Praise for Business Intelligence Success Factors: Tools for Aligning your business in the Global Economy "Olivia Parr Rud does a remarkable job of weaving together many topics in a strategic way. As 'quants,' we're fascinated with data and fact-based decision-making. But success only comes when you consider the human factor, especially effective communications. Making topics like evolutionary biology, complexity science, and systems thinking relevant for business success is a unique and compelling view. As Max Frisch said, 'We hired workers and human beings came instead.'" —Anne Milley, Senior Director, Technology Product Marketing, SAS "Business Intelligence Success Factors is a must-read for anyone implementing BI on an organizational level. This book explains the business landscape and the underlying reasons for our current volatility, offering clear guidance on navigating our information rich global economy." —Ron Powell, Editorial Director, Business Intelligence Network Transform challenges into opportunities with emerging Business Intelligence technologies Written by an expert in data mining and statistical analysis, this valuable resource unveils the connection between the increased use of BI and the need for new, proven theories and models in BI, as well as the guidance to implement them successfully in your organization. Are you ready to become adaptable? Learn how to harness today's rapidly evolving global economy with Business Intelligence Success Factors.

"This readable, practical book helps business people quickly understand what business intelligence is, how it works, where it's used, and why and when to use it-all illustrated by real case studies, not just theory." Nigel Pendse Author of The OLAP Report www.olapreport.com So much information, so little time. All too often, business data is hard to get at and use-thus slowing decision-making to a crawl. This insightful book illustrates how organizations can make better, faster decisions about their customers, partners, and operations by turning mountains of data into valuable business information that's always at the fingertips of decision makers. You'll learn what's involved in using business intelligence to bring together information, people, and technology to create successful business strategies-and how to execute those strategies with confidence. Topics covered include: • THE BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE MINDSET: Discover the basics behind business intelligence, such as how it's defined, why and how to use it in your organization, and what characteristics, components, and general architecture most business intelligence solutions share. • THE CASE FOR BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE: Read how world leaders in finance, manufacturing, and retail have successfully implemented business intelligence solutions and see what benefits they have reaped. • THE PRACTICE OF BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE: Find out what's involved in implementing a business intelligence solution in your organization, including how to identify your business intelligence opportunities, what decisions you must make to get a business intelligence project going, and what to do to sustain the momentum so that you can continue to make sense of all the data you gather.

Deliver BI Solutions with Microsoft Office PerformancePoint Server 2007 Maximize the powerful BI tools available in PerformancePoint 2007 with help from this practical guide. You will learn how to collect and store data, monitor progress, analyze performance, distribute dynamic reports, and create maintainable projects and forecasts. Business Intelligence with Microsoft Office PerformancePoint Server 2007 provides full details on creating scorecards and dashboards, performing advanced analysis on data, and setting up business plans. You will also learn how to integrate PerformancePoint with ProClarity, Excel 2007, and SQL Server Reporting Services. Configure, deploy, and secure all the PerformancePoint components Create KPIs, scorecards, reports, and dashboards with the Dashboard Designer Create business models with the Planning Business Modeler and create budgets and forecasts with Excel 2007 Enable advanced data analysis with PerformancePoint Server and ProClarity tools Take advantage of the enhanced analytic capabilities of Excel 2007 Use SQL Server Reporting Services for analytics Align performance with organizational objectives

You're intelligent, right? So you've already figured out that Business Intelligence can be pretty valuable in making the right decisions about your business. But you’ve heard at least a dozen definitions of what it is, and heard of at least that many BI tools. Where do you start? Business Intelligence For Dummies makes BI understandable! It takes you step by step through the technologies and the alphabet soup, so you can choose the right technology and implement a successful BI environment. You'll see how the applications and technologies work together to access, analyze, and present data that you can use to make better decisions about your products, customers, competitors, and more. You’ll find out how to: Understand the principles and practical elements of BI Determine what your business needs Compare different approaches to BI Build a solid BI architecture and roadmap Design, develop, and deploy your BI plan Relate BI to data warehousing, ERP, CRM, and e-commerce Analyze emerging trends and developing BI tools to see what else may be useful Whether you’re the business owner or the person charged with developing and implementing a BI strategy, checking out Business Intelligence For Dummies is a good business decision.

