There’s no doubt that business intelligence (BI) is essential for CIOs, helping to turn raw data into something meaningful. But as you may know, there are numerous questions and problems that can arise with implementing a BI strategy. Data inconsistencies, lofty vendor promises and end users resistant to new technologies are only a few of the potential challenges. How do you get around such issues to create a successful BI strategy?
This briefing walks you through the finer points of an ideal BI strategy and highlights the current trends in BI. We explain how to deal with inconsistent data, why businesses are moving to prebuilt analytic applications and where the future of BI lies. By reading the advice of experts, you’ll be armed with the knowledge you need to make your strategy as successful as possible.
This guide is part of SearchCIO-Midmarket.com’s Midmarket CIO Briefings series, which is designed to give IT leaders strategic management and decision-making advice on timely topics.
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Getting high-quality data for a BI strategy
Your BI plan of action requires you to transform your data into usable -- and actionable -- information, but in the back of your mind, you can't help but wonder if you're missing some vital key to the bigger picture. The culprit might just be your data.
You have several approaches to fixing inconsistent data or even making up for a lack of historical data. By understanding the options and recognizing the needs of your company, you can extract the valuable insight you need from the data you have currently. Expert Scott Lowe details the necessity of making a translation matrix, as well as the positives and negatives mitigating unreliable or absent data points. Whether you simply wait to collect more information or engage in a more strenuous data scrubbing, you’ll know you have quality information you can trust for your BI initiative.
Learn more in "BI strategy is nothing without high-quality data." Also:
Saving time and money with off-the-shelf BI applications
Advanced key performance indicators, real-time data and visually appealing dashboards are the epitome of BI applications, but many organizations struggle to get off the ground while chasing those ideals. So what’s an organization to do? They turn to prebuilt analytic applications (PAA), which offer a great alternative to custom-built applications.
Expert Phil Simon explains how a faster ROI can be achieved with out-of-the-box BI tools. He arms you with tips on what not to do in BI, as well as warns you against the pitfalls of confusing fast with faster. He also gives you guidelines for building up internal knowledge within your team as a key success factor in adapting a prebuild BI tool. As long as an organization understands restrictions and is able to accept a new way of doing things, PAAs can give you the tools you need with faster turnaround and better success rates than traditional BI implementations.
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A BI strategy in the cloud
You're no stranger to the prevalence of the cloud, so it should be no surprise that you can leverage the cloud for your BI needs. Before you jump in with both feet, a smart CIO will ask what the cloud offers that traditional software cannot.
Expert Jonathon Hassell provides his insight into why it’s only logical for the cloud to move into BI, and explains all the advantages of a BI cloud. For example, organizations can redeploy existing investments into new services, helping with a healthy bottom line. Saving money is win-win, but saving time is a soft cost savings that can feed a healthy ROI. With on-demand BI capabilities, the instantaneous improvements are a tempting way to add value back to the business. By leveraging a BI cloud, midmarket companies can leave the software licensing; giant, power-consuming servers; and storage space to the cloud vendor, while avoiding the big cost-of-entry price for playing with enterprise-grade BI tools.
Learn more in "A partly cloudy forecast: Moving to a business intelligence cloud." Also: