The Business Intelligence Team
So what’s the BI Team? It seems like I’ve talked all around the subject. There were clever anecdotes about consultants, mini-rants in my comments and back-peddling into a definition of BI. A cynical person might suggest I’m avoiding the topic and they’d be right! I think its my technical background raging against the next phrase that I’m actually going to say in the light of day (or more appropriately the light of my monitor). The BI team are the folks that make the BI cycle work. You know the thing where the data gets turned into knowledge that drives profitable business action. The ones that determine the focus from the vision and make it a strategy. They’re the crayon stick figures (the ones in my silly diagram fashioned solely because every really critical idea must be white-board friendly) that make the top and bottom line look much much better. I still haven’t said it have I? They’re suits. Business people. They don’t know meta data from their metacarpal (even though both tend to be critical to the practice of BI), but at the end of the day they are the folks who make world class BI work. There I said it! Are you happy now?
Much of the buzz (when it comes to BI) is about technology and that’s disappointing. I’ve set up my Google alerts to give me the latest BI news. What I get is ‘SAP to purchase Business Objects’ and ‘Microsoft announces Performance Point’. If you do get a white paper that talks about some business related success its tied back to the purchase of an analytical application. Don’t get me wrong. I love tech. Its just that the successful practice of BI has very little to do with it. Any reasonably competent IT team can establish and support the business the tools that BI requires. I’d even argue that in the right circumstance there’s a case to be made for outsourcing the infrastructure and support work. What needs to be discussed, understood and embraced is the organizational behaviors that need to be fostered for a company to make smarter decisions locally and strategically. It boils down to making this cycle work:
I’ve read the books (well tried to…there’s a couple out there that just suck the life right out of you) and to me, working in admittedly mid-sized environment, it boils down to making it work for the analysts and enabling the broadest possible audience of actors. There’s discipline and process around getting your data organized and usable, providing this to the right folks with the rights skills, and translating this into action. Its interesting because all the vendors know this. I’ve talked to a bunch of them and there’s always the person they bring in who has done it really well somewhere else. If you get this person talking in the appropriate environment you’ll get some really good info. I’ve heard of a couple of different takes on making the BI cycle work but generally it comes down to defining the BI Team as the leaders between the sponsors and the BI community. Its the group of individuals who can provide sustainability, foster mutual accountability across channels and support the ‘like-cycle’. Yep, I said ‘like’ NOT ‘life’. Interested in the like-cycle? Or the composition of the BI Team? Let me know and I’ll make it the subject of next week’s post!
Gotta run…
Tags: Business Intelligence, Consulting, Grand Rapids, Michigan, West Michigan
