13: Other Secrets to Success
The author addresses a few "aspects" that she feels are not as significant as the technical and organizational aspects that were previously discussed, but nonetheless seem to be common themes that warrant attention: culture, promotion, training, and the use of graphical display.
The Role of Culture
The value of a BI system is wasted in a corporate culture where employees are not able to utilize the information to pursue new opportunities, make decisions and implement solutions, or work without considerable constraints.
In survey responses, it was found that BI was least successful in companies where access to data is tightly controlled, persons in positions of authority value their own gut-feel over analysis, adherence to "business as usual" is valued and innovation discouraged, efficiency is stressed over effectiveness, is unwilling to confront the "brutal facts," and computers and IT are not seen as a method of attaining competitive advantage.
The author gives some concession to the value of gut-feel decision making, indicating that it should not be dismissed entirely, as it is often based on knowledge and experience that is difficult to quantify. The example given is of doctors who must make fast decisions based on little information, who develop over time a sort of intuition that leads them to make effective decisions in short order, and based on a more holistic understanding than a detailed factual analysis. However, the problem comes when gut-feel decisions are automatically preferred over intelligence to the contrary.
Even when a culture outwardly encourages fact-based decision making, there is the potential for facts to be hidden, misinterpreted, or misrepresented, either by individuals who have made a decision and are seeking to present confirming evidence (even if it must be manufactured) or by those who fear the repercussions of contradicting the opinions of a narcissistic superior. This may also occur when new data rises that contradicts a previous conclusion, and the assumption is made that the "problem" is with the new data or analysis.
Another common problem is data hoarding. Restriction of access to data, either by superiors who fear losing power to subordinates who "know too much," subordinates who fear that the data will expose their poor performance, and among peers who feel that retaining information was a competitive advantage over their rivals or a method of defending their turf, is a "surprisingly" widespread problem. From survey responses, this was noted even among companies who considered their BI implementations to be successful, in spite of anecdotal evidence to the contrary.
Promoting Your BI Capabilities
Promotion of BI capabilities within an organization is requisite to their utilization (if you build it, they won't come). Users may be resistant to change, or may not see the relevance of the BI system to their areas of responsibility, and overcoming these barriers requires a proactive approach to fostering adoption.
A suggested approach is to foster awareness of the solution during the development stages (such that people are aware of what is coming and how it could impact them), then providing a deeper level of knowledge as the project nears implementation, and finally promotion to increase usage after the system is available. If you wait until the project is delivered, you have wasted time, and will face the problem of building a sufficient user base while meanwhile having to justify the maintenance cost of a system that no-one seems to be using.
It's also important to promote the system in terms the user can understand: the benefits that the system will deliver, rather than the technical features of the solution. Overcoming the navel-gazing tendencies of IT departments is a significant hurdle, and it may be more effective to seek "champions" for the project who are outside of the IT organization.
As to the IT experts, some coaching will be necessary. The author suggests coaching them to develop an "elevator speech" for real business users, consisting of a one-minute description of the solution in terms that the user can understand and appreciate, and especially removing the tendency to speak in acronyms and techno-babble. There is a brief section on coming up with "tag lines," and another on coming up with a catchy name for a solution.
The author also catalogs some of the promotional media that can be used in an internal promotional campaign:
- Road Shows - Doing ad-hoc presentations for the business that provide scenarios, success stories, and user testimonials that indicate the value of the system
- Multimedia - A video clip or pod cast may seem like an inefficient way of providing information, but it is helpful in overcoming the tendency of IT personnel to provide lengthy text documentation that people will generally not read.
- Newsletters - Existing corporate newsletters are often a good resource. IF they are well-edited, they will insist on brevity and relevance, and will provide editorial assistance
- Industry Journals - Getting industry exposure often has a greater impact on persons within the company.
- Brown-bag lunches - These events invite participants to bring a bagged lunch (or breakfast) to an informal informational session, which is less threatening than a formal meeting or presentation.
- Trinkets and Trash - Small items and give-away can help to raise awareness. Especially if it's an item that may be useful in the office setting, it will have visibility and repeat exposures. The author also refers to the use of T-shirts for the team or user groups, which may seem hokey, but the sight of a large number of people in the same color/style of shirt piques curiosity.
- Intranet - Most companies have portals that can be useful for reaching employees, though this tends to be a poor medium for providing information to potential users.
- Staff Meetings - Providing announcements to be delivered at staff meetings helps to inform future users. If successful, an announcement could generate an invite to do a longer presentation.
(EN: Much of the information on "promotion" seem hokey and amateurish. I'd recommend turning to the marketing department for better advice on developing promotional messages for internal use.)
Training
Another common theme in successful case studies is a significant investment un user training. Some of the promotional media may have provided basic information, and may even have provided some walk-through demonstrations, but classroom training is often necessary to fully equip users to exploit the system.
As with promotion, training must avoid the tendency to dwell upon features and delve the technical underpinnings of the systems and focus on "real" tasks that provide value to the user.
Also, training is not once-and-done: as new employees enter the company or existing employees change their positions, training in the BI system should be repeated. It is also necessary to support training by providing other means to provide information that can serve as a refresher, to provide additional information to niche users with special needs, and to keep users abreast of developments and newly-discovered methods of using the system. Training must be an ongoing service to ensure ongoing utilization.
Graphics
In case studies of successful BU deployments, graphical representation of information seems to be a common theme. Non-technical individuals can derive more meaning from a dashboard or chart than from a report that presents heavy text and a lot of tabular data.
In some instances, a chart (such as a scattergraph) can provide a visual indication of information that may be overlooked in a table of figures, and can lend credence to a textual (or verbal) interpretation of the numbers.