Praise for Successful Business Intelligence "If you want to be an analytical competitor, you've got to go well beyond business intelligence technology. Cindi Howson has wrapped up the needed advice on technology, organization, strategy, and even culture in a neat package. It's required reading for quantitatively oriented strategists and the technologists who support them." --Thomas H. Davenport, President's Distinguished Professor, Babson College and co-author, Competing on Analytics "When used strategically, business intelligence can help companies transform their organization to be more agile, more competitive, and more profitable. Successful Business Intelligence offers valuable guidance for companies looking to embark upon their first BI project as well as those hoping to maximize their current deployments." --John Schwarz, CEO, Business Objects "A thoughtful, clearly written, and carefully researched examination of all facets of business intelligence that your organization needs to know to run its business more intelligently and exploit information to its fullest extent." --Wayne Eckerson, Director, TDWI Research "Using real-world examples, Cindi Howson shows you how to use business intelligence to improve the performance, and the quality, of your company." --Bill Baker, Distinguished Engineer & GM, Business Intelligence Applications, Microsoft Corporation "This book outlines the key steps to make BI an integral part of your company's culture and demonstrates how your company can use BI as a competitive differentiator." --Robert VanHees, CFO, Corporate Express "Given the trend to expand the business analytics user base, organizations are faced with a number of challenges that affect the success rate of these projects. This insightful book provides practical advice on improving that success rate." --Dan Vesset, Vice President, Business Analytics Solution Research, IDC

Extract and analyze mission-critical enterprise data using Microsoft Office 2007 This authoritative volume is a practical guide to the powerful new collaborative Business Intelligence tools available in Office 2007. Using real-world examples and clear explanations, Microsoft Office 2007 Business Intelligence: Reporting, Analysis, and Measurement from the Desktop shows you how to use Excel, Excel Services, SharePoint, and PerformancePoint with a wide range of stand-alone and external data in today's networked office. You will learn how to analyze data and generate reports, scorecards, and dashboards with the Office tools you're already using to help you in your everyday work. Create Excel PivotTables and PivotCharts and apply Conditional Formatting Convert Excel spreadsheets into Excel Tables with Conditional Formatting and Charting Connect external data to Excel using Office Data Connections and SharePoint Create SharePoint dashboards that display data from multiple sources Add Key Performance Indicators and Excel Services reports to your dashboards Harness advanced SQL Server 2005 data analysis tools with the Excel Data Mining Add-In and Visio Cluster Diagrams Generate integrated PerformancePoint Scorecards Create Visio PivotDiagrams and Windows Mobile spreadsheets

Up-to-date, comprehensive coverage of the Oracle database and business intelligence tools Written by a team of Oracle insiders, this authoritative book provides you with the most current coverage of the Oracle data warehousing platform as well as the full suite of business intelligence tools. You'll learn how to leverage Oracle features and how those features can be used to provide solutions to a variety of needs and demands. Plus, you'll get valuable tips and insight based on the authors' real-world experiences and their own implementations. Avoid many common pitfalls while learning best practices for: Leveraging Oracle technologies to design, build, and manage data warehouses Integrating specific database and business intelligence solutions from other vendors Using the new suite of Oracle business intelligence tools to analyze data for marketing, sales, and more Handling typical data warehouse performance challenges Uncovering initiatives by your business community, security business sponsorship, project staffing, and managing risk

