Business Intelligence should help organizations improve business outcomes by making informed decisions. The problem is that Business Intelligence is the overarching term applied to the tools, technologies, and best practices that that supposedly help organizations make sense of data. Where should you start? What tools should you use? What are the best practices? How do you manage the mass of data flowing into your organization? To which buzzwords should you pay attention? Perficient’s Enterprise Information Solutions group helps organizations determine how to put business and intelligence back into Business Intelligence. In a previous post, I looked at Business Intelligence and what it means today. In this post, I examine some of the trends we are seeing today.
Tag: Strategy
Business Intelligence – What does it mean today?
Business Intelligence should help organizations improve business outcomes by making informed decisions. The problem is that Business Intelligence is the overarching term applied to the tools, technologies, and best practices that supposedly help organizations make sense of data. Where should you start? What tools should you use? What are the best practices? How do you manage the mass of data flowing into your organization? To which buzzwords should you pay attention? Typically, Business Intelligence is a technical implementation driven more by speeds, feeds, and glossy brochures. Perficient’s Enterprise Information Solutions group helps organizations determine how to put business and intelligence back into Business Intelligence. This post tries to define what Business Intelligence means today.
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Unwrapping your shiny new Planning, Budgeting, and Forecasting Application?
On Christmas morning, I sat with my family excitedly unwrapping presents. I must admit that I got everything I wanted and more. My son gave me a handlebar/ski-pole mount for my Drift HD video camera. Getting it made me start thinking about doing more with the camera than the typical user does – here is me going downhill – here is me crashing (take a look) – here is me trying to keep up with my family – etc. That led me too why do companies not do more with their Planning, Budgeting, and Forecasting (PBF) applications? I imagined you unwrapping your brand new Oracle Hyperion, IBM Cognos TM1, or SAP BPC software and saying “Now what?” All too often, the answer is more of the same, more manual processes to get the data, more ad hoc reporting, more unneeded detail in the budget, and more off-line spreadsheets to get the data in shape for the PBF application. Like me with my video camera, you need to start thinking about doing something different. Do not do it for the sake of being different; do it for the sake of doing things better. Here are some ideas to get you away from the incessant hunt for data, the everlasting close process, and endless reconciliation.
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Personal Analytical Tools
As 2012 ends, I thought it would be interesting to look at a category of tools that is gaining a significant hold in the Business Intelligence (BI) world. These tools are Personal Analytical Tools. The design of these tools allows users to be self-sufficient, to explore data, and to analyze it without IT involvement. The concept of user self-sufficiency is not new but the new tools are finally allowing users to realize the goal.