- The first step should be to identify and define the BI goals and objectives, and which stakeholders are involved in the process.
Embark on a strategic road trip for your business. Define your destination (BI goals) and identify key travel companions (stakeholders). Much like planning a road trip, setting clear objectives aligned with your business journey. - Select which team members would be responsible for BI implementation and assign roles and responsibilities according to the team members' skills and knowledge.
Assemble your business crew, each member with a unique role. Think of them as essential members of your road trip team—some navigate, some drive, and others handle logistics. Align roles strategically, mirroring the careful selection of roles in a coordinated team, ensuring everyone contributes to the smooth journey. - Select a BI platform, such as Excel, Microsoft Power BI, Tableau.
Select a Business Intelligence (BI) vehicle for your journey. Consider Excel as a reliable SUV, Power BI as a high-performance sedan, and Tableau as a top-of-the-line luxury car. Choose the vehicle that suits your business travel needs, ensuring a smooth journey in navigating insightful strategies. - Plan the project according to the company’s needs outlining the scope, timeline, and budget of the project.
Plan your BI project as you would plan an extensive road trip. Determine the route (project scope), set the duration (timeline), and allocate resources wisely (budget). Similar to orchestrating a well-planned road trip, carefully outline the parameters of your business initiative for a seamless and enjoyable journey. - Design and build the data warehouse which should align with the data management plan.
Craft a detailed itinerary for your business travel. Develop a systematic approach to storing vital travel documents (data), much like organizing a travel itinerary. This ensures easy access to pertinent information during your business journey. - Connect the data source to the BI platform and analyze the company’s data.
Approach data navigation as you would navigate through unfamiliar roads on a trip. Connect various data points (road signs) to find your way through the comprehensive business landscape, understanding where you are and where you can go. - Test the solutions to know if they suit the business requirements and once the solution is found deploy it to the organization.
Envision your business solutions as a meticulously planned road trip strategy. Before presenting it to your entire team (organization), conduct a strategic review to ensure everything aligns seamlessly. Once validated, implement this well-thought-out strategy across the organization for optimal satisfaction and a successful business journey.
Companies such as Netflix, Amazon, and Starbucks use business intelligence (BI) to optimize their business. For example, Netflix implemented BI to customize platform content recommendations for its users. This was achieved by analyzing user data, which in turn informed personalized preferences and recommendations. Amazon optimized its supply chain management by analyzing data from its warehouses so it could predict which product would be sold and adjust its inventory accordingly. Starbucks used demographic data and traffic patterns to find out where to open new stores.
Small business owners benefit from analyzing their data as well, you don’t have to be a large corporation to do so. New technology has made BI accessible to businesses of all sizes. During a business journey everything can become complex, and data can become overwhelming, entangled, and difficult to understand.
It’s important, as a business owner, to design and plan how data is to be collected to use it in favor of the business goals and reach the desired destination.
I have a small favor to ask, if you find this information useful, I ask that you share this blog with other business owners that might find this content useful as well. I will be setting a lot of effort towards posting regular content to help share knowledge about all things related to business and how data analytics can be used to improve companies. Thank you!