Five steps to creating an all-encompassing BI 2.0 investment strategy
Steve Andriole
"The promise of business intelligence (BI 1.0) is finally turning the performance corner," says Cutter Fellow Steve Andriole. "We've connected BI to business performance management and we've begun the journey toward structured/unstructured data integration and interpretation and real-time analytics. Almost all of the major BI players have found new homes. All systems are go. The next generation of business intelligence (BI 2.0) is real -- and ready." Andriole recently assessed the BI marketplace and offered advice to help firms craft a BI 2.0 investment strategy:
Here are 5 steps Andriole suggests companies take to prepare themselves for BI 2.0:
- Build an 'introspective architecture" capable of providing wide and deep insight into how you operate, how you make money, how you lose money, and the ability to ask what-if questions about the impact of alternative processes.
- Inspect your database platforms and architectures. If your company has multiple disparate data sets and nonstandardized database platforms it is ill positioned to exploit process mapping or the full range of emerging BI tools and your ability to achieve real-time optimization will be threatened.
- Model the descriptive and prescriptive questions and answers you'd like your BI environment to handle. Such Q&A exercises constitute BI requirements gathering and should position your firm to think about BI today (1.0) and BI tomorrow (2.0).
- Pilot existing BI tools for their ability to support descriptive and explanatory and predictive questions and answers. Huge investments are probably not advisable at this point for most companies.
- Try to influence the major BI vendors. While this is tough for smaller companies to accomplish, the larger enterprises can influence the way BI vendors think about real-time optimization that results from synergy among BI tools, BPM tools, rules engines, and the processes necessary to support the ongoing search for optimal performance.
Andriole recommends that firms consider solutions that include on-demand/in the cloud BI, commercial/Open Source BI (COBSI), and SOA-compliant platforms. In addition, he asserts, "The clear marching order is to invest in strategy development and business process modeling (BPM). These investments will trigger the greatest return on BI investments. If you haven't invested in BPM, it's time."
To request a copy of the Business Intelligence Executive Report (Vol. 10, No. 2), containing Dr. Andriole's analysis, or to schedule an interview with Dr, Andriole, contact Kara Letourneau (+1 781 6487 8700 or press@cutter.com)