Dumb Business Intelligence Choices Smart CIOs Make

Because business users have been trained over the years by IT people like you and me to provide reporting specs for operational system reporting, these business users reasonably think that information requirements should be defined as reporting requirements.

Dumb idea #9 – Glorified reporting only. BI initiatives are often positioned organizationally as an improvement on “reporting” and are viewed as something done by IT. No wonder there is little, if any, advancement of strategic information usage in many companies.

When an organization appreciates that BI is far more than reporting and can serve as an important tool to advance their competitive position in the marketplace, then you know you are on the smart track.

In the not too distant future, will smart CIOs lead their companies to the BI promised land? Some analysts predict a world of wise business decisions based on real time business information. In this future IT will not waste time crunching special reports. Instead needed data will be available in just one or two clicks, in much the same fashion as people come to expect to get information on the Internet.

Yes, BI can be the new strategic tool that lives up to its potential, but if and only if it is applied wisely.

Patricia Bramhall, founder of Tydak Consulting Services, LLC, is a thought leader in the field of IT and strategic solutions. She has an enviable record of achieving project objectives and deliverables on time and below cost, with budgets of up to $120 million under her management.