W19_Dashboard with Business Intelligence 2

1)    Step 1- Problem or Opportunity Statement

A BI dashboard is a tool that transforms information and displays Key Performance Indicators (KPI) and metrics to assess organizational performance. BI systems are capable of consolidating very complex data from internal or external third parties, which uses different applications to centralize the information and convert it into actionable data. This data compares to other metrics and performance indicators.

Business Intelligence dashboard is a powerful tool to elaborate dashboard with big data. It is also more useful for the dashboard to project managers, project directors, and executive managers. 

Can Business Intelligence’s applications provide efficiency of use of resources, the stability of administration of the information, scalability to share spreadsheets or data, and avoid indifference from managers of watching the reports generated?

What other advantages of making a dashboard with Business Intelligence platforms compare to other reporting software?

Let’s determine the advantages of Business Intelligence over other report software.

2)    Step 2 – Feasible Alternatives

For reporting, we will compare

1.     Business Intelligence Software

a.      Power BI Desktop

b.     IBM Cognos Online

c.      Dundas BI Online

2.     ERP SAP (CJI3 module)

3.     MS Excel

  

3)    Step 3- Develop the outcomes for each alternative

We can get the following reports in the form of dashboards or tables from each platform as follows:

1.     Business Intelligence Software

a.      Power BI Desktop

Based on the following list of charts:

·        Area charts: Basic (Layered) and Stacked

·        Bar and column charts

·        Cards: Single number

·        Cards: Multi-row

·        Combo charts

·        Doughnut charts

·        Funnel charts

·        Gauge charts

·        Key influencers chart

·        KPIs

·        Line charts

·        Maps: Basic maps

·        Maps: ArcGIS maps

·        Maps: Filled maps (Choropleth)

·        Maps: Shape maps

·        Matrix

·        Pie charts

·        Ribbon chart

·        Scatter, bubble, and dot plot charts

·        Scatter-high density

·        Slicers

·        Standalone images

·        Tables

·        Treemaps

·        Waterfall charts

b.     IBM Cognos Online

Based on the following list of charts:

·        Column Charts

·        Line Charts

·        Pie Charts

·        Bar Charts

·        Area Charts

·        Point Charts

·        Combination Charts

·        Scatter Charts

·        Bubble Charts

·        Quadrant Charts

·        Bullet Charts

·        Gauge Charts

·        Pareto Charts

·        Progressive Column Charts

·        Micro charts

·        Marimekko Charts

·        Radar Charts

·        Polar Charts

·        Range Indicator Charts

c.      Dundas BI Online

Based on the following list of charts:

·        Bubble Chart

·        Data Bar Table

·        Table

·        Calculate Box Plot

·        Parallel Coordinates

·        Treemap

·        Add Trend Line

·        Bar

·        Stacked Bar

·        Line

·        Point

·        Pie

·        Scatter Plot

·        Pie/Sunburst

·        Waterfall

·        Radar Charts

·        Gauges

2.     ERP SAP

This ERP contains a different list of reports, but we will focus only on the most used by the user, which is CJI3.

3.     MS Excel

4)    Step 4- Selection of the acceptable criteria.

Stephen J.C. Paterson has suggested a dashboard for the Oil and Gas sector in his paper Best in Class – Dashboard for the Oil and Gas Projects. The first page of a dashboard contains the following:

-       A brief executive narrative

-       Common Metrics such as:

-       Unique metrics such as:

o   Safety

o   Hit Task %

o   Critical Path Length Index (CPLI)

o   Current Execution Index (CEI)

o   Milestones

o   IEAC’s

Can we elaborate a dashboard with the alternatives proposed?

5)    Step 5- Compare the outcomes from each alternative analysis done in Step 3 against the minimum acceptable criteria from Step 4.

The dashboards elaborated by the different platforms are as follows:

1.     Business Intelligence Software

a.      Power BI Desktop

b.     IBM Cognos Online

c.      Dundas BI Online

2.     ERP SAP (CJI3 module)

It is not possible to elaborate a dashboard with SAP

3.     MS Excel

Stephen J.C. Paterson elaborated a dashboard with Excel.

As a result, we can summarize in the following table:

6)    Step 6- Selection of the “best”.

As shown in the table above, we can discard ERP SAP to elaborate dashboards. It requires an additional interface to prepare a data source and then load it to develop a dashboard.

Comparing BI Platforms against MS Excel, we can elaborate dashboard for managers for a first page on each platform. 
The visualization is different because it requires time to master BI platforms. 
The data sources are not shown in the same way. The logic to build charts and set parameters are also different from each other.  
For the author, the best BI Platform is Power BI which allows to manage data source easily and set parameters to modify charts in a very intuitive way. 

7)    Step 7- How to plan on tracking/reporting on the recommended choice. 

As shown in this post, a dashboard for Oil and Gas Projects can also be elaborated with BI Platforms. 
The author has perceived that for elaborating a dashboard, the data source needs to prepare differently among BI platforms. It cannot be the same for all the charts we want to use for each BI platform.
There are other differentiators than can be analyzed to determine other advantages of BI platforms compare to MS Excel. A second post will follow this research.   

8)    REFERENCES.

1.   Durcevic, S. (2019, July 24). 10 Business Intelligence Dashboard Best Practices In The Digital Age. Retrieved August 28, 2019, from https://www.datapine.com/blog/bi-dashboard-best-practices/

2.   Conrad, A. (2018, November). Top Business Intelligence Requirements & Checklist Template for 2019. Retrieved August 28, 2019, from https://selecthub.com/business-intelligence/top-business-intelligence-requirements/

3.   Spicer, T. (2019, March 22). The Definitive 10-Point Scorecard Before Choosing a BI Solution - DZone Big Data. Retrieved August 28, 2019, from https://dzone.com/articles/the-definitive-10-point-checklist-before-arriving

4.   Microsoft. (2019, August 20). Visual types in Power BI. Retrieved September 7, 2019, from https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/power-bi/consumer/end-user-visual-type

5.         Paterson, S. (2017, October). Best in Class – Dashboards for Oil and Gas Projects. Retrieved September 27, 2019, from https://pmworldlibrary.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/pmwj63-Oct2017-Paterson-Best-in-Class-Dashboards-for-OG-Projects.pdf