Establishing 'Making it Happen' as a 'Formal & Predictable' Discipline

Individual Impact and Usage of BI	BI operational performance metrics

ENCYCLOPEDIA→ Enterprise Intelligence → - BI End-to-End → - Business Intelligence Performance Management →

BI Organizational Impact success assessment

This performance area goes beyond the individual and looks at how well BI has performed at an organization level. Most of the performance parameters here talk about the ultimate benefits realized from the BI.

BI has met the business requirements for which it was implemented:

This is essentially related to the scope-adherence of BI, both at the levels of core components (DW+OLAP) as well as the end-user tools. Some examples are:

The Business themes as agreed are delivered: With reference to data warehouse scoping phase,
The Business information requirement are delivered (refer do not rely only on business requirements only as you model and design your data warehouse)
The dimensions and measures as agreed are delivered
The vintage of data as agreed is extracted and populated
The frequency of refresh is happening as agreed.

BI has enabled improvements in business processes:

Through various analytics around the defects, TATs, activity based management, expense analysis etc... BI should be able to deliver inputs on process weaknesses and inefficiencies. It should also with the help of business modeling and analytics, be able to help generate the solutions. One can run scenario analysis on various process models, resource normalization, cost targets etc.

BI has been able to achieve the direct benefits as envisaged:

The direct business benefits from BI can be (refer business intelligence business case)-

Reduction in the number of people generating MIS & Reports
Increase in the TAT for information generation
Regulatory compliance
Reduction in financial write-offs
Higher customer satisfaction index
Better risk-portfolio...

The key in this factor is that one is able to show a direct and tangible link between BI and the business benefits. All the above said examples will need more than BI to make it happen. Through user feedback and also by defining 'what' was lacking' and 'what is now', one can measure the proportion of impact, which BI had on the business benefits.

BI has delivered high ROI:

BI initiatives are sold with very high ROIs (200% plus). For example- 'With the sales compensation cost of more than 100 million USD per annum, even if you are able to make 2% reduction, through better sales compensation analysis, the BI platform will pay for it self.' However, when you are looking at the actual ROI BI has delivered; one will need to be very hard-nosed on the actual costs as well as on the benefits.

TIP- One way of being hard-nosed in recognizing the actual benefits is to ask the question in a reverse order:

Typical way to ask Benefit question: How much of benefit has been realized with BI platform.
Right way to ask- How much of the benefit would not have been realized, without the BI platform? The reasons is that many things which BI does, might have been done irrespective (though with some pain), because of their sheer criticality.

While we advocate conservatism in benefit calculation, one will need to recognize the fundamental shift BI brings in managing and running your organization.

BI has enabled improved communication & cooperation across the organization:

This is a soft one and may not be 'quantifiable'. However, it’s an important point. BI brings integration and harmony across the teams within an organization. Some examples of how this happens are:

It builds an agreement between the functions on the single truth of information. It can reduce or eliminate the countless situations around people not believing or accepting the each-other's data.
It enhances alignment on business goals, objectives and performance scorecards: BI 'universalizes' the assessment and interpretation of performance. As the performance scorecards are generated on 'well-defined, agreed and visible' grounds, functions spend less time in contesting the output.
If BI is coupled with collaboration and work-flow layers it helps people to exchange commentary on the information and do a transparent review.

BI has supported strategic business objectives:

This is shade similar to realization of BI ROI but more fundamental. BI serves many objectives at operational, managerial and strategic levels. However, the investment on BI should be more governed by its contribution to the strategic objectives. For example BI can have operational benefits related to reduction of the headcount of people generating MIS or better regulatory compliance. However, the real benefit will be, if it helps you to enhance your sales channel management in a high growth distribution-driven business model.