Transcript What is Business Intelligence?

Research in Business Intelligence
and Sustainability Reporting
Andre Calitz
Jack Bacon Ph.D., P.Eng.
Jack Bacon has often been called "A New Carl Sagan." He is an internationally-known motivational speaker, a distinguished
lecturer (emeritus) of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA), and one of the most requested
speakers in the world for topics concerning technology and the factors that shape human society.
A noted futurist and a technological historian, he has written three popular books entitled "My Grandfathers' Clock," "My
Stepdaughter's Watch," and “The Parallel Bang,” with many thousands of copies sold of each. A fourth: “Killer Apps for the
Green Global Village” is in the works. His lectures have captivated tens of thousands of all ages in thirty-two countries on
six continents, and he has appeared on numerous radio and television broadcasts.
In his daily work, he is on the management team overseeing the construction and operation of the most complicated
technical project in history: the International Space Station.
A graduate of Caltech (B.S. '76) and the University of Rochester (Ph.D. '84) his extensive career includes roles in the
development of many cutting edge technologies, including controlled thermonuclear fusion, the development of the
electronic office, factory automation, and the globalization of business. He pioneered the deployment of several artificial
intelligence systems, learning his craft at the famed Xerox Palo Alto Research Center.
He was the United States' lead systems integrator of the Zarya-the jointly-built spacecraft that forms the central bridge and
adapter between all US and Russian technologies on the Space Station. This landmark in technological history was built in
Moscow by American and Russian engineers and launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in November 1998.
Jack is a fellow of the Explorer's Club, a member of the AIAA, the National Speakers Association, the International
Federation of Professional Speakers, Engineers Without Borders, and Rotary International. He was a founding member of
the board of directors of the Science National Honor Society (www.ScienceNHS.org). Among his numerous awards, he is a
recipient of NASA’s Exceptional Achievement Medal, the Director’s Special Commendation, and the coveted Silver Snoopy
award-the only award to fly in space. He routinely advises numerous academic programs and institutions, and he is a
champion of education throughout the world.
When he's not on the road, Jack cherishes his time together with Kathleen: his lifelong love since high school, found five
states away after 27 years apart. (You’ve gotta love the Internet!)
Overview
•
What is BI?
• What is sustainability?
• Research being conducted at
NMMU Dept CS
Slide 2 of 256
In recent years the practice of
sustainability reporting has
become increasingly
important to the domains of
both business and education
(King, et al. 2009).
Research and development in
the field of sustainability
reporting and the larger field
of Environmental Information
Systems (EIS) is increasing
and growing in importance.
What is Business Intelligence?
• Business Intelligence (BI) can be
described as “leveraging the organisations
internal and external information assets
for making better business decisions”
(Kimball & Ross; 2002).
What is Business Intelligence?
• Miller, Bräutigam & Gerlach (2006) define
BI as “getting the right information to the
right people at the right time”,
encompassing “all the capabilities
required to turn data into intelligence that
everyone in your organisation can trust
and use for more effective decision
making”.
What is Business Intelligence?
• Is a broad category of applications and
technologies for gathering, storing,
analysing, and providing access to
information to help organisational users
make better business decisions
(Rossetti; 2009:Online).
Business Intelligence evolution
Evolution Phase
Business Question
Enabling Technology
Data Collection
(1960s)
“What was my total revenue for
the day?”
Data Processing Applications
Data Access
(1980s)
“What were sales quantity in
Australia last March?”
Data Warehousing & Decision
Support
(1990s)
“What were sales quantity in
Europe? Drill down to
Germany”
On-Line Analytical Processing
(OLAP)
Data Mining &
Analytical processing
“What is likely to happen to
sales in Europe in fuel prices
increase? Why”
Advanced algorithms, increased
computing power
Relational Databases
Business Intelligence Platform
SA Government Sustainability Related Legislation
Social economic development
Reconstruction and development fund Act (1994)
Development facilitation Act (1995)
Minerals and petroleum resources Act (1995)
Broad Based Black Economic Empowerment Act (2004)
Environment Health and safety
Mineral Health and safety Act (1996)
National Water Act (1998)
National Environmental management Act (1998)
Air quality Bill (2003)
Labour, governance and ethics
Employment equity Act (1998)
Skills Development Act (1998)
Promotion of Access to Information Act (2000)
Promotion of access to equality and prevention of unfairness discrimination Act (2000)
Prevention and combating of corrupt actions Act (2004)
Result
Data Sources
Analysis
Visualisation
Internal Data
Data Marts
OLAP
Queries
Data Warehouse
EIS, DSS,
Decisions
Data Mining
ExternalData
Meta Data
Data Marts
Knowledge
Management
Information delivery tools
Diversity of BI Tools
BI Users, Analysis and Tools (Gartner)
Number
of Users
IT
Product
Manager or
Business Analyst
Executives
Few
Tens
Tens
CRM Related
Questions and
Analysis
Who’s going to
pay for all this?
Product
Profitability?
Demand
Forecast?
Customer
Segmentation?
Fraud?
BI Tools and
Function
Developer,
Administration,
Metadata,
Security
Ad Hoc Query,
OLAP reports,
Data Mining,
Advanced
Analysis
Managers
Occasional
Information
Consumers
Extranet:
Partners,
Customers
10 to Tens
100 to Thousands
Many
Thousands
Actual vs. Plan
Metrics?
Customer
Loyalty?
Customer
Satisfaction?
