Why Most Reporting Systems Fail, & What to Do Instead, With Ben Zittlau

Feb 12, 2025

Ben Zittlau, co-founder of Parakeeto and an expert in data operations, shares valuable insights on why agencies struggle with data reporting. He discusses the pitfalls of relying on all-in-one software solutions, emphasizing their failure to deliver meaningful insights. Ben highlights the challenges of gathering fragmented data and the myth of a single source of truth. The conversation dives into the importance of maintaining flexibility in data integration, while underlining the hidden costs of being locked into one platform, ultimately advocating for cleaner, more effective data practices.

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ANECDOTE

Ben's Jobber Growth Story

Ben Zittlau brought a data-driven, scientific growth approach to Jobber as it scaled from 15 to about 130 people.
He managed data operations including telemetry, experiments, and analytics to optimize business processes and outcomes.

INSIGHT

Tool Data Limits Agency Insights

Tools generate data but limit insights because they're designed for operational use, not deep analysis.
Cross-team insights require bridging fragmented data across different tools, which most platforms can't do effectively.

INSIGHT

Myth of Single Source Truth

The notion of a 'single source of truth' via pushing all data into one platform is flawed.
Operational data is messy and constantly changing, so no single system can perfectly capture complete truth in real time.

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Points of Interest

01:00 – 01:45 – Guest Introduction: Marcel welcomes back his co-founder, Ben Zittlau, highlighting his expertise in data operations and agency growth strategies.
03:35 – 05:50 – Scaling Data Operations: Lessons from Jobber: Ben shares insights from his experience at Jobber, detailing the challenges of building and scaling a data operations team in a fast-growing company.
08:43 – 13:14 – Why Agencies Struggle to Get Insights from Their Data: Discussion on how agencies collect vast amounts of data across multiple tools but fail to derive meaningful insights due to fragmentation and inconsistency.
13:15 – 16:05 – The Myth of a “Single Source of Truth: Marcel and Ben challenge the common belief that pushing all data into a single platform solves reporting issues, highlighting the reality of messy operational data.
19:26 – 21:48 – The Limitations of All-in-One Software Solutions: Exploring why all-in-one agency management tools often fail to deliver on their promise of seamless reporting and data integration.
24:43 – 27:44 – The Hidden Costs of Locking into a Single Platform: Discussion on how agencies become “trapped” by software providers, making it difficult to switch tools without major operational disruptions.
30:29 – 35:53 – How to Integrate Data Without Sacrificing Flexibility: A deep dive into the challenges of stitching data from various tools while maintaining adaptability and historical accuracy.
35:54 – 41:14 – Accuracy vs. Precision: Why Clean Data is a Myth: Why agencies should focus on broader trends instead of pursuing impossible data perfection, and how to handle data inconsistencies effectively.
41:15 – 44:15 – A Modern Data Approach: Extract, Transform, Load (ETL): Introduction to the ETL process, which allows agencies to clean and transform data before reporting, improving reliability and flexibility.
50:14 – 52:00 – Lessons from Finance: What Agencies Can Learn from Accounting: Marcel compares data operations to bookkeeping, explaining how structured financial workflows can serve as a model for better agency data management.

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