In this IBM Redbooks publication we describe and discuss DB2 Data Warehouse Edition (DWE) Version 9.1, a comprehensive platform offering with functionality to build a business intelligence infrastructure for analytics and Web-based applications, and best practices for deployment. DB2 DWE integrates core components for data warehouse construction and administration, data mining, OLAP, and InLine Analytics and reporting. It extends the DB2 data warehouse with design-side tooling and runtime infrastructure for OLAP, data mining, InLine Analytics, and intra-warehouse data movement and transformation, on a common platform based on DB2 and WebSphere. The platform pillars are based on the technology of DB2, Rational Data Architect (for physical data modeling only), the SQL Warehousing Tool, Intelligent Miner, DB2 Cube Views, and Alphablox. DWE includes an Eclipse-based design environment, DWE Design Studio, that integrates the DWE products (with the exception of Alphablox and Query Patroller) with a common framework and user interface. The new SQL Warehousing Tool enables visual design of intra-warehouse, table-to-table data flows and control flows using generated SQL. DB2 Alphablox is the tool for developing custom applications with embedded analytics-based visual components. DWE enables faster time-to-value for enterprise analytics, while limiting the number of vendors, tools, skill sets and licenses required.

In this IBM Redbooks publication, we describe and demonstrate how to implement enterprise performance insight. This is an initiative that has a primary focus on the integration of Business Process Management and Business Intelligence. With this capability, management has an enterprise-wide view of their business that can enable proactive business management. We discuss the techniques, architectures, and processes used to define and implement such an environment. Among the specific techniques and technologies used are key performance indicators, process alerts, management dashboards, analytic applications, application integration, process modeling and monitoring, and real-time business intelligence. The products featured are DB2 UDB, DB2 Alphablox, WebSphere Information Integrator, WebSphere Portal, WebSphere Business Monitor, and WebSphere Business Modeler. Performance insight is an element of a more global initiative called business innovation and optimization (BIO). With this, we can enable business performance management, an initiative for the effective use of people, processes, assets, and technology to proactively achieve business goals and measurements. It enables strategic alignment of business and technology, resulting in real-time access to data and continuous process and data flow, for proactive business management, and business goal attainment.

"This book is the definitive guide for SAP NetWeaver BI professionals. Based on their extraordinary expertise with the product, the authors provide deep insights about key innovations in the areas of user experience, query performance, integrated planning, and enterprise-wide data warehousing." —Stefan Sigg, Vice President, SAP NetWeaver Business Intelligence The long-anticipated publication of this second edition reflects the growing success of SAP NetWeaver as well as the various Business Intelligence (BI) capabilities that are embedded with SAP BW version 7.0. Written by SAP insiders, this comprehensive guide takes into account the ever-changing features, functionality, and toolsets of SAP NetWeaver to bring you the most updated information on how to use SAP BW to design, build, deploy, populate, access, analyze, present, and administer data. You'll discover the options that are available in SAP NetWeaver and uncover a new means to improve business performance. This book reflects the process an organization goes through during an implementation of the software. The authors begin with an introduction to BI and SAP NetWeaver and quickly progress to information modeling and enterprise data warehouse concepts. You'll learn how to access and deliver meaningful analytic information to the organization, as well as perform integrated planning functions. Finally, the authors share invaluable insight on warehouse administration, performance, and security. With more than 50 percent new or revised material, this second edition of Mastering the SAP Business Information Warehouse shows you how to: Extract data from online transaction processing systems Store transformed data in a way that best supports reporting and analysis Use the various Business Explorer tools such as BEx Report Designer, BEx Analyzer, BEx Broadcaster, and BEx Web Application Designer Schedule, monitor, troubleshoot, and archive data loads The companion Web site contains sample chapters in Wiki format and the authors' blog where readers may enter discussions about the book and SAP. Wiley Technology Publishing Timely. Practical. Reliable. Visit our Web site at www.wiley.com/compbooks/ Visit the companion Web site at www.wiley.com/compbooks/mcdonald The companion Web site contains the sample code presented in the text of the book, plus implementation templates.

