- ITPMG Confidential - ITPMG © Copyright 2011 ITPMG, LLC Michael Bitterman Charlie Ambuhl Founders - ITPMG, LLC How Agile Business Intelligence Is Vital to Your Organization
- ITPMG Confidential -
ITPMG
© Copyright 2011 ITPMG, LLC
Michael Bitterman
Charlie Ambuhl
Founders - ITPMG, LLC
How Agile Business
Intelligence Is Vital to
Your Organization
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Agile BIITPMG2ITPMG. All rights reserved.
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In Our Dos and Don’ts of BI Dashboard
Development Presentation We…
• Defined what a dashboard is and is not
• Discussed the impediments to developing, deploying and managing successful dashboards
• Outlined our five-phase plan and an architecture
• Established a number of dashboard ―no-nos‖
• Offered a number of dashboard ―dos‖
• Gave you some best practices and made recommendations that you could implement
• Sent you away with the hope that you could gain higher penetration into your organization
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Agile BIITPMG3ITPMG. All rights reserved.
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Today We Are Going to…
• Define BI (or at least give you one more definition
to work with) and its conflicts
• Define Agile BI
• Illustrate the Agile BI environment
• Explain BI “self service” in terms of what IT does
and what the business should do
• Explain the technology for Agile BI
• Summary
• Recommendation
• Questions and answers
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Among the many definitions is this consolidated perspective from the CIO’s point of view:
―Business intelligence refers to the practices, technologies and applications for gathering, managing and analyzing data with the objective of delivering intelligence to assist organizations in making more informed, therefore better and faster decisions.‖
What Is Business Intelligence (BI)?
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•According to an IBM survey of 2500 CIOs:•The use of BI analytics for decision making continues to be a high priority for organizations
•83% of the CIOs surveyed said that BI analytics is the way they are going to give their organization a competitive edge
•An Accenture study of 250 executives revealed•Producing analytics and making use of them is most often limited to the organization’s SMEs that know how to get them and make use of them
•72% of companies indicated they were working toward greater use of analytics
•Of those making use of analytics over 40% of decisions are made without using them
•What does this mean?•The inevitable now includes death, taxes and spreadsheets
The BI Conundrum
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The BI Conundrum
•Study done by Oracle:•70% of organizations remain tied to the ―spreadsheet culture‖
•In 2007 4% of organizations surveyed indicated that they had provided analytic capabilities to most of their organization’s workers
•In 2010 4% of organizations surveyed indicated that they had provided analytic capabilities to most of their organization’s workers
•In 2007 13% of the organizations said that their workers could build their own reports and dashboards
•In 2010 13% of the organizations said that their workers could build their own reports and dashboards
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• Currently there remains a mixed picture for the adoption of BI and its associated analytics
•CIOs say ―yes,‖ but adoption is not there• Data continues to increase in volume and
users continue to insist on gaining access to more information
•Relatively few organizations have or can provide what their workers are demanding
• There are issues surrounding access to data and the speed by which it can be provided in a form that offers it up as information
•Spreadsheets continue to rule the day
What Do We Know and Can Conclude?
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•A ―data democracy‖ needs to be created within the organization — data availability to all that need to access it
•Executives, managers and workers get education and training regarding the use of analytic tools
•Followed by greater access to analytic tools and corporate dashboards
•How do we accomplish this?• By building an Agile BI environment
What Are We Going to Do About It?
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What Is Agile BI?
• Agile BI is the right user having easy and ready access to the
right information at the right time and in the right form
• The right user is any of the 95% of people in the organization
who are non-technical (using a PC or mobile device doesn’t
make you a techie)
• The right information answers the question(s) the user has right
now, as opposed to the question the business analyst thought
they were going to ask when they wrote the enterprise BI
specifications a couple of years ago
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The Agile BI Environment
The development and deployment of an Agile BI
environment consists of three major components:
1. Alignment between IT and the business/agency
2. Support structure and agreement between IT and
the dashboard user community
3. The BI technology
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IT and Business/Agency Alignment
• This is an area that has been discussed for years,
and Agile BI doesn’t approach it from the traditional
standpoint of IT vs. business plans, projects and
priorities
• The Agile BI focus on IT to business alignment deals
with the development, implementation, management
and use of BI analytics within the organization
• The challenges for IT regarding alignment with the
business are…
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The Alignment ChallengeB
usin
ess
IT
Th
e T
hin
kin
g
Ga
p
Flexibility and Agility Control and Risk Mgm’t
Business Requirements Standards
Reacting Planning
Interactive Requirements Gathering
Now, what if? We’ll Get Back To You
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The traditional support structure for IT has been:
• Annual “planning meeting”
• Develop the “strategy” or tweak the last one
• Develop the IT budget
The Agile BI Support Structure
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The traditional support structure for IT has been:
• Annual “planning meeting”
• Develop the “strategy” or tweak the last one
• Develop the IT budget
And then go back to the day to day operations — usually
“event driven,” and also try to complete last year’s projects.
This is the norm and probably will be after we’re all gone.
Agile BI, however, looks at support differently and from two
perspectives. The focus is on where to draw the line
between IT support and business/agency “self service”!
