Business Process Driven BI – An Example

A quick example of how BI & BP (business process) should go hand in hand…

Working with statisticians from Central Michigan University, we’ve jointly developed PVForecaster, a product that allows hospital administrators to forecast their patient volumes on an hour-by-hour, specialty-by-specialty basis.  Tactically, the result is better control over scheduling and costs.  Strategically, PVForecaster helps administrators forecast changes in demand and react accordingly (e.g. build more capacity, etc.)

The PVForecaster  business process design is a good example of how BI (and predictive analytics) applications should integrate with business processes.  In our case, rather than just accepting data and ’spitting’ out forecasts, users drive the system as follows:

1) A planner uses PVForecaster to develop a number of forecast scenaria for the hospital.  For example, what is expected to happen if we increase our advertising budget?  What if we reduce it?  What if our operating territory’s population increases by 2%?  Stays flat?  Decreases?

2) The planner uses the BI tool to  review these scenaria with hospital executives.  Together they decide which scenario will be the one that the entire hospital will work from.  They use a routine in the BI application to designate this as the ‘working assumption.’

3) Department managers from across the hospital are given access to the ‘working assumption’ forecast in the BI tool.  They can use the tool to slice and dice through this forecast along all the relevant dimensions (e.g. date, specialty, time of day, etc.).

4) Using this information, the department managers can plan accordingly.

Yes, we could analyze data and build forecasts without implementing this business process.  But, the tools may not ever get used.  They may become the unused toy of some isolated planner.  On the other hand, implement a business process wherein all the relevant parties have, and need, access to the BI tool to do their jobs and you’ve developed a powerful tool that will get used and will provide enormous value.

Do you have any other good examples of business process / business intelligence synergy?  Put them in your comments.  Thanks!

– Ben

Dataspace Profiled in “New” Newspaper

Last month Ann Arbor’s long established newspaper, the Ann Arbor News, shut down.  But, it was replaced with a web / twice weekly hard copy publication.  Little did I know that Dataspace would be one of the first companies profiled in the new business section.  To see what they have to say, click here.

I, also, wanted to add a little ’subjective’, business intelligence quiz here.  The answer is really open to interpretation so it will be interesting to see what people think.  The question is: What was the first business intelligence tool?  Why?

Feel free to add your opinion as a comment.

Thanks for following us!

– Ben

Selling Business Intelligence to the Business

Business executives already know our secret.  The best business intelligence systems are not about the system.  The best business intelligence systems are about the business.  Sometimes it’s up to us, as IT professionals, to remind ourselves of this reality.  When talking to a business executive, don’t use keywords like analytics, data mining or data warehouses.  Instead, talk to them about their business.

Ask them if they know which of their customers are the most profitable and which are actually draining resources.  Ask if they want to find ways to reduce the amount they spend in legal costs.  Ask if they want to be able to predict the future demand for their products and services, so they can match capacity and staffing levels accordingly.

As experienced IT professionals we know that the way to provide these answers is to use the data already being collected by organizations in their operational systems (like ERP, CRM) and present it in new, visually appealing ways, with Business Intelligence (BI) tools.  But, occasionally we need to remind ourselves that no matter how cool the technology (to us, even that first program we all wrote that displayed the words “Hello World” was really cool), that’s not what sells BI.

Executives appreciate technology, and many are quite savvy, but when it comes to how they spend their day, they’ve got problems to solve, opportunities to capitalize on, and stakeholders to please.  To them, the best systems are like dishwashers – tools that get a job done.  Executives are not interested in how the dishes get clean, just that they do get clean in a fast, reliable, budget-friendly way.

In other words, executives are interested in the benefits of BI, not how it gets delivered.  So, the next time you’re discussing BI with an executive, sell the benefits, not the tool.  Sell the value of sales force ranking, not the BI system.  Sell the patient volume forecast, not analytic algorithms.  Sell the ability to direct your valuable purchasing dollars to the lowest cost vendors, the ability to have your sales executives use their limited time to court the most profitable clients, the ability to gauge the effectiveness of your latest promotion… you get the idea.

I’ve gotten some great feedback on my Blog posts and I’d love to hear your input.  Feel free to add a comment or email me directly at btaub@dataspace.com.

Dataspace is now an Information Builders Partner!

Just a quick note here, a few weeks ago I wrote the IBI was a sensible player in the BI space that is sometimes overlooked in BI evaluations. Well, to follow that up, Dataspace has just joined the Information Builders (IBI) partner program. For more information, check out the link to the press release on our home page: www.dataspace.com.

Business Intelligence: Where to turn now?

In my discussions with customers and others in the BI field I am hearing a lot of anguish about software vendors.  Many of the larger BI players have been sucked up into bigger companies and I’m hearing that these BI vendors, which were never customer-friendly to begin with, are now becoming downright customer-hostile – even with customers who have paid maintenance for the privilege of obtaining technical support.  Take a look at this article from CIO Magazine for more detail on the turmoil, and this article on Business Intelligence vendors to watch.

BI software vendors used to be grouped into the top three or four players, with open source and smaller players taking a far back-seat.  Things have changed.  Every week I’m seeing product announcements from new entrants.  Some of the tools look really good.  One I’m a big fan of, despite some limitations, is QlikView.  They’ve been around for a while, but are still relatively new compared with long-time BI players.

As consultants, we have the opportunity to work with a great group of clients, and we apply our expertise regardless of the technology they have already deployed – even if its one of the aforementioned customer service-challenged companies.  What to do, though, when a client asks us to recommend a new technology to help them rid themselves of their BI headaches, or make a new start in the field?  We’ve learned that the company behind a technology is as important to a successful implementation as the technology itself.  After all, you can get management dashboards, alerts, statistical analysis and basic reporting from virtually all of the established players.

So, who to choose?

Of course it depends on the application, but if you’re looking for enterprise-class reporting, dashboarding capability, the ability to email basic business intelligence to a broad audience, reasonable licensing models, and an independent vendor partner with a great reputation for customer service, the answer could very well be Information Builders, IBI, the creators of Focus and WebFocus.

What?  Isn’t IBI an old-line mainframe reporting solution?  That’s what I thought.  But, then I saw the technology demonstrated to one of my clients.  Is it perfect?  No.  Other major vendors like Business Objects, Cognos and MicroStrategy each have their unique advantages and disadvantages.  But, IBI really seems to ‘get it’ in two very important ways:

1) WebFocus provides flexibility but also comprehends a fact I’ve been talking about for a long time: MOST USERS DO NOT CREATE REPORTS FROM SCRATCH.  In most BI environments reports are created by IT and, perhaps, a few power users.  The vast majority of users don’t want to and don’t need to create reports from scratch.  (For more on this see my post on tying the BI tool to the user. )

2) IBI customers are genuinely happy both with the tools AND with the vendor.  As with any piece of software, tech support issues do occasionally arise, but the feedback I’ve received is that when they occur, they are given top priority.  Can you say that about your BI vendor?

We were so impressed with the research we’ve conducted, that we’re considering partnership with IBI.  If you are evaluating Business Intelligence tool sets, I recommend that you consider them.

– Ben