The Phrase Business Intelligence
January 5, 2010
I first came across the word “Business Intelligence” at the 1999 Cognos meeting in Toronto when their CEO announced the “new IT category” as part of the leadership strategy. Their marketing gurus must not have done a manual search or focus group since there wasn’t any indication that anyone really knew why it’s called “business intelligence.” Let’s look at the historical words in this category of making data more meaningful. Throughout my 29-year career, Information Technology Professionals have tended to over-complicate what they are trying to accomplish by coming up with descriptive labels that tend to remind me of a NASA space mission. Back in the Eighties, we called it Decision Support Systems (“DSS”). In the early Nineties, it was referred to as Executive Information Systems (“EIS”). Then, with the explosion of relational data base technology, the new movement became coined as various tangible models: Data Warehousing, Data Marts, Closets, Data Mining, and the like.
From an IT perspective, there are a lot of differences between these definitions throughout the years. At the same time, how do they really differ from a business executive viewpoint? Are the decisions in business being made today differ significantly from decisions that were made yesterday? Does the thinking process differ from an analytical viewpoint? Does having more data mean that you can make better decisions? Are decision-makers better off with all of the data that is available? How does the business executive think about “business intelligence” from an information viewpoint?
Here’s a three-part “Maslow’s Triangle” layered model to think about Business Intelligence from a business perspective.
1. How’s Business?
First, at the base of the triangle, you have to ask “How’s Business?” This layer really emphasizes “time over periods” of transactions. Traditionally, this area is termed “transactional reporting” and simply put, is giving the user their numerical tabulation of data at the end of a period. What would a business person define as “Best in Class” in this area? Give me my reports as near-time as possible for the period that I am looking at and be able to sub-category my different business lines, product lines, financial divisions, etc. Most of the data could be described as the data from “double-entry bookkeeping systems.” With today’s ERP-style systems, this kind of information is fairly accessible as long as you are dependent on internal data only. Some data feeds may be external feeds or internal non-structured data sources that still have the same timeframe. Examples would include “customer satisfaction” data, quality data, and other operational inputs.
For example:
“What is the revenue over the last quarter?”
“How many X was sold in the last week?”
“What is the profit for the month?”
2. Why?
The next layer up the triangle is simply put “Why?” Why did the business’ Eastern Region have a 5% increase in sales year over year? Why did we miss our numbers in the last week of the quarter? Why did our market share grow in our mature product line in the last 2 quarters?
3. What If?
The last layer of the triangle is “What If?” If one can receive their business results from “How’s Business” and then is able to determine “Why” the business performed in this fashion, the “What If?” pinnacle of the triangle will provide a roadmap for the decision-maker to model their potential decisions that they have in mind.
For example, if one knows their financial performance and also sees where the business over-achieved and where it under-achieved, it is able to move resources of the business (management & money) to the area of need. Whether the strategy is to provide more or less resource is up to the person involved. The numbers themselves are not going to make the decision.
So, then is “Business Intelligence” an oversold phrase in the world of Information Technology? A “Qualified Yes” and a “Qualified No.” The challenge today is that the tools actually work and work well if the approach taken is right. At the same time, recent publications and noted experts all agree that the road to Business Intelligence is cluttered with a lot of failed attempts, a lot of capital spend that isn’t going to be realized from an investment viewpoint, and a lot of disenfranchised users.
I’ll write about this dilemma in my next blog.
Sprechen sie…IT?
December 17, 2009
Tonight I was at a local grocer (that’s headquartered in Michigan). I was at the “No Limit Self-checkout” at around 9:45 PM. (I have a BUNCH of kids so I shop after bedtime…) Anyway…while I was there, they began to shut down ALL of the checkout lines except for the 12 items or less lanes. They explained to those in line that it was time for “change over” and that the lanes would be open just as soon as they were finished. Um…huh?? It’s 9:45PM. I want to go home. I don’t care why my line just got shut down…what are my other options? “Change Over” means nothing to me. I just want to check out.
The whole experience reminded me of what it’s like to be in the operational side of the business requesting services from IT. Think about the SNL sketch with Nick Burns the Help Desk guy. He speaks a language that his customers don’t understand and then treats them like they are stupid for not getting it. The customers eyes glaze over thinking, “so…um…ok… how will you fix my problem?”