The Agile BI Support Structure
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The BI Process Approach for Self Service
Separate the use of the
data and turning it into
information, which is
the job of the business/
agency…
…from gathering,
preparing and making
the data available,
which is the job of IT
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•Decisions
•Strategy
•Policies
•Objectives (e.g. clear understanding of what is driving revenue
performance
•Goals (e.g. achieve x% revenue growth
•Calculated metrics (any combination, variation of the standard set
of metrics
•KPIs (e.g. profitability, liquidity, shareholder value
•KPMs (e.g. enterprise value, trailing/forward pricing/earnings
•Metrics (e.g. segment income growth %, customer retention)
•Dimensions (customers, customer segments, products, time,
regions)
•Pre-calculated attributes (standard, cross-enterprise metrics, KPIs
and KPMs
•Pre-built aggregates (used to speed up reports and queries)
•Analytical data (data warehouse and data marts)
•Operational Data (ERP, CRM, financial, HR, etc.)
The BI Performance Management
Approach for Self Service
Business
Business
and/or IT
IT
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The Technology for Agile BI
The primary change is from a ―structured‖ to an ―associative‖ technology architecture
REGION
STATE
PRODUCT
SALES
PERSON
Traditional - Structured
REGION
STATE PRODUCT
SALES
PERSON
Innovative - Associative
IT Driven
•Linear, pre-defined thinking
•Insights missed in hidden data
•Months to make changes
•Data-centric
Business – User Driven
•Follows the user
•All data always available
•Minutes to change (self service)
•Insight-driven — what if?
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Traditional SQL Structure
Query Based BI Solution
Query Engine Application
Layer
Query
1
Query
2
Query
3
No inherent associations
between queries (e.g. queries
sharing filter state)
No inherent associations back to
original data set (e.g. drill to
detail)
Associations must be hard
coded query-by-query into the
application layer
This is time consuming,
expensive and inefficient
Results in inflexible, brittle and
distinctly non-agile BI
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Traditional Analysis Has Been Query Based
• SQL has been the in-place standard for 50+ years
• There are a few other query languages, e.g. MDX
(multi–dimensional queries)
• Query languages are perfect for loading,
extracting and altering data, so by default they
became the de facto choice for doing the
analysis, but…
• Each query is separate and divorced from the
source data and from data in any other query
• Query result sets are not associated with any
other query, so it turns out that today…
• Queries are not the best tool for actually doing
analysis
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A Change in Technology
Associative BI Solution
Associative
Engine
Application
Layer
The Associative Engine provides
inherent built-in associations
among all result sets and back to
the un-aggregated detail data
Result Set 1
Result Set 2
Result Set 3
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A Change in Technology
Associative BI Solution
Associative
Engine
Application
Layer
The Associative Engine provides
inherent built-in associations
among all result sets and back to
the un-aggregated detail data
Result Set 1
Result Set 2
Result Set 3
Associations are provided ―free
of cost‖ because adding or
modifying result sets does not
require any additional effort
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A Change in Technology
Associative BI Solution
Associative
Engine
Application
Layer
The Associative Engine provides
inherent built-in associations
among all result sets and back to
the un-aggregated detail data
Result Set 1
Result Set 2
Result Set 3
Associations are provided ―free
of cost‖ because adding or
modifying result sets does not
require any additional effort
The result is
Agile BI
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A Change in Business Thinking
Associative BI Solution
Associative
Engine
Application
Layer
Result sets update themselves
instantly as the user executes
selections within the application
With no hard-coded associations
and no pre-defined drill paths the
user can explore the data in any
direction
―Breakthrough‖ business
insight is found by following
where the data leads vs.
following the path pre-
determined at least months if
not years ago
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• Users Make Changes Themselves: The cycle of innovation continues in a rapid
flow directed by the user
• Data Can Come and Go as Needed: New tables can be added to the mix so the
flow of analysis can continue un-interrupted
• Fast Response: The user can quickly and easily see what the data is telling them
• User Directed Drill Downs: Users can drill down the paths they decide are
important not those planned for them in advance
• Cheap and Fast Experimentation: Once the user is in charge the evolution and
penetration of the dashboard is viral. Users find themselves with their hands on
the pulse of the business and a real sense of empowerment
• Knowledge Sharing: Dashboards, KPIs, tips and tricks propagate around the
company like shared decks of presentation slides creating a culture of innovation
What Does Agile BI Bring?
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• Low Hanging Fruit Is Harvested: Once user controlled technology is introduced user
can what they have always wanted. The result is a burst of user energy, innovation and
business optimization
• Jumpstart to Innovation: Users stop asking questions when they cannot get answers.
When they can get answers they start asking questions again. Answers lead to more
questions and eventually to innovative solutions
• Closing Loops: Those in charge of a process can get answers about the results of the
process and how it is working. The effects of actions can be readily seen and new
leading indicators can be quickly developed allowing more effective changes to be made
resulting in greater optimization
• Increasing Accountability: More visibility equals greater accountability. When an agile
dashboard “turns the lights on” all can see where performance is and where it is headed
• Propagation of Knowledge: Discoveries in one part of the business about the business
or the dashboard can be shared and then tuned for each situation as they arise
What Are the Benefits?
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In Summary
For BI self service• Draw clear lines where IT and business
ownership and governance begin and end• Empower your business users
• Embrace next generation BI technology• Practicing Agile BI
• Leave IT in control of• Standards• Risk Management• Data preparation• Bringing Agile BI to the enterprise
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In Summary
For Agile BI• Remember that original estimates of cost and time are always too low
• Don’t over promise• Don’t over commit• Have a strategy and a plan that can be shown to the organization and then followed and amended as necessary
• Monolithic models have not been successful for implementation of BI — be flexible
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To receive additional materials and details on
How Agile Business Intelligence is Vital
to your Organization
contact ITPMG at:
by email:
or phone:
+1.843.377.8228