Transform data into action for competitive advantage "The knowledge assets of an organization are becoming increasingly important for competitive advantage, and therefore, the way in which knowledge is created, renewed, and communicated is critical. This book provides practical insights into how this may be achieved through the establishment of a Business Intelligence Competency Centre and is a valuable read for 'information professionals.'" --Bill Sturman, Information Architecture Project Manager The Open University, United Kingdom "BI is more than technology and projects. BI must live in the organization--as a BICC. This book helps to make BI tangible and understandable, bringing it to life." --Miriam Eisenmann, Project Manager (PMP) CSC Ploenzke AG, Germany "This book is a must-read for planning and implementing your BICC. It is a pragmatic guide that addresses a lot, if not all, of the questions you'll be asking yourself. Don't miss out on getting a head start from the people who thought this through from start to finish . . . Pray your competitors don't get hold of this book!" --Claudia Imhoff, President Intelligent Solutions, Inc., USA "Creating a BICC forces the organization to focus on the importance of centralizing the gathering, interpreting, and analyzing of information to create business insight." --Anne Ulyate, Group Manager Business Intelligence Mutual & Federal, South Africa "BI is a highly visible element in the 'business value' trend for IT investments. Initiatives, such as competency centers, should empower user organizations to drive even more value out of their BI investments." --Marianne Kolding, Director, European ServicesIDC, United Kingdom

Transform disparate enterprise data into actionable business intelligence Put timely, mission-critical information in the hands of employees across your organization using Microsoft SQL Server 2005 and the comprehensive information in this unique resource. Delivering Business Intelligence with Microsoft SQL Server 2005 shows you, step-by-step, how to author, customize, and distribute information that will give your company the competitive edge. It's all right here--from data mining, warehousing, and scripting techniques to MDX queries, KPI analysis, and the all-new Unified Dimensional Model. Real-world examples, start-to-finish exercises, and downloadable code throughout illustrate all of the integration, analysis, and reporting capabilities of SQL Server 2005.

This groundbreaking book is the first in the Kimball Toolkit series to be product-specific. Microsoft’s BI toolset has undergone significant changes in the SQL Server 2005 development cycle. SQL Server 2005 is the first viable, full-functioned data warehouse and business intelligence platform to be offered at a price that will make data warehousing and business intelligence available to a broad set of organizations. This book is meant to offer practical techniques to guide those organizations through the myriad of challenges to true success as measured by contribution to business value. Building a data warehousing and business intelligence system is a complex business and engineering effort. While there are significant technical challenges to overcome in successfully deploying a data warehouse, the authors find that the most common reason for data warehouse project failure is insufficient focus on the business users and business problems. In an effort to help people gain success, this book takes the proven Business Dimensional Lifecycle approach first described in best selling The Data Warehouse Lifecycle Toolkit and applies it to the Microsoft SQL Server 2005 tool set. Beginning with a thorough description of how to gather business requirements, the book then works through the details of creating the target dimensional model, setting up the data warehouse infrastructure, creating the relational atomic database, creating the analysis services databases, designing and building the standard report set, implementing security, dealing with metadata, managing ongoing maintenance and growing the DW/BI system. All of these steps tie back to the business requirements. Each chapter describes the practical steps in the context of the SQL Server 2005 platform. Intended Audience The target audience for this book is the IT department or service provider (consultant) who is: Planning a small to mid-range data warehouse project; Evaluating or planning to use Microsoft technologies as the primary or exclusive data warehouse server technology; Familiar with the general concepts of data warehousing and business intelligence. The book will be directed primarily at the project leader and the warehouse developers, although everyone involved with a data warehouse project will find the book useful. Some of the book’s content will be more technical than the typical project leader will need; other chapters and sections will focus on business issues that are interesting to a database administrator or programmer as guiding information. The book is focused on the mass market, where the volume of data in a single application or data mart is less than 500 GB of raw data. While the book does discuss issues around handling larger warehouses in the Microsoft environment, it is not exclusively, or even primarily, concerned with the unusual challenges of extremely large datasets. About the Authors JOY MUNDY has focused on data warehousing and business intelligence since the early 1990s, specializing in business requirements analysis, dimensional modeling, and business intelligence systems architecture. Joy co-founded InfoDynamics LLC, a data warehouse consulting firm, then joined Microsoft WebTV to develop closed-loop analytic applications and a packaged data warehouse. Before returning to consulting with the Kimball Group in 2004, Joy worked in Microsoft SQL Server product development, managing a team that developed the best practices for building business intelligence systems on the Microsoft platform. Joy began her career as a business analyst in banking and finance. She graduated from Tufts University with a BA in Economics, and from Stanford with an MS in Engineering Economic Systems. WARREN THORNTHWAITE has been building data warehousing and business intelligence systems since 1980. Warren worked at Metaphor for eight years, where he managed the consulting organization and implemented many major data warehouse systems. After Metaphor, Warren managed the enterprise-wide data warehouse development at Stanford University. He then co-founded InfoDynamics LLC, a data warehouse consulting firm, with his co-author, Joy Mundy. Warren joined up with WebTV to help build a world class, multi-terabyte customer focused data warehouse before returning to consulting with the Kimball Group. In addition to designing data warehouses for a range of industries, Warren speaks at major industry conferences and for leading vendors, and is a long-time instructor for Kimball University. Warren holds an MBA in Decision Sciences from the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, and a BA in Communications Studies from the University of Michigan. RALPH KIMBALL, PH.D., has been a leading visionary in the data warehouse industry since 1982 and is one of today's most internationally well-known authors, speakers, consultants, and teachers on data warehousing. He writes the "Data Warehouse Architect" column for Intelligent Enterprise (formerly DBMS) magazine.