Is your IT department speaking your language? If not, then how will they ever help you to solve your business problems? Chances are they don’t understand you either. Bridging the gap takes a skilled interpreter who can understand both. Your best BI architects do this and don’t try to explain ETL, Dimensional Models or ODS to you…cuz really…do you care how it works if it answers your questions and helps to make sense of your data.
We Do BI Faster… Part 2
December 8, 2009
It’s been my experience that BI projects fail when the technical team fails to understand the urgency that exists with their customers. Failure also comes in the form of not delivering what was needed to answer the business questions or delivering in a format that doesn’t fit into the day-to-day way that the Customer does his/her job.
My son’s day-to-day life is impacted by data points. One of my sons has Type 1 Diabetes. It’s a pain to manage. There are numbers EVERY day!!! Right now he is tied to a Continuous Glucose Sensor and an insulin pump. (When I say tied…I’m not kidding…it’s really attached…by a 23” tube…24×7.) We receive data points every 5 minutes. On his pump, I can see a display that tells me what his BG is right now. It allows me to make decisions right now. What it does not tell me is how past decisions have impacted the current BG. It doesn’t tell me how actions I take now will impact future BG. I use my “gut” to determine what to do when his BG is high and requires insulin or low and requires some sugar. There are some pre-programmed “rules” that help me to make my decisions (e.g. it takes 1 unit of insulin to drop his BG 90 “points”). Displaying these data points on my son’s pump is great if he’s the only one making decisions. However, his dad, me, our doctor, my son’s teachers…all of us need to see the data to make the right decisions. More importantly, we need to see the historical data to understand the impact of past decisions. A tool does exist from his pump company that allows me to upload the data and view pretty graphs in PDF reports. But the data keeps changing…every 5 minutes…Isn’t the same true in business?
At a grocer…a shopper decides to buy Crest toothpaste and not Colgate (no offense to Colgate…but I’m in a P&G town). The shopper does this despite being sent oodles of coupons for Colgate. What does that data point tell me? Should I stop sending Colgate coupons to that shopper? If I start sending Crest coupons can I guarantee that the shopper will come back the next time they need Crest? Where will that decision get made? Where should the BI tool be?
At a utility company…right now, I get my bill at the end of the month and I pay it. I’ve set my thermostat back to 67 in the Winter and 74 in the Summer. I’ve seen a decrease in my bill over the last 12 months since I started doing this. But last night was COLD!!! I was so cold that I couldn’t sleep. What’s the impact of turning up my thermostat to 72 while I sleep? If the utility company decides to build me a BI app that sits on my PC and prints for me really pretty graphs, it does me no good when I’m lying in bed and want to make a decision on if it’s worth it to turn up the heat.
For a sales guy/gal…I enter all of my contact info in Salesforce.com. I have to send out my forecast to my boss, typically in Excel. Should the IT team give me Business Objects for me to see my past customer sales? What about Cognos?
When I design BI solutions, I try to make sure that the solution is delivered in a tool that I need and that makes sense to me. I don’t want my customers to require training just to look at their data. The tool should be easy for me, cuz analyzing the data is HARD!!! What are you giving your customers for data analysis? Is it a tool that’s easy for you to build? Or easy for them to see the data in the format that they need?
Just Say No!
September 14, 2009
With the difficult economy comes difficult choices. LÛCRUM is focused on helping our customers to realize the value of their data. This enables us to focus on what we do best, and continue to strengthen our skills in this area. This additionally increases our success in our work, as we only offer our expertise in the areas in which we truly are world class – data oriented solutions. This does however mean that on occasion we have to say no to our customers. This would typically be due to the fact that we are being asked to do work that is not truly within our focus. We have recently turned down infrastructure, pure design oriented development, and custom development requests. This is not easy to do in a difficult economy, but frankly is a critical aspect of our business – Focusing where we EXCEL. This has also given us the opportunity to partner with some great local firms. KiZAN, US Digital Partners, and recently DLP Solutions. These firms practice this focus, and it’s a pleasure working with them. I look forward to our long term partnerships, and to continuous improvement in our focus area – helping our customers to Realize the Value of their Data.
How Many Versions of The Truth Does Your Company Have?
September 11, 2009
Years ago, while at one of my previous employers, I was part of a cross functional team of people from across the organization given the seemingly simple task of identifying our best customers. Seems like this should have been pretty easy right? Define what best means, run a report or two, discuss the findings and cross it off the “to-do” list. Oh how naive I was to believe it would be so smooth.
