15-MINUTE MANAGER dashboards, queries, and alerts e-mails. For example, using Waterfall methodologies and depending on the size of BI implementation, it could take anywhere between 3-6 months of iteration. In addition, constant change in the requirements and in the time reports built result in missing schedules, and most importantly, unhappy users. Users don’t recognise the connection between the implemented solution and their problem. Apart from methodologies, most scenario requirements are individual driven, cascading change requests and causing delays in delivery. Decision making across the enterprise is based on individual judgments. With so many individual niche solutions, complex BI solutions integration of various voluminous data sources is almost impossible.
Where are the Returns? Having said that, some of these challenges could be addressed with the help of packaged BI applications. Some of the advantages of packaged BI application are as follows: These
“BI wind is blowing towards bringing in innovations with the successful concepts of agility, mobility, cloud and bigdata” Sunil S Ranka, Member of the Board of Directors for BIWASIG
applications are typically designed for a specific domain (e.g. CRM, finance, or HR). They come with pre-built data extractors for relevant data sources, data models, sets of metrics, reports and dashboards. They satisfy 80 per cent (80%) of customer requirements and serve as a solution accelerator. They leverage vendor knowledge from prior customer experiences and implementation. It works best when your IT department lacks relevant functional/technical experience. Does it
BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE DIRECTION The subsequent few years will see a shift from traditional BI to next generation BI approaches The next wave of BI products will have new methodologies such as leveraging the existing investment and fixing the basics
data discovery. This will be the key through which companies will find data within their existing data ig data is no more a concept. It B has come a long way to become main stream and will need to be part of the overall corporate IT strategy
Establishing a Center of Excellence for BI, a common ground where business and IT could come together and make faster and better decisions with the common objective of successful BI
BI in cloud will be the next wave and data security and multitenance could be a roadblock but with low TCO, companies will need to make the first move
ompanies will need more of the C ‘Google” style “inmemory” analytical tools for faster business and
Mobile BI will be the next buzzword and agile BI will be the new norm
mean packaged applications can resolve all issues? Not necessarily. It may resolve up to 80 per cent (80%) of the requirements but the remaining 20 per cent (20%) could cause potential issues during upgrades and reinforcements. At times, out-of-the-box metrics definitions may not match existing corporate metrics definitions. Packaged applications have better user feedback, ease of configuring applications and bring in refined reports, which are tested before deployment. According to the TDWI group, customised BI applications are more tedious as they seek business requirements, define project scope, hire developers, build ETL tools, design schemes, build reports, generate feedback, train users and so on.
Which Way Does the BI Wind Blow? Even with various bottlenecks, BI has evolved to beome an integral part of the corporate success strategy and there is an effort to make necessary modifications. Clearly, the wind is blowing towards bringing in better innovations with the success of concepts such as agility, mobility, cloud, bigger data volume, etc., and people are willing to change with the need and companies are investing in innovating next generation products. (see box) Sunil S Ranka, Member of the Board of Directors for BIWASIG (BI Warehousing and Applications Special Interest Group).
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