BI Best Practices and Future Directions Sessions

Back to Tracks and Agenda

Ethan Durda

Software as a service (SaaS) is hardly a new concept but with the advent of new technologies and more general user acceptance of not having control of their data the possibility of BI as a service is gaining traction. This session will talk about the technological and architectural considerations and issues surrounding this landscape and the potential for companies to lower their initial costs dramatically and their total cost of ownership generally to support the BI function within their organizations.

Heather Sinkwitz, Trax Technologies

The world of business intelligence is evolving from an IT focused data solution for static reporting to a business focused intelligent solution for value driven analytics.  The emergence of new tools and technology enables business users to quickly answer critical questions in real-time across multiple platforms.  New talent is emerging in the market to meet the growing BI boom.  The future of business intelligence is a world of actionable analytics ingrained in our everyday lives.  Let’s chat about today, tomorrow and beyond and how to align your BI strategy to meet the growing, evolving demand.

Paul Grill, InfoSol Inc.

Rarely in the field of human experience has so much been spoken about so little. While there are true values to be had from what we call big data today it is hard to imagine it will reach the level of the hype we see across the world from pundits to technologists to every imaginable subject matter expert. While big data won’t make “Free Will Irrelevant” as a recent article breathlessly declared, it can be used…and has been successfully used, to make your business operate better. This session will talk about what big data really is and what it really can be used to do.

Adam Lange, Lake Tahoe Community College

The NSA’s bulk data collection programs have met increased public scrutiny as a result of the leaks of whistleblower Edward Snowden. These recent revelations have sparked a global debate on surveillance and privacy.

Businesses and other nongovernmental organizations should not be exempt from this general debate on privacy policy. As business intelligence professionals, we must work to maintain the trust of our stakeholders by thinking critically about all information we store and analyze.

This session is a call for renewed focus on the ethical framework of business intelligence. Concerns will be raised about a current lack of transparency, and what businesses should do to build more openness with respect to what information is collected, how it is used, and whom it is shared with. No easy answers will be provided in this session, but hopefully it helps inspire a larger and lasting discussion.

Ethan Durda

This session will describe the various methods of using Agile for daily management of a BI team. Care will be given to walk through and deal with the daily disturbances that BI teams are faced with. Some best and worst case examples will be shared from the presenter’s experience and practice.

Donald MacCormick Chief Product and Strategy Officer, Antivia

Do you need to deliver information to decision-makers on the front-line of your organization?

If so, what’s stopping you?  [expand title=”continue reading…” alt=”continue reading…” swaptitle=”collapse”]

Is it because your existing BI tools are too hard for front-line workers to use? Or, too slow? Or, too hardware intensive? Or, too expensive?

Join Donald MacCormick, Chief Product & Strategy Officer of Antivia, the creators of DecisionPoint™, for this fast-paced session to see how you can sweep aside all of these barriers aside, enabling you to:

• Give front-line decision-makers zero-training BI that also answers their follow-on questions, without them having to go back to IT
• Create BI content with the “application-like” interfaces that front-line decision makers need, 10x faster and without coding
• Deploy BI content, that scales cost-effectively to large numbers of mobile and desktop users and fits in to your existing IT infrastructure[/expand]

Chris Kruger, InfoSol Inc.

Aren’t all babies supposed to be cute? You decide. In this BI baby boot camp, I will play with the new SAP BI babies, Lumira, Predictive Analysis, and Design Studio. You will see me get dirty as a live demonstration will be given, showcasing the workflows, tips, and introductory parenting tips to these new and powerful creations. The good, the bad, and the ugly will be discussed without all of the marketing hype. Find out what they do and why, then tell us how the babies look. When your bosses inevitably ask you about the joys and struggles of adopting one of these tykes, you will be able to inform and warn before commitment. You will understand what these babies were created for, how much they cost to raise, and the joys and benefits of raising/owning them.  [expand title=”continue reading…” alt=”continue reading…” swaptitle=”collapse”]

Chris Kruger is an Account Manager for InfoSol, providing Business Intelligence solutions for a wide range of clients. His passion for business and relationship building supports his motivation to learn everything he can about his clients and their business. Chris has in-depth knowledge and experience with multiple BI solutions and specializes in Mobile Business Intelligence. Chris has presented at many events, most recently including SAP User Groups and the ASUG Business Objects User Conference in Orlando, FL. Chris is a contributing member to many Business Intelligence Groups including America’s SAP User Group (ASUG).[/expand]

Ethan Durda

Technologists can be accurately accused of being too focused on the technological delivery and data sourcing issues associated with producing Key Performance Indicators (KPI’s) for the business. We forget sometimes that these calculations and numbers affect decisions made in the business and often compensation. This session will help put a framework and methodology for developing KPI’s to drive business value and change across the organization with a set of tools to avoid some of the unintended consequences that KPI’s cause.

