The document discusses the need for business intelligence due to the complex business environment companies operate in today. It outlines several key challenges companies face related to data, processes, tracking analytics, people, and geography that make it difficult to obtain reliable and timely information for effective decision making. This can lead to uninformed decisions, inefficient processes, high costs, and data quality issues. The document argues that a business intelligence solution is needed to provide consistent metrics and insights, optimize data management and distribution, and increase sales and marketing effectiveness through real-time reporting, analytics, and visibility into performance and trends.

1. Need of Business Intelligence
Vivek Mohan

2.  2 
Today’s business environment is highly complex
Competitors
Rapid
Technology
Shifts
Suppliers
Industry
Business
Models
Channels
(as partners,
resellers and
competitors)
Customer
Needs
Organization
 The business environment is
composed of myriad core elements
with complex relationships and
multiple touch-points
 Companies need to navigate a
complicated data maze to drive sales
 Data critical for successful company
operations is generated across
multiple sources and platforms that
are often not well integrated
Problem – Complex Environment

3.  3 
Data
Process
Tracking &
Analytics
People
Geography
Typical BI challenges for companies
 Lack of current data knowledge landscape
– Required data is not easily available
– Secondary data sources are not well integrated
 Data abundance leads to storage/mining issues
– Lack of data leads to inability to derive business insights
– Inconsistent data formats leads to quality issues
 Lack of single source of truth due to absence of unique
ID to link entities
 Multiple data sources at different levels of product flow
 Many data providers, each sending data with different
issues such as:
– Different (periodically changing) layouts
– Inconsistent/missing identifiers and fields
– No customer master, often replicates of same customer
with different IDs
– No customer types, affiliations or relationships in data
Problem – Data Challenges

4.  4 
Data
Process
Tracking &
Analytics
People
Geography
Typical BI challenges for companies
 Disparate and volatile data sources
 Data format changes
 Data mismatches due to timing issues (e.g.,
SP direct and IMS data)
 Frequent business rule changes
 Manual and ad-hoc QC steps
 Variable adherence to QC process
 Lack of well-defined QC responsibilities
 Unique issues including data capture, sample size, reporting
across multiple channels, data masking and de-identified
patient information make it difficult to get a comprehensive
picture of customer situation
Problem – Data Challenges

5.  5 
Process
Typical BI challenges for companies
 Processes are not well defined, efficient, flexible,
scalable or measurable
 Process business rules are inconsistent between
stakeholder groups
 Manual data processing causes regular data cleaning
 Lack of continuous enhancement
 Lack of QCs at critical touch points
 Lack of management best-practices
 Lack of thresholds based on history and business rules
Data
Tracking &
Analytics
People
Geography
Problem – Process Challenges

6.  6 
Process
Tracking &
Analytics
People
Geography
Data
Tracking &
Analytics
Typical BI challenges for companies
 What to measure? How to track?
 What platform? Who to share with?
 Lack of consistent metrics across the
S&M organization
 Can the data add incremental business value
relative to current capabilities?
“…expertise-based consulting on best-practices”
“…quality results based on user-defined thresholds”
“…standardized data checks and packages?”
“…ability to compare tests to historical results?”
“…visual data-quality dashboard”
“…Web-based user interface”
“…ability to create user-defined tests?”
“…ability to export quality reports”
Problem – Tracking Challenges

7.  7 
Process
Tracking &
Analytics
People
Geography
Data
Typical BI challenges for companies
 Analysts
– Focus needs to shift from loading/validating data
to performing analysis
– Ad hoc platform capabilities need to be provided
for varied/quick analysis
 Sales Force
– Needs integrated customer view, high quality actionable
reports and quick turnaround
 IT
– Requires automated solutions to reduce operational
support/cost, efficient architecture to reduce code base,
minimal effort to input data into the system
– Lack of well-defined roles and responsibilities
– Lack of data stewards with the right mix of skills
– Lack of appropriate training and coaching
– Lack of data governance for compliance
People
Problem – People Challenges

8.  8 
Process
Tracking &
Analytics
People
Geography
Data
Typical BI challenges for companies
 Currency
 Market Structure
 Language
Geography
Problem – Geography Challenges

9.  9 
 Delayed response, missed opportunities
 Lack of automation and operational execution
 Inability to embed data in real time
Automated actionable insights
 Lack of consistent metrics
 KPIs don’t translate to behavior
 Poor/delayed visibility
 Information overload
Reporting,
dashboards & KPIs
 No consistent business rules
 System does not scale – not easy
to adapt to new data, new metrics
Data aggregation
& synthesis
 Time consuming and error
prone DQ processes
Data acquisition
& cleansing
Data management issues lead to mistrust, cost escalation,
organizational confusion and loss in credibility
Issues
Problem – Consolidated Issues

10.  10 
Many organizations struggle to obtain reliable, accurate
and timely information to make effective business decisions
EffectsKey Challenges
Abundant data not organized
or integrated effectively
Limited data management rules,
guidelines, and roles
Inefficient and inconsistent data integration,
analytics, and reporting processes
Inconsistent metrics, KPIs,
and reporting templates
Uninformed
Business Decisions
Too Many Conflicting Reports
Inefficient Processes
High Operating Costs
Data and Reporting
Quality Issues
Problem – Effects

11.  11 
 We have too many sources for the same data; I don’t know where to get the data I need; It takes too
long to get the data I need for analysis; We aren’t getting value from our data
 Our processes take way too long to run and require too many people; Our analysts spend too much
time just pulling data; We have no data or capabilities to evaluate our marketplace
 We don’t understand/use the reports we already have; I wish we could see everything on one page
 Sales and marketing have conflicting metrics, goals, and definitions
There are several triggers that may necessitate
clients to revisit some or all elements of the BI strategy
Time
Field is complaining about too many reports with conflicting information
Technology is outdated and new and exciting technology is not used
Increasing data quality issues… and adding more people is not helping
Need to move to fact-based decision making from intuitive
guesswork. Field is not used to using information and insights
Selling environment and processes are changing
New leadership in sales, marketing or BI
Problem – Triggers

12.  12 
The business intelligence solution
Share consistent metrics and insights into key drivers of performance
at all levels of the organization
Monitor campaigns to improve effectiveness
Implement executive dashboards and other easy-to-use real-time reporting and analytics
Optimize management, integration, consolidation and distribution of commercial
information throughout the organization
Select, acquire, and clean required internal and external business data
Quick, efficient and accurate sales and marketing analytics to provide actionable insights
Integrate and aggregate diverse datasets to create 360° views of business entities
Provide visibility into the performance of business functions and emerging trends
Increase sales effectiveness through mobile BI concepts
Problem – Benefits of BI