In reality it took months to determine that there were in fact numerous clusters of our best customers, yet no master list that everyone could agree upon. Marketing had its list, and so did sales, and accounting, and finance, and operations. Everyone was pulling different points of data from different systems, and thus getting radically different results. We had multiple versions of the truth. Sadly, we never did figure it out. A month into the project, the company was bought out and we were pretty much all downsized out within a couple months – this actually ended up being a great thing for me. Still, that experience has stuck with me, and taught me a valuable lesson – to be useful, data needs to present one version of the truth.
Had we been able to create this list quickly and accurately, we could have spent time trying to determine the best ways to serve our best customers. We could have examined ways to get new customers that were similar to our best customers, convert good customers into great ones, and improved the results of the organization. Instead we spent time and money simply trying to figure out whose list was the right list. What a waste!
As the “marketing guy” I am not the utmost authority at LUCRUM on business intelligence and data architecture. Still, having gone through that experience makes me genuinely appreciate the services we provide our customers. I have been in their shoes – seeking the truth, seemingly finding it, wanting to move forward, only to have everything come to a screeching halt because of inconsistent, incomplete information. It is a frustrating situation to be in, and I smile every time we solve such a problem for a Client.
If you are spending more time debating the truth as described by your data than you are determining what to actually do about it, you should talk to us. We can deliver one accurate, actionable, complete, and timely version of the truth for you – saving you time, money, and a whole lot of aggravation.
Democratizing Data
June 25, 2009
Wired magazine has a great interview this month with America’s first ever CIO, Vivek Kundra, who has been tasked with making the vast amounts of data collected by the Federal Government available for public use. Kundra talks candidly about the need to open up this information to the people, and the power that can come from analyzing and understanding data. The project is now coming to life on the site data.gov. Sources for data include the EPA, Library of Congress, FBI, National Science Foundation…. and on and on and on, with reports ranging from peanut recall data to most wanted lists to on time reports for airlines.
Here is an excerpt from the article explaining the goal of the site:
"The goal of Kundra’s new Web site, Data.gov, is create a place where all the information is easy to find, sort, download, and manipulate. He wants to put as much data out there as possible, then sit back and let the private sector come up with great ways to use it. He envisions a future in which well-designed spreadsheets, charts, and graphs are embedded in applications for phones, Facebook, and blogs."
This quote speaks to the power of data in our world. Certainly our government has more of this raw material than anyone, and opening it up to be refined and tapped into by citizens and businesses will help to create new breakthroughs in our world. Data gives us the ability to better understand our world. Of course it often must be refined, shaped, and combined with other pieces of data to become useful information. Once information is created, we have the opportunity to see our world in new and exciting ways. it becomes the basis for informed debate, enlightened creativity, and compelling innovation.
By opening this data up to the public, the collective wisdom of the nation and even the world is being enhanced. People everywhere will have greater insight, deeper understanding, and ultimately a better definition of the truth. What to do then is a whole different debate, yet one that can also be guided by data.
The data.gov site is by no means perfect. It is definitely still a work in progress. There are broken links, some reports and files have limited formats, it is clunky and cumbersome, there are limited feeds, and there is not yet much data from individual states. Still, it appears that the site will continue to add enhancements, data sources, and useful functionality to address these issues. Even in its current imperfect state, data.gov has the potential to deliver great information.
Something else I learned from the article is that Kundra is embracing concepts like cloud computing, software as a service and open source development – placing the government further up the innovation curve than I would have guessed. It is plesantly surprising to see such things.
Mr. Kundra closes the article with a quote that I really like – "By democratizing data, the American people will be able to hold their government accountable, based on evidence rather than talk." Politics has no shortage of talk on both sides of the aisle. It is great to see that perhaps data will play a bigger role in governing our country, informing our citizens, and advancing our economy. While I would never wish for data to replace talking, I am hopeful that it provide us with more intelligent things to say.
