Business Intelligence ROI Remains Elusive; A next-generation approach to “ease of use” may hold the answer
On March 6th, 2013 the Fitzgerald Analytics team attended the quarterly symposium of the TDWI NYC Tri-State Chapter. The keynote presenter was Neil Raden, founder of CEO of Hired Brains Research and author of a leading book on decision management: Smart Enough Systems: How to Deliver Competitive Advantage by Automating Hidden Decisions.
For decades, Business Intelligence has been seen as both an essential and sometimes disappointing area of technology investment. Billions of dollars have been invested in presenting insights to business managers, but frequently the ROI has been soft and difficult to measure.
Neil Raden has long been concerned about the fact that usage rates for large-sale BI systems has “stalled at 10 to 20 percent of users, depending on which survey you believe.”
Of course BI will survive, but Raden said “we may not recognize it ... the need to analyze and use data will not go away, but BI will be part of a 'decision management continuum' incorporating predictive modeling, machine learning, natural language processing, business rules, traditional BI, visualization, and collaboration capabilities.”
Neil's talk focused on these questions:
∎ Why do many Business Intelligence implementations fail to achieve their potential?
∎ Will a broader definition of the concept enable better results?
∎ How can you optimize BI systems when you are not in complete control?
∎ What best practices and case studies are most instructive?
ROI on Business Intelligence - Neil Raden on Next-Generation "Ease of Use"
∎ Will a broader definition of the concept enable better results?
∎ How can you optimize BI systems when you are not in complete control?
∎ What best practices and case studies are most instructive?
ROI on Business Intelligence - Neil Raden on Next-Generation "Ease of Use"
Neil Raden is CEO and Principle Analyst at Hired Brains Research. He is a long-time practitioner, well-known author and consultant focused on data warehousing, Business Intelligence, analytics, big data, and decision sciences. He is the author of "Smart (Enough) Systems,” together with James Taylor. This book focuses on decision automation for optimizing practical business decisions. A favorite topic for Mr. Raden has been how to integrate strategy, planning, management and execution as the tools to achieve optimum decision making.
Neil Raden's talk was followed by a presentation by Tony Baer of Ovum Research entitled " Making Big Data Manageable: Getting Better Results by Managing Big Data Quality"
Intersecting with Neil Raden's keynote, Mr Baer asked “what does it take to turn the promise of Big Data into tangible results?” Big opportunities to benefit from new technology have come and gone, yet the consistent challenge has been translating new potential into concrete benefits. Mr. Baer shared a practical perspective on making big data manageable by understanding key challenges you must overcome to leverage big data, especially the unique data quality issues the Big Data sources introduce.
Mr. Baer also shared his insight that while Business Intelligence and Big Data are viewed and managed separately, in reality "Big Data and Business Intelligence must converge." Big Data needs to be approached with "less of a silo mentality," and so does Business Intelligence.
Tony Baer - Big Data and Business Intelligence Must Converge
Tony Baer - Big Data and Business Intelligence Must Converge
Jaime Fitzgerald, Founder and Managing Director at Fitzgerald Analytics, served on the Board of Directors of the TDWI NYC Chapter, and helped organize the event.