Business Intelligence describes the basic architectural components of a business intelligence environment, ranging from traditional topics such as business process modeling, data modeling, and more modern topics such as business rule systems, data profiling, information compliance and data quality, data warehousing, and data mining. This book progresses through a logical sequence, starting with data model infrastructure, then data preparation, followed by data analysis, integration, knowledge discovery, and finally the actual use of discovered knowledge. The book contains a quick reference guide for business intelligence terminology. Business Intelligence is part of Morgan Kaufmann's Savvy Manager's Guide series. * Provides clear explanations without technical jargon, followed by in-depth descriptions. * Articulates the business value of new technology, while providing relevant introductory technical background. * Contains a handy quick-reference to technologies and terminologies. * Guides managers through developing, administering, or simply understanding business intelligence technology. * Bridges the business-technical gap. * Is Web enhanced. Companion sites to the book and series provide value-added information, links, discussions, and more.

Making business intelligence work: Start-to-finish guidance for managers This book offers a true enterprise view of business intelligence. IBM expert Mike Biere shows managers how to create a coherent BI plan that reflects the needs of users throughout the organization-and then implement that plan successfully. Biere explains how to objectively assess the business case for BI, and identifies proven solutions for the obstacles that lead many BI projects to fail. Coverage includes: Setting appropriate expectations and goals for your BI project Understanding how the key components of a complete BI solution fit together Designing effective BI solutions-including content management, handling unstructured data, and end-user segmentation Providing effective support for BI end users Introducing Corporate Performance Management (CPM): an executive's view of BI Previewing tomorrow's "next wave" in BI solutions Comprehensive checklists for planning your BI project

"If you are looking for a complete treatment of business intelligence, then go no further than this book. Larissa T. Moss and Shaku Atre have covered all the bases in a cohesive and logical order, making it easy for the reader to follow their line of thought. From early design to ETL to physical database design, the book ties together all the components of business intelligence." --Bill Inmon, Inmon Enterprises is a visual guide to developing an effective business intelligence (BI) decision-support application. This book outlines a methodology that takes into account the complexity of developing applications in an integrated BI environment. The authors walk readers through every step of the process--from strategic planning to the selection of new technologies and the evaluation of application releases. The book also serves as a single-source guide to the best practices of BI projects. Business Intelligence Roadmap Part I steers readers through the six stages of a BI project: justification, planning, business analysis, design, construction, and deployment. Each chapter describes one of sixteen development steps and the major activities, deliverables, roles, and responsibilities. All technical material is clearly expressed in tables, graphs, and diagrams. Part II provides five matrices that serve as references for the development process charted in Part I. Management tools, such as graphs illustrating the timing and coordination of activities, are included throughout the book. The authors conclude by crystallizing their many years of experience in a list of dos, don'ts, tips, and rules of thumb. The accompanying CD-ROM includes a complete, customizable work breakdown structure. Both the book and the methodology it describes are designed to adapt to the specific needs of individual stakeholders and organizations. The book directs business representatives, business sponsors, project managers, and technicians to the chapters that address their distinct responsibilities. The framework of the book allows organizations to begin at any step and enables projects to be scheduled and managed in a variety of ways. is a clear and comprehensive guide to negotiating the complexities inherent in the development of valuable business intelligence decision-support applications Business Intelligence Roadmap

