The Importance of Self-Service BI for CEOs

As CEO, you’re constantly faced with having to make the tough decisions for your company.

To make the best decisions, you need accurate, reliable and timely information. The problem is that you’re constantly being bombarded with data that is inaccurate and unreliable.

The key to great decision-making is your ability to glean insight from the massive amounts of information flowing into your business every day from disparate sources – in real time.

One way to do this is by using self-service BI (business intelligence) that integrates data from multiple sources and delivers data views that are report-ready. Self-service BI empowers you with the data platform and tools to enable you to can gain access to timely, accurate information and analyze it from every angle.

Many organizations are faced with a multitude of static spreadsheets making their way from person to person via email. Intuitively everyone knows that the spreadsheets cannot be trusted. Are the calculations right? Did everyone copy and paste in the right data? Is the spreadsheet data up to date?

Unlike spreadsheets that can’t be trusted to provide accurate, real-time data, self-service BI encourages information-sharing and collaboration across the enterprise, eliminating data silos.

As such, you’ll have a single version of the truth, enabling you to make the best decisions for your company because you’ll be working from an automated, up-to-date integrated data model.

Using aging enterprise data to make business decisions is like reading yesterday’s news – the usefulness of the content is diminished. However, when you have access to the most up-to-date data, you can increase market share by discovering new opportunities, cut costs by identifying unprofitable areas within the organization as well as identify rapidly changing market trends.

A self-service BI platform encourages dashboard-sharing and data collaboration and it also provides easier ways to share information within and outside the walls of your organization. You and your team can engage on important information. In addition, data insight is critical to a cohesive work environment where every team member is informed and is able to help you make better business decisions.

As well as delivering the best impact within your organization, self-service BI helps you lower your overall IT costs because your IT staff no longer has to take the time to generate reports for the business. It also helps you cut your overall costs because it enables you to respond more rapidly to changing business conditions and make faster decisions – and making quicker decisions helps you eliminate mistakes.

For most enterprises today, sustaining lean operations depends on their ability to flawlessly execute on their priorities – strategic as well as tactical. As a result, an organization must collaborate on information – horizontally or vertically – in a fast, efficient and mistake-free manner.

Self-service BI can facilitate collaboration and create efficiencies that help drive the overall operational value of the enterprise. As a business leader, you can leverage self-service BI to access critical information to more quickly make the best decisions for your company and improve operations.

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