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Daniel Power

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Editor, DSSResources

76 points

Daniel Power is a Professor of Information Systems and Management at the College of Business Administration at the University of Northern Iowa, Cedar Falls, Iowa and the editor of DSSResources.COM, the Web-based knowledge repository about computerized systems that support ...

Daniel Power is a Professor of Information Systems and Management at the College of Business Administration at the University of Northern Iowa, Cedar Falls, Iowa and the editor of DSSResources.COM, the Web-based knowledge repository about computerized systems that support decision making, the editor of PlanningSkills.COM, and the editor of DSS News, a bi-weekly e-newsletter. Dan writes the column "Ask Dan!".

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Jan. 11, 2012

Daniel Power is now following Wayne Eckerson and 1 other person

Jan. 11, 2012

Daniel Power and 6 other people answered this question

How thin is the line between business intelligence and business analytics applications?

Both BI and BA are subsets of computerized decision support. Vendors and consultants do not agree on the categories. You may be interested in two of my columns:
How do predictive analytics support decision making? at URL http://dssresources.com/faq/index.php?action=artikel&id=239
What is business intelligence? at URL http://dssresources.com/faq/index.php?action=artikel&id=4 more

Business Analytics

Business Intelligence

Data Governance

Data Management Software

July 4, 2011

Daniel Power recommends this answer by Jonathan Wu

Do you think tablets will be the driving force behind mobile BI adoption? Why or why not?

Yes, I believe that tablets will be a driving force behind mobile BI adoption. Tablets are gaining in popularity at the expense of personal computers. The mobility, connectivity, low price and ease of use make tablets very attractive...I am responding to this question on my ... more

Information Technology

Business Intelligence

Information Management

June 28, 2011

Daniel Power recommends this answer by Lyndsay Wise

Should BI Teams Reside on the IT or the Business Side?

I think that it really depends on the situation and goal of the project. However, based on experience, the BI projects that have been most likely to succeed are ones that have both aspects - in terms of being driven by the business through the ... more

Information Technology

Business Intelligence

June 17, 2011

Daniel Power answered this question

What is mobile business intelligence?

I agree tablets are an important delivery platform for mobile BI. For the past 6 weeks, I have been experimenting with the Motorola Xoom with Google Android.
A new age tablet has many advantages including excellent battery life, touch recognition and hi rez display. The apps ... more

Information Technology

Business Intelligence

Business Intelligence Applications

May 6, 2011

Daniel Power and 5 other people answered this question

What is the impact of social media on decision making?

Hi all--
Thanks for the comments. Let me list some hypotheses about the impact of social media on decision making. Your comments will impact my decision making on an article I am writing. Thanks. Dan
1. Business decision support tools developed to use social media data will ... more

Information Technology

Business Intelligence

Decision-making

April 16, 2011

Daniel Power and 7 other people answered this question

What are the top 3 things potential buyers should know about business intelligence?

Managers in firms that do not currently have a business intelligence capability should know the following three facts:
1. A number of solutions and technologies are advertised as business intelligence systems. It is important that managers know why they want a new decision support capability.
2. The ... more

Information Technology

Business Intelligence

March 16, 2011

Daniel Power and 2 other people answered this question

How do you define BI vs. Analytics vs. Visualization vs.Reporting vs. Charting? Religious topic?

At DSSResources.com we consider "BI a popularized, umbrella term introduced by Howard Dresner of the Gartner Group in 1989 to describe a set of concepts and methods to improve business decision making by using fact-based support systems. The term is sometimes used interchangeably with briefing ... more

Information Technology

Business Intelligence

Jan. 26, 2011

Daniel Power and 5 other people answered this question

What are the top questions a buyer should ask a BI vendor?

Hello all. You can check my article
Power, D. J. "Tips for Choosing Enterprise-wide DSS Software" URL http://dssresources.com/papers/dsssoftwareeval/index.html more

Information Technology

Business Intelligence

Business Intelligence Vendors

Jan. 25, 2011

Daniel Power and 4 other people answered this question

How can we transition from treating BI as an IT project to treating BI as a cultural transformation?

