Brain Vibe

marketing muses to stay engaged

April 7, 2009 • 4:56 pm 0

Business Intelligence: Decisions, Decisions

“Business Intelligence is all about supporting business decision.”

How many times have you heard that? It’s become the standard mantra. It is so ubiquitous that I don’t think anyone questions anymore the validity of the statement. It just is. However, this is probably the hardest part to facilitate when building out you business intelligence practice. Facilitating decisions is what makes BI stragetic.

Just what is the business decision? What does a business decision look like?

Elements of a Business Decision:

Purpose: drive a business outcome – ex: revenue, shareholder value, profitability, market share
Position: leads a company, division, department
Point in Time: transition along a process or environment

A typical approach during the business analysis phase for BI is to at business decisions across a business process and where questions are asked to change behavior in that process. Although, the difficulty with this level of granularity is that it is too deep. These transition points are tactical. Intelligence across this process and at these decision points is important, but you don’t get the strategic value of BI at this level. You need to look at the outcome of the process and provide a platform that supports the decision of what to do next. This is the unstated question.

Let’s take an example. Sales management will always want a perspective on the pipeline and forecast. This shows them how they are meeting their numbers quarter to quarter. However, outside of conversion and volume, there are business decisions that sales managers need to make. Should they adjust their territories to capture new opportunity or shore up existing business? Are there changes needed in commissions to incent sales people along certain products and services to improve profitability or revenue? BI can lead sales management with insights that will guide them to optimize their processes and management rather than just data.

Purpose: market share, revenue, profit
Position: sales
Point in Time: aligned to quarterly pipeline and forecast

To align BI to the business decision it is important to include executives in the discussion. Get beyond the reports they want to see and ask the question about how they manage their business. Walk through scenarios of what they ask as changes in the market or the business arise and how information can help them make a decision. The better able you are to see how they manage their business, the more valuable the BI practice will be to supporting the business.

Filed under: business intelligence, performance management, Business, business analysis, business analytics, business intelligence, business management, Business process, Data Warehousing, Databases, Decision making, Management, Market share, project management

March 30, 2009 • 4:00 pm 1

Why Business Intelligence is So Difficult

Reading the buzz on the Jim Davis’s presentation at SAS Global Executive Forum, what it made me realize is that if as an industry we can’t agree on what Business Intelligence is or Business Analytics, how are we supposed to make sense of it in implementation?

business intelligence confusion You have analytics players, enterprise application vendors, business process consultants, and analysts all trying to sell the ‘hype’ of a better way to analyze your business and makes decisions. SAS wants to sell their analytic solution that really pioneered data mining in businesses. Oracle and IBM wants to push dashboard solutions that links to business processes and their enterprise applications. Gartner that tries to tie together people, process, and technology but is really is focused on what technology to buy. Then, you have consultants that are trying to help you implement the technology even as they document your processes. The problem is that it’s all boiling down to the one with the best tool wins.

Enter in the ‘Business’ and now you have a problem. All they want to know is how they can meet their business objectives. IT is trying to sell the solution and make them understand the technology, and the business glazes over and can’t figure out what to focus on. I’ve sat in these discussions where IT tells me, “You tell us what to do, we’ll do it. Don’t worry about the solution.” It is open ended. This leads to IT unable to work towards tangible goals and results. The business walks away frustrated, projects run from months into years, and original budgets are thrown out the window. I liken these projects to Boston’s Big Dig.

Neil Raden provided a perfect way to get through the fluff and hype that surrounds analytics and business intelligence. See article From BI to Business Analytics, It’s All Fluff

“I don’t like the term business analytics; it doesn’t tell me anything. Frankly, I think business intelligence as a term is downright laughable, too. What does that mean? Is integrating data intelligence? Is generating reports intelligence? Maybe its informing, but isn’t intelligence something you HAVE not something you do? Does doing what we call BI lead to intelligence, or just some information? A long time ago we called this decision support, and that gets my vote.”

So here’s my take on what steps to take when and how to venture into BI and analytic solutions.

Steps:

What decisions need to be made?
At what point in our business and business processes are these decisions made?
What information is needed at these points?
How should our applications and data provide this information – triggers or visualization?

See the steps? It starts with the business decion and ends in the technology. So, when you begin to review vendors and solutions, make sure you have steps 1,2,3 in mind before you determine how to solve step 4.