The ultimate goal of business intelligence solutions is to provide information and insights that facilitate proactive decision-making, create a competitive advantage and drive organizational excellence. However, the data foundation is critical as the basis for all types of reporting and analytics. The goal of the data foundation is to provide integrated, trusted and timely data from which reporting and analytics can be performed.
A robust data foundation can provide an organization with tremendous benefits, both in terms of efficiency and effectiveness related to decision-making. Specific benefits include:
- One-stop shopping for data
- A single version of the truth
- Driving common understanding across the enterprise
- Facilitating organizational communication and collaboration
Conversely, not establishing a data foundation introduces a significant increase in risk and potential inefficiency to the organization. Possible consequences of the lack of a robust data foundation include:
- Multiple answers to the same question
- Making less than optimal business decisions
- Wasted time finding, collecting and summarizing data for use in reporting and analytics
Enhancing reporting and analytics can be transformational for an organization. Implementing an effective data foundation can provide trusted, integrated data that turns raw information into actionable insights in a timely manner. Developing and implementing the proper strategy and plan can provide a significant return on investment with greater visibility to make more effective decisions.
