Defining BI Requirements - Information Needed

The first task in a BI progam [and the first goal of the BI roadmap] is to identify what the business wants to achieve, and how business intelligence can support that need.

Look for opportunities in your organisation where business intelligence can:

1. improve the quality of day-to-day decision making
2. add value to operational efficiency
3. support tighter collaboration

BI Value Assessment

1. Where can business intelligence be used effectively?
2. Who will use the application?
3. What information do they need?
4. How will the outcomes be measured?

Assessing What Information Is Needed

When looking for BI opportunities in an organization, defining what information would offer the most value is a key requirement. This is achieved by understanding the decisions that must be made at each stage of the process, the raw data available and the measureable outcomes of those decisions. It often helps to start in reverse, at the high level process:

1. Define The Process Measures
2. Define The Activity Measure

Defining the Process Measures

he critical success factors for each core process in the functional area. These are generally measures calulated from transactional data, such as average sales volume, average prices, profitability, etc. Link these outcomes to corporate strategies, goals, and objectives.

Defining the Activity Measures

Activity Measures are the base measures captured at transactional level - sales data, resources employed, cost

The most relevant measures are driven by the functional area and processes for which the BI application is being developed, for example:

• Sales measures - unit sales, amount sales, count of orders, backlog
• Production measures - assembly units, hours, inventory
• HR measures - turnover, tenure, employee satisfaction, absenteeism

It is also important to consider the people impact, by measuring the impact BI has on users.

NEXT: Identifying BI Opportunities for Developing The BI Roadmap

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