This IBM Redbooks publication deals with exploiting DB2 UDB’s materialized views (also known as ASTs/MQTs), statistics, analytic, and OLAP functions in e-business applications to achieve superior performance and scalability. This book is aimed at a target audience of DB2 UDB application developers, database administrators (DBAs), and independent software vendors (ISVs). We provide an overview of DB2 UDB’s materialized views implementation, as well as guidelines for creating and tuning them for optimal performance. We introduce key statistics, analytic, and OLAP functions, and describe their corresponding implementation in DB2 UDB with usage examples. Finally, we describe typical business level queries that can be answered using DB2 UDB’s statistics, analytic, and OLAP functions. These business queries are categorized by industry, and describe the steps involved in resolving the query, with sample SQL and visualization of results.

Link business intelligence to the Web! Technologies, integration, and applications. Internet-enabled business intelligence: from planning to profit In-depth coverage of integration and key enabling technologies, including Java and XML Advanced analysis and profiling: understand customers better, and respond faster Clickstrean analysis: understanding how customers use your site Linking data warehouses to CRM and other enterprise/value chain systems This is the first start-to-finish guide to planning, deploying, and profiting from Internet-enabled data warehouses. Leading business intelligence specialist William Giovinazzo covers every enabling technology, every analysis approach, and every key challenge you'll face in linking business intelligence to the Web. From infrastructure integration to state-of-the-art profiling and wireless applications, Giovinazzo shows how everything fits together—and exactly how to use Web-enabled data warehouses to deliver powerful ROI in your business. How the Internet enhances your business intelligence infrastructure Leveraging key enabling technologies: Java, XML, XSL, and more Breakthrough analysis techniques: understand customers better, and respond faster! Integrating data warehouses with CRM and other enterprise and inter-enterprise systems Establishing common warehouse metadata Drawing on the clickstreams generated by your Web and e-commerce sites Personalization techniques that work

You go online to buy a digital camera. Soon, you realize you've bought a more expensive camera than intended, along with extra batteries, charger, and graphics software-all at the prompting of the retailer. Happy with your purchases? The retailer certainly is, and if you are too, you both can be said to be the beneficiaries of "customer intimacy" achieved through the transformation of data collected during this visit or stored from previous visits into real business intelligence that can be exercised in real time. Data Warehousing and Business Intelligence for e-Commerce is a practical exploration of the technological innovations through which traditional data warehousing is brought to bear on this and other less modest e-commerce applications, such as those at work in B2B, G2C, B2G, and B2E models. The authors examine the core technologies and commercial products in use today, providing a nuts-and-bolts understanding of how you can deploy customer and product data in ways that meet the unique requirements of the online marketplace-particularly if you are part of a brick-and-mortar company with specific online aspirations. In so doing, they build a powerful case for investment in and aggressive development of these approaches, which are likely to separate winners from losers as e-commerce grows and matures. * Includes the latest from successful data warehousing consultants whose work has encouraged the field's new focus on e-commerce. * Presents information that is written for both consultants and practitioners in companies of all sizes. * Emphasizes the special needs and opportunities of traditional brick-and-mortar businesses that are going online or participating in B2B supply chains or e-marketplaces. * Explains how long-standing assumptions about data warehousing have to be rethought in light of emerging business models that depend on customer intimacy. * Provides advice on maintaining data quality and integrity in environments marked by extensive customer self-input. * Advocates careful planning that will help both old economy and new economy companies develop long-lived and successful e-commerce strategies. * Focuses on data warehousing for emerging e-commerce areas such as e-government and B2E environments.