Using Business Intelligence Wisely

1. Using Business Intelligence Wisely Improve analysis and strategic business decisions within your student financial services office Presenters: Elizabeth Mendez, Broward Community College Brett Perlman, SAS Institute, Inc.

2. The Intelligence Gap Many Higher Education Institutions: Cannot generate the intelligence they need. Cannot generate intelligence fast enough to act on it. Continue to incur huge costs due to uninformed decisions and misguided strategies. The opportunities afforded by a successful intelligence strategy have never been greater

3. Background on BCC: BCC is the 2nd largest community college in Florida, 6th in the nation. BCC has 3 main campuses and 3 major centers. BCC headcount is approximately 65,000. BCC runs a fully integrated database (homegrown) to support operational systems, which include Finance, Student, Human Resources and Payroll systems. This database was developed through a collaborative partnership with SAG and is deployed in 8 institutions that collectively represent more than 50% of the community college FTE in the state of Florida as to whether a student can register, pay, disburse financial aidas to whether a student can register, pay, disburse financial aid

4. Symptoms: Tactical decisions are made every minute. Because of the speed at which these decisions must be made, some decisions are taken by the system with little or no human intervention. Strategic decisions require more information. BCC�s operating system is ill prepared to support strategic decision making. So was the culture of our staff. BCC did not have an alternative way of obtaining information designed specifically to provide support for decision making at the strategic level. An initiative to alleviate some of the demand for information began. The new president wanted �fact-based� decision making. Cashiering, financial aid, and collection initiatives require information from different sources that span multiple terms or years Operatiing systems are designed to run individual day to day transactions.Cashiering, financial aid, and collection initiatives require information from different sources that span multiple terms or years Operatiing systems are designed to run individual day to day transactions.

5. 1st Attempt at supporting decision making: A mirror image database was created, which was a copy of the operational database. Crystal Reports was purchased to query against the mirror image database. Power users were selected from the BCC community to receive technical training. Users could build and view reports via Crystal Enterprises. Actually this was our second report writer Actually this was our second report writer

6. Reporting Obstacles: Querying the database was extremely complicated. The database structure was complex. Data experts would have to review the reports generated for accuracy & interpretation due to the complexity of the data. Data integrity issues Refreshing the data took too long, approximately 6 hours for less than � of the operational database. We were still only generating operational or transaction based reports and analyses. Bullet 1: the data was displersed among hundreds fo tables and files with obscure relationships. integrityIt was later discovered that the process of moving data from the operations database to the mirror image database was missing records Bullet 1: the data was displersed among hundreds fo tables and files with obscure relationships. integrityIt was later discovered that the process of moving data from the operations database to the mirror image database was missing records

7. TrendsBusiness Intelligence �The big trend in 2006 will be bringing BI to the masses and getting beyond the power users.� �The whole trend is not use of BI in executive offices, but BI capabilities that can be used by any executive line manager or employee.� --Dan Vesset, Analyst, IDC (Computerworld, January 2, 2006)

8. Defining a BI Solution: Define what BI means to the institution Supports continuous improvement and strategic planning Support decision making at the College. Support user needs Information is easy to obtain/query and accessible via user-friendly tools. The data speaks to the business. Information is accurate and up-to-date. Design the logical structure of the data. Because it is designed with the business users, decision making process in mind, the database structure speaks to the user in business terms.Design the logical structure of the data. Because it is designed with the business users, decision making process in mind, the database structure speaks to the user in business terms.

9. Defining a BI solution: �Turn raw data into information, and information into knowledge� Patti Barney, VP Information Technology Broward Community College

10. Defining the BI Solution: Select the software: Allows for the delivery of the data to the data warehouse to the user�s desktop. Fast and stable, high performance and reliable. One integrated product from a single vendor Vendor solution that was fully customizable A good price

11. Defining the BI Solution: BCC selected SAS� software to provide the extraction, transport, loading (ETL) and data presentation services. SAS� offers a data warehousing/Business Intelligence suite that provides the majority of tools required. SAS� partnership with education BCC has chosen 2 products from SAS� and is looking into a third. SAS� Enterprise Intelligence Platform SAS� Financial Intelligence

12. Building a BI Team: Selection of teams and team members IT team User teams Virtual competency center Team understanding of the BI concept Accountability at various levels Allow the team time to absorb the concept and ask many questions.

13. BI teams at BCC: 3 teams were built representing the key user areas of the College (Student, Business, Academic) Each team had a team leader well versed on the College operational system. Each key area had functional users assigned Each functional area had a data auditor assigned Each functional user was expected to include additional focus groups as needed

14. Business Team We have a representative from Financial aid on the team as well.We have a representative from Financial aid on the team as well.

15. Student Team

16. Academic Team

17. Virtual Competency Center See handout

18. Further Defining BI Opportunities Each team/functional area tasked with the following: Where can BI be applied in their organization? Who will benefit? What College strategic goals will the BI request support? What question(s) need be answered. Define measurements and dimensions Reality check must take place to verify the data needed is available Evaluate alternatives within and among teams

22. SAS� Solution and Definitions proposal: Business process information gathering meetings Understanding of systems involved Understanding of business objectives High level customer deliverables High level means data source, dimensionality, reporting, KPI and security requirementsHigh level means data source, dimensionality, reporting, KPI and security requirements

23. SAS� requirements definition System Design: Data source Data extraction Data refresh cycle Data dimensions Data hierarchies Data preparation Data models Reporting KPI�s Portals Security

24. SAS� requirements definition (con�t) Project resources Training recommendations Project risks Critical success factors Project schedule

25. Use of data via SAS� Enterprise Software demo

26. So what? Continuous improvement, keep the process going.Continuous improvement, keep the process going.

27. Top 5 Business Intelligence Trends Predictive analytics are being embedded in many BI applications, creating clearer views of opportunities and trends. Dashboards and scorecards are proliferating through the enterprise, offering interactive drill-down capabilities. New integration technology is feeding real-time data into BI applications, enabling real-time decision-making. BI front ends are working their way lower in organizations� hierarchies, fueling changes in business processes. Staffing needs are shifting, as more staff with analytical, statistical, and business domain experience are required. Source: InfoWorld (August 22, 2005)