Everyone is guilty of falling into a rut and building reports the same way over and over again. This year, don’t just churn out the same old reports, resolve to deliver better business intelligence. Think about what business intelligence means. Resolve, at least in your world, to make business intelligence about helping organizations improve business outcomes by making informed decisions. When the next report requests land on your desk leave the tool of choice alone, Cognos in my case, and think for a while. This even applies to those of you building your own reports in a self-service BI world.
Think about the business value. How will the user make better business decisions? Is the user trying to understand how to allocate capital? Is the user trying to improve patient care? Is the user trying to stem the loss of customers to a competitor? Is the user trying find the right price point for their product? No matter what the ultimate object, this gets you thinking like the business person and makes you realize the goal is not a report. Continue reading “Think Better Business Intelligence”