In a joint commentary, SMU School of Accountancy Associate Professor of Accounting (Education) and Associate Dean (Student Matters) Gary Pan and SMU School of Economics and School of Accountancy graduate Daphne Koh noted that analytics can help small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) understand and analyse their current operations as well as identify future business opportunities. More importantly, analytics can be used to generate in-depth insights to make more timely and better-informed decisions rather than relying on intuition in the decision-making process. Despite the advantages, they highlighted that there are three key barriers that stifle the widespread adoption of analytics by SMEs.  First, Associate Prof Pan and Ms Koh pointed out that many SMEs have qualms about adopting analytics solutions due to concerns about cost and complexity of implementing and managing such solutions. Second, they observed that the shortage of talent poses a significant constraint for widespread analytics adoption in SMEs. Finally, they argued that cultural barriers can hamper the widespread incorporation of analytics by SMEs, where some SMEs do not embrace data-driven decision-making and are inclined towards an intuition-based approach. While Associate Prof Pan and Ms Koh acknowledged that it is critical for SMEs to mobilize quickly and embrace analytics so as to benefit from the advantages, they have to also consider the following factors – cost and complexity, talent shortage and cultural barriers – prior to adoption and develop a strategy to tackle these challenges in order to successfully unleash the true value of analytics.