Allan Pym and Ofir Gil, APOS Systems Inc.

Successful traction of SAP BusinessObjects content within an organization typically brings significant growth in the deployment.  It also brings growth in the platform management challenges resulting from volume and complexity.  In order to keep your deployment on track without limiting its reach, these volume and complexity challenges need to be managed efficiently. This session will identify key challenges areas impacting system awareness, content management and system management, and will look at methods and technologies for addressing these challenges.

Adam Lange, Lake Tahoe Community College

Another day, another report request. Soon enough, your email inbox is bursting with requests for new reports and changes to existing reports. It is a familiar sight for all business intelligence practitioners. So how can we transition away from email-based communication and create an efficient request system that tracks reports and dashboards throughout the development lifecycle? Furthermore, how can we create a process that satisfies the needs of everyone across the spectrum, including managers, developers, and end-users?

This session will show how Lake Tahoe Community College successfully implemented a SharePoint based system for tracking report requests. The presenter will also share general recommendations for any organization seeking to adopt a similar process.

Paul Grill, Jake Tully, Bree-Anna Mustad – InfoSol Inc.

The predictions by industry experts in 2010 that mobile Business Intelligence was the next big thing and the majority of BI usage would be mobile within three years did not exactly pan out. Part of the reason was the lack of return on investment, but part was that the BI dashboard tools were just not ready and viable for fast mobile development and deployment.

This enlightening session will both explain and demonstrate the current and future mobile BI dashboard solutions for BusinessObjects deployments and introduce the next exciting generation of tools that allow you to design, develop and deploy BI dashboards on the mobile device itself!

Ethan Durda

This session will be a quick walk through of some of the specific techniques that do and don’t work in BI. Specific topics will cover the major phases of a project including Initiation, Definition, Execution, Control and Close and how these can be best managed for BI projects. A general Agile methodology and techniques used at multiple clients will be explained.

Chris Kalaras, Antivia

Do you have a mountain of SAP BusinessObjects Web Intelligence reports in your BI portfolio? Are those reports looking a little tired and not delivering the modern, interactive experience your decision-makers need?

If so, join Chris Kalaras of Antivia, the creators of DecisionPoint™, to see how you can transform your Web Intelligence content into the task-focused interactive dashboards and BI Apps that today’s business users expect.  See how to:

• Leverage your existing investment in Web Intelligence to deliver modern, interactive dashboards and BI apps, quickly and with no-coding
• Create stunning content with pixel-perfect layouts and high production values that reflect your corporate brand
• Deploy BI content, cost-effectively to large numbers of mobile and desktop

Chris Kruger, InfoSol Inc.

BI has progressed in function and features over the years and is approaching a level of ease of use that many people would like to see it transformed into a consumer driven field. The technology department would then be primarily defined as a data acquisition and delivery organization but BI itself would be developed and managed by end users. The tools are in place, but can it be done? What does self-service really look like and is it a realistic replacement for the status quo? These topics and concrete examples will be discussed and delivered in this session.

Chris Kruger, InfoSol Inc.

SAP now has three more tools that were added to the already over-crowded tool belt. Let’s face it, you aren’t Batman, you don’t have the powers of the Cape Crusader, and chances are that you don’t know what each tool is used for in your BI tool belt. In all reality, you don’t have time to learn each of those tools and you barely have time to master one. So, save some time and headaches and learn what each tool was made for and why. In this session, we will discuss the purpose of each tool, the audience they were created for, what they are used for, and how organizations can capitalize on the functionality to see an ROI on their Business Intelligence dollars. When you know what each tool does, you can then start scaling buildings and saving the world in no time. Well, at least your business users will think you have super powers.

 

Back to Tracks and Agenda