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April 7, 2008

Business intelligence ROI and focus

The article, Gartner: Business intelligence ROI, value a matter of mind over money, begins with "Determining the return on investment (ROI) and value of a business intelligence (BI) software investment is often an exasperating task, but not an impossible one, according to one Gartner analyst."

I completely agree, but I also feel it's a matter of maturity, and mature BI environments can get there. I also believe it's a best practice to measure and that it has a high correlation to overall "success", whether success is defined by the numbers or otherwise.

Following are some focuses, in order from healthiest to unhealthiest, that business intelligence programs fall into. As we progress through the focuses, you will notice the focus gets further and further away from the user.

Business Focus #1: Return on Investment
ROI is the holy grail of focus for business intelligence. Those teams that focus on achieving it have learned what business intelligence is all about. Studies have shown that driving toward ROI highly correlates to self-reported program success scores. The focus on ROI just seems to encourage the development team to work backwards to doing the right things day in and day out for the ultimate arbiter of success - the bottom line. Ultimately, to claim this focus, a team must have a great handle on the succeeding focuses well.

Business Focus #2: Data Usage
Those programs that don't measure ROI or are too removed from business processes that drive ROI but still want a business-focused BI program focus on the usage of the data. The objective here is increasing numbers and complexity of usage. With this focus, user statistics such as logins and query bands are tracked; however, little is understood about what the users ultimately do with the results.

Business Focus #3: Data Gathering and Availability

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Posted by William McKnight at 1:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

August 17, 2006

Providing ROI with Business Intelligence

Below are some learnings and tips on BI/DW ROI from Neil Freake, Senior Manager of BI/DW at Scotiabank, a client who I had the privliege of presenting with yesterday at the Shared Insights show. The presentation was titled "Providing ROI with Business Intelligence." This was an additional slide so it's here, as promised, for the attendees... and all of you.

- Financial Models need to factor in attrition rates
- Calculating “lift” is often not a viable argument (wholly dependent on assumptions)
- Benefit is based on Profit NOT Revenue (ergo…understand margin calculations)
- Financial Models must be more accountable when defining costs (i.e., SOX)
- First Run Cost Estimates are always off +/- 25%
- Payback Calculation – two camps
- Cost Camp: begin to calculate as soon as you incur costs through cumulative life of benefits
- Benefit Camp: Calculate payback after project has been implemented (Not recommended or realistic)
- Soft Dollar benefits are easier to argue / more difficult to prove
- Hard Dollar benefits are rare, more difficult to argue and almost impossible to prove.
- Most organizations use a 10% interest rate when calculating NPV
- How well you define your assumptions will dictate how well your model stands up to financial scrutiny
- Every financial model has weaknesses (highly subjective)
- Would have to be in a lab to prove benefits
- Double dipping benefits – most common error in business cases (who has the right to claim a benefit?)
- ROI is purely an internal (and sometimes external) marketing tool
- The higher the dollar amount the more scrutiny your project will face

Posted by William McKnight at 12:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)