What is a data warehouse and why should a company use one? What is business intelligence and why should a company use it? I'll answer those questions, as well as discuss BI concepts, the types of BI solutions and the BI lifecycle. And end with a discussion about the Microsoft BI stack.

1. James Serra – Business Intelligence Consultant
JamesSerra3@gmail.com
JamesSerra.com

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3. Agenda
 What is Business Intelligence?
 BI Concepts
 Why use a Data Warehouse?
 Why use Business Intelligence?
 BI Solutions and Lifecycle
 What is the Microsoft BI stack?

4. Or more briefly:
Help with: “I have all this data, what should I do with it?”
“Knowledge is power!”. BI is a core business function that
allows companies to be more competitive and reduce costs.

8. BI allows you to present the data in many different formats

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• Master Data Management – Processes, policies and tools that
define and manage master data
• Star Schema – Fact table referencing any number of
dimension tables
• Cube – Built from Star Schema. Summarization of data to
quickly slice and dice. User does not need to create table
relationships/joins

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12. Legacy applications + databases = chaos
Production
Control
MRP
Inventory
Control
Parts
Management
Logistics
Shipping
Raw Goods
Order Control
Purchasing
Marketing
Finance
Sales
Accounting
Management
Reporting
Engineering
Actuarial
Human
Resources
Continuity
Consolidation
Control
Compliance
Collaboration
Enterprise data warehouse = order
Single version
of the truth
Enterprise Data
Warehouse
Every question = decision
A data warehouse is the foundation of a business intelligence solution.
75% of the effort in an end-to-end BI solution is building the DW

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15. Tangible Benefits:
− Enable critical data and analysis tools as identified for
multiple business groups
− Provide data integrity, simplification and standardization for
the business areas
− Provide dynamic and interactive reporting
− Reports create simplicity and reduce Business Technology
dependence for report creation and updates
− Cost savings by reducing the business users effort to create
these reports and validate the data
− Rapid access to data from all sources
− Standard KPI and dashboard reports
− Allow for data mining and predictive analytics

16. Intangible Benefits:
− Improve efficiency and accuracy of decision support system
for management and executive decision making
− Reduce manual consolidation efforts thereby improving
productivity
− Provide transparency

17. • Is excessive overtime a reason for employee turnover?
• How are the sales territories performing?
• How are the sales people performing?
• Which customers are likely to buy from us?
• What products do our customers buy together?
• Do we have suppliers in the same region that we can
consolidate?
• Is a decrease in sales due to the weather?
BI will stimulate questions and give you answers
that you never had before!

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19. BI Bible: The Microsoft Data Warehouse Toolkit by Kimball

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Operational Data Store (ODS)
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BPM BAM Business Activity Monitoring and
Business Intelligence
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Kimball methodology
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Inmon methodology

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• SQL Server Analysis Services (SSAS) – OLAP cubes containing
summarized data
• SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) – Server-based report
generation software
• Visual Studio 2008 BIDS, SQL Server Data Tools (SSDT)
• Report Builder – Light weight version of SSRS
• PerformancePoint – Dashboard creation in SharePoint
• Power Pivot – Excel add-in to query data
• Power View – Fun, visual, drag-and-drop report builder

25. • Data Mining – Analyze data to find hidden patterns
• Master Data Services (MDS) – Centralized data source for
Master Data Management
• Data Quality Services (DQS) – Manage the integrity and
quality of data
• SharePoint – Landing zone for most Microsoft BI tools.
Most reports are viewed on SharePoint
• Excel & Excel Services – Excel is the common front-end for
most Microsoft BI tools. Excel Services enables you to
display workbooks on SharePoint

27. James Serra, Business Intelligence Consultant
Email me at: JamesSerra3@gmail.com
Follow me at: @JamesSerra
Link to me at: www.linkedin.com/in/JamesSerra
Visit my blog at: JamesSerra.com

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