Channel
Effectiveness?
Customer
Profitability?
Customer
Satisfaction?
Leads
Generated?
Proposals
Submitted?
Sales booked?
Order Status?
Survey
Information?
Dashboard,
Scorecards,
Corporate
Performance
Management
(CPM)
Reports and
Spreadsheets,
Ad Hoc Query,
OLAP
Reports and
Spreadsheets
Reports
What is Business Intelligence?
• Gartner (2008) defines BI as a platform
which “enables users to build applications
that help organisations learn and
understand their business”.
What is Business Intelligence?
• Gartner further defines a BI platform as a
software platform delivering twelve
capabilities, categorised by functionality:
Integration, Information delivery and
Analysis.
The twelve capabilities of a BI platform
are:
• Integration
–BI infrastructure management.
–Metadata management.
–Programmatic development tools.
–Workflow and collaboration enablement.
The twelve capabilities of a BI platform
are:
• Information delivery.
–Reporting.
–Dashboards.
–Ad-hoc querying.
–Microsoft Office integration.
The twelve capabilities of a BI platform
are:
• Analysis
–OLAP.
–Advanced visualization.
–Predictive modelling and data mining.
–Scorecards.
What is Sustainability?
• Sustainability of a company means
conducting operations in a manner
that meets existing needs without
compromising the ability of future
generations to meet their needs.
• It means having regard to the impact
that the business operations have on
the economic life of the community in
which it operates.
Sustainability includes environmental, social
and governance issues (King 3,
2009:108).
Stakeholders
Any Group affected by and affecting the
company’s operations. (King 3; 2009:108)
What is Sustainability reporting?
• Sustainability Reporting is the way
a company reports its activities and
impacts relating to financial,
environmental and social issues.
Sustainability reporting.
• The report is aimed at giving readers an
over all view of the organisations social,
economic and environmental performance
along with its financial performance.
Integrated reporting
• Is a holistic and integrated representation
of the company’s performance in terms of
both its finance and its sustainability (King
3; 2009:104).
Sustainability Reporting Best Practices (Rea,
2010)
• Readability of reporting
• Completeness
• Tidiness
• Simplicity
• Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) Accuracy
• References
• Stakeholders
• Benchmarks
• Compliance: The GRI/King III is the
benchmark standard for report.
• Future focused
Dashboards
• A dashboard is a multilayered
graphical performance management
system, built on a BI system that
enable organisations to measure,
monitor and manage business activity
using both financial and non-financial
measures (Eckerson; 2006:Online).
Sustainability research at NMMU
• SME sustainability reporting
• Balanced scorecards
• Dashboards
• HEI - Sam
• Syspro projects
SME’s
• SMEs will have to watch their customer
retention, increase their production and
increase customer value (Andric,
2009:Online).
• SME’s will have to re-evaluate, redesign
and refine their products, processes and
business models to be sustainable.
• Comply with sustainability reporting.
The Development of a Balanced
Scorecard for Sustainability Reporting
• A balanced scorecard is a strategic
planning management tool that provides
managers with a comprehensive set of
measures to assess how the organisation
is progressing toward meeting its strategic
and visionary goals (Smith 2007:166).
Sustainability reporting at Higher
Educational Institutions
• Financial and other regulatory
requirements
• SAPSE requirements
• Comply with sustainability reporting
• No research conducted in S.A.
Model for Higher Education Institution Sustainability Reporting
Government
Regulations
SAPSE
Criteria
Annual Reporting
Criteria
Management
annual
evaluation
Sustainability
Reporting
KING III
Institutional
strategic plan
Balanced
Scorecard
and
dashboards
Vision 2020
Other criteria
List of
evaluation
criteria
Continuous
monitoring
and
adjustments
Management
Reports
Feedback
Annual
evaluation
and status
reports
Long term
strategic
reports
Corrective
action
plans
Future of BI and Sustainability
• New tools
• Levels of a business
• Importance
• Regulation
Slide 250 of 256
Ensuring BI and Sustainability Success
1. You apply sophisticated information
systems and rigorous analysis not
only to your core capability but also to
a range of functions as varied as
marketing and human resources.
2. Your senior executive team not only
recognizes the importance of analytics
capabilities but also makes their
development and maintenance a
primary focus.
3. You treat fact-based decision making
not only as a best practice but also as
a part of the culture that’s constantly
emphasized and communicated by
senior executives.
4. You hire not only people with analytical
skills but a lot of people with the very
best analytical skills – and consider
them a key to your success.
5. You not only employ analytics in
almost every function and department
but also consider it so strategically
important that you manage it at the
enterprise level.
6. You not only are an expert at number
crunching but also invent proprietary
metrics for use in key business
processes.
7. You not only use copious data and inhouse analysis but also share them
with customers and suppliers.
8. You not only avidly consume data but
also seize every opportunity to
generate information, creating a
“test and learn” culture based on
numerous small experiments.
9. You not only have committed to
competing on analytics but also have
been building your capabilities for
several years.
10. You not only emphasize the
importance of analytics internally but
also make quantitative capabilities
part of your company’s story, to be
shared in the annual report and in
discussions with financial analysts.
(Davenport, Harvard Business Review, Jan 2006)
NMMU Dept of Computing
Sciences
• Business Intelligence Hon course
• Sustainability Research
• Industry collaboration
• Syspro, SME’s and HEI
• International collaboration
• Oldenburg University (Germany)
Thank you
Questions