The global research department of our client analyzes and produces reports from field-based data in order to provide senior leadership and its constituency information about the progress of work overseas. The information is vital to the strategic vision and decision making of the organization's overseas leadership.
The purpose of this project was to design and implement a decision support and business intelligence system to provide the global research department with capabilities to analyze, report, and publish progress indicators across dimensions that would help drive strategic decision making. The client needed a way to consolidate their reporting environment, automate the reporting process, and leverage their existing data to gain additional insight to include; historical views, current key metrics, and trend analysis.
Additionally, the client was looking to learn BI design and implementation best practices supported by a methodology that would transfer into future projects that they could largely perform on their own. Prior to the Business Intelligence project, the client had no previous data mart or business intelligence experience. Ironworks Consulting performed the following tasks during this engagement:
- User requirements gathering and definition
- System architecture and design of a multi-tiered business intelligence platform
- Design and implementation of business defined extract, transform, and load processes
- Design and implementation of a dimensionally-modeled data mart
- Knowledge transfer of our methodology in building an enterprise BI solution that is extensible in support of new subject areas in the future
Ironworks Consulting, a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner, worked with the client to perform a full life-cycle Business Intelligence Project that included the design, implementation, deployment and testing of an ad-hoc data analysis infrastructure utilizing existing Microsoft technology investments and ProClarity analytics.
The business intelligence solution is comprised of Microsoft SQL Server 2005, Microsoft SQL Server Analysis Services 2005 (SSAS), Microsoft SQL Server Integration Services 2005 (SSIS), and ProClarity Analytics 6.0 for analysis and information visualization.
The business intelligence framework selected allowed for increased productivity during the development and architecting of the data mart database structures and ETL processes. The SQL Server 2005 Business Intelligence toolset helped deliver a solution that satisfied all data mart goals and requirements for the customer. The solution delivered an extensible enterprise ready analytical platform. ProClarity Analytics 6.0 provided an ad-hoc analytical tool that met the requirements of the user community as defined in the first phase.
While development efforts involved the beta editions of both SQL Server 2005 and ProClarity, the end solution was successfully migrated to the production releases of both products at the completion of the engagement.
Our client has realized benefits in the following areas:
- Data and business process management and quality
- Report development processes and information delivery automation
- Analytics and visualization
- Insight into organizational data and trends
Additionally, the client is in a position to design and implement future data marts using best practices within an extensible environment that can leverage enterprise-grade ETL processes and a robust security model.