And Data for All: Why Obama’s Geeky New CIO Wants to Put All Gov’t Info Online
Shocking Statistics on Spreadsheets
June 3, 2009
A number of recent studies have shown that, among other things, up to 94% of spreadsheets used today contain errors. Read more
Moderation
May 14, 2009
Yesterday, I was fortunate enough to have been chosen to moderate a panel discussion put on Technology First in Dayton, Ohio. The event was entitled “My Web 2.0 Story,” and featured a diverse and talented panel made up of the following professionals:
- Alan See – Berry Network
- Doug Ross – Western Southern
- Tony Blankemeyer – PicsMatch
- Joshua Smith – NCR
- Neil Arthur – Dayton Business Journal
The panel was great – Alan is a Marketer, Doug is an IT Guru, Tony a young entrepreneur, Joshua is an HR professional, and Neil a newspaper publisher. They provided an excellent mix of viewpoints, backgrounds, and skills. Each panel member contributed unique ideas to the conversation, and they worked surprisingly well with one another to articulate their views. I dropped in my two cents from time to time as well.
Common themes included transparency, service, and innovation. There was considerable discussion around the idea of using web 2.0 as a business tool for listening – both internally to the needs of employees and externally to customers, competitors, and influencers. Finally, just about everyone recommended that the best way to understand web 2.0 was, as Alan See put it “to get in the water and swim.”
Interestingly there was considerable discussion around the measurement of social media. I am fascinated by this concept, and view this as an emerging area of opportunity in the technology space. The ability to measure not just activity on the social web, but to then link it to internal metrics and measures is fascinating. I am currently exploring this space as part of my job here at LUCRUM, so it was good to hear so many questions about it. (I will be discussing this more in upcoming posts, but suffice it to say I am excited about it.)
Andy Hickey, with the Technology First, had the great idea of having the tables construct questions during the lunch portion of the meeting at the begining. I then called on the tables throughout the meeting to ask questions – sort of analog web 2.0 style. We bounced back and forth between my questions and those of the crowd – all of which were exceptional.
I made a number of new connections at the meeting and picked up some great ideas as well. My thanks to Andy, Ann, the panel, the crowd, and everyone who made the event so much fun.
If you were there, I would love to hear your thoughts on the event. What did you like? What didn’t you like? What was the best question / answer you heard? Who was your favorite panelist? Chicken or beef? Please share your comments…
Handy Advice
April 2, 2009
If you spend a considerable amount of time working on a computer every day, you may have experienced carpal tunnel syndrome to some degree. I found myself wearing a wrist brace a few years back while battling this painful condition. If you or someone you know is experiencing pain, you may want to check out this short video from percussionist David Kuckhermann in which he shares some simple exercises he uses to avoid the pain.
If that is not enough, check out these tips from software engineer Dan Hersam. The cubicle can be a dangerous place. Stretch, use proper equipment, and go easy on the Mountain Dew. If these stretches are the most exercise you get in a given day, at least you will still be able to text. Thanks to Lifehacker for the tips.
The Difference
February 26, 2009
How happy are your customers with your service? How profitable is your business? How many new customers did your latest promotion attract? What is most important to the 20% of your customers that drive 80% of your revenue? What if you could know all this and more right now, in real time?
Information such as this might likely drive decisions as to how you would manage the future of your business. Information such as this would help you identify the most important problems facing your business, and then to solve them accordingly.
The source of information like this probably exists within your company right now, most like in the raw state known as data. Like to a vein of gold lurking underneath the grassy surface of the earth, you could be siting on top of a mountain of wealth and not even know it. That wealth is not always readily apparent, and often, like ore, requires some refinement before value can be realized. Sometimes it must be cleansed. Sometimes external elements must be added. At the end of the process, you have something whose value to the world is obvious.
Why doesn’t everyone have great information? First you just need to know what to look for. Next you need to know where to look for it. Finally you need to know what to do once you find it. Once all of this is accomplished you can ply this asset for tremendous and previously unrealized value.
Data can live in file folders, spread sheets, data bases, email messages, web sites, etc… It surrounds us. This abundant natural resource, if mined properly, refined thoughtfully, and shaped intentionally can yield information and knowledge whose value is literally as good as gold.
This information could be the difference from having an effective service recovery problem that addresses customer concerns in real time or having countless unhappy customers telling 3,000 of their closest friends on the web how you failed to deliver. Information and action could make the difference.
This information could be the difference between pulling the plug on that seemingly unpopular product line, or realizing that the unprofitable product actually helps to sell the profitable one because it is bought in tandem. Information and action could make the difference.
This information could be the difference between guessing as to the financial health of your business or knowing with certainty if some cancer exists within your business – if not caught early will result in the death of your firm. Information and action could make the difference.
Good information, and what you choose to do with it, can make all the difference in the world.