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August 25, 2009
Are You a BI Skeptic?
People who are skeptical typically need to see results in order to be persuaded. If you're a skeptic yourself, or are trying to convince a person you report to that is a skeptic of something, concrete case studies, visuals, and hard number can be what's needed to persuade people.
In terms of business intelligence tools (commonly referred to as BI), skeptics believe that making a big investment in BI tools is an expense they cannot justify, especially in the current business landscape. Some believe it's an unjustifiable expense due to the fact that there are tools and resources they've already invested in. They don't realize how different today's tools are from the tools they bought a few years ago. Many don't realize that their staff are left to struggle with ineffective reports and don't realize how much easier business decisions could be to make if only the right data was available. If you don't have comprehensive data in front of you, aren't your decisions just being made based upon guesswork? Estimates can have a large margin of error and this can be costly to a business, especially in today's business landscape!
Are Your Analytical Tools Really Effective?
Effectively analyzing data can help any business leader or even an entry level staff member make more effective decisions and the truth is that too many companies cannot use the data analysis tools they've already invested to their maximum benefit in for several reasons --- namely the fact that they have a heterogeneous computing environment so their tools have trouble talking to each other.
Many businesses who haven't paid much attention to business intelligence tools think they've already got a decent BI system because they get reports today. They've been running these reports daily, weekly, or monthly for as long as they can remember but in many cases, these static reports don't really help them analyze their business effectively because the reports are a bit like jigsaw puzzles that take time, effort, and sometimes take system down-time to obtain. Many people become so accustomed to using the tools that they have that they don't even realize how much better and easier it could be. If you've always had to wait for information and always had to include a certain margin of error because it wasn't “up to the minute” information, you don't really know what you're missing.
Many of today's data mining tools can help you get instant information in a format that's much easier to understand and easier to use, regardless of how many systems have to be looked at in order to come up with a report. With the right data you can: get, share, and analyze information as and when you need it and this means you can make educated decisions about your business.
While some executives believe that their company already has reports and data to use, others others just don't realize what type of an impact better analytical tools could have on their business. Some people have become complacent with their mediocre systems and tools and don't realize the positive impact on their business if they could make their data more usable to their staff and for their own strategic purposes.
For many BI skeptics, nothing talks quite the way money does and while there is an initial investment in putting new business intelligence tools in place, the return on investment comes when you can quickly pinpoint areas for your business to improve and grow. These improvements can come in operational improvements that reduce the need for staff or that improve order cycle time for happier customers and can also help you analyze information so that you can make more sales than before.
How can you decide if your business intelligence tools need to be improved or upgraded? Talk to a business intelligence specialist who can show you in dollars and cent and with case studies what kind of difference it can make to your bottom line.
Posted by Sasha Grebenyuk at August 25, 2009 3:15 PM
Comments
Nice post. I have been working with a lot of BI skeptics: people who always want to see ROI calculations before starting a BI project.
But sometimes showing case studies and presenting technologies capabilities isn't enough. It takes a cultural shift to make the jump (especially when the organization is still working on Excel sheets).
Posted by: lamia ben at August 27, 2009 6:31 AM
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