of the data with public disclosure permission.