People are generally afraid of change. Using computer-based systems is much more accepted today then at anytime in the past, but all the concerns about being replaced by a machine, having your job de-skilled, etc. persist. Trying to sell BI as a cultural transformation may ... more

Information Technology

Business Intelligence

Business Intelligence 2.0

Dec. 24, 2010

Daniel Power and 10 other people answered this question

Would you recommend datamart or data warehouse for a first time BI project?

I still think for companies without data marts or data warehouses, primarily medium-sized companies, the best place to start is a data mart. Companies with legacy marts/warehouses may be able to reengineer with an enterprise data warehouse. Figure out your purpose, check your resources. more

Information Technology

Business Intelligence

Business Intelligence Forum

Business Intelligence Implementation

Nov. 29, 2010

Daniel Power and 8 other people answered this question

Excel for BI Best Practices: What are your 3 tips for using Excel as a business intelligence tool?

Excel is a desktop analysis tool that can be used by an analyst or a manager to summarize data, visualize relationships among variables and forecast trends. The keys to using Excel are:
1) have a good dataset that you know how to manipulate. Are there missing ... more

General Management

Information Technology

Nov. 29, 2010

Daniel Power and 5 other people answered this question

How can i bring BI to SMBs that have data sources that don't connect?

In an SMB I suggest you look at building a small data mart using a product like MS Access or MS SQL server to integrate data from multiple sources. Once the data model is tested you will need a regular Extract Transform and Load procedure ... more

Information Technology

Business Intelligence

Business Intelligence Applications

Nov. 29, 2010

Daniel Power recommends this answer by Ron Dimon

Any examples of hidden costs in BI investments?

This is a great question as, like you say, "all costs in" are not well understood in many business and I.T. investments. I'll take a stab around on-premise, enterprise BI initiatives and think from a Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) perspective (NB: this would be ... more

Information Technology

Business Intelligence

Business Intelligence Applications

Business Intelligence Software Solutions

Nov. 15, 2010

Daniel Power and 2 other people answered this question

What's one thing that business decision makers misunderstand about the value of data quality?

The quality of the historical data limits the usefulness of any decision support one tries to provide with that data. Dirty data is poor data even if we "clean it" "massage it" or "adjust it". more

Information Technology

Business Intelligence

Business Intelligence Software Solutions

Nov. 15, 2010

Daniel Power and 4 other people answered this question

How do I get my VPs on board with predictive analytics again when it failed us before?

I agree with John. I would analyze why projects failed. If the problem was the data, the model, and/or the technology, then we can do a better job of implementation. more

Information Technology

Business Intelligence

Business Intelligence Solution

Nov. 8, 2010

Daniel Power and 2 other people answered this question

Can business intelligence help make my company more green?

In my opinion green BI is all hype. A good business intelligence decision support system should help your company reduce paper reports, but that is about as green as it gets. You can potentially reduce energy costs for servers, workstations, etc. and gain more saving.
Business ... more

Information Technology

Business Intelligence

Business Intelligence Software Products

Nov. 3, 2010

Daniel Power and 3 other people answered this question

What are the benefits of data visualization?

Data visualization means a chart, graph or picture shows the data in some meaningful context. The old saying is that "one picture is worth a thousand words." So a good data visualization should be better than showing a table with a thousand numbers and words. ... more

Information Technology

Business Intelligence

Business Intelligence Applications

Nov. 2, 2010

Daniel Power and 8 other people answered this question

What's the #1 reason why business intelligence projects fail?

People -- the wrong project manager, poor support from senior management, overly optimistic about project, lack of skills, inexperience with the technology. more

Information Technology

Business Intelligence

Business Intelligence Applications

Following 3 Topics

Business Intelligence

Data Warehousing

Information Technology

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