Does your IT team build one-off reports on request? Should they be doing this?
The article argues that while business leaders often rely on IT teams to create one-off reports due to discomfort with analytics tools and IT's role in integrating BI systems, this reliance creates bottlenecks and delays, and instead, businesses should empower decision-makers with self-service analytics platforms so IT can focus on managing data infrastructure and security rather than manual report generation.
When we think of BI and analytics, we often imagine business leaders and managers using rich dashboards to drive innovation. However, in reality, many business leaders and managers find themselves waiting for IT to respond to their requests for reports—reports that only the IT team has the access and expertise to produce.
Why business people turn to IT for reporting
According to Deloitte, 67% of managers and executives are not comfortable accessing or using data from their analytics tools. This discomfort perpetuates the belief that the IT team, being more comfortable with technology, is best suited for the reporting job.
Often, after adopting a BI tool, the IT team helps integrate it into the organization, making it natural for others to view IT as the expert and owner of the tool. However, this can become a significant bottleneck: business people rely on IT to pull and modify reports, leading to delays in accessing timely data and disempowering decision-makers from fully leveraging organizational data.
Instead of letting IT tickets pile up, analytics should live where decisions are made, allowing IT to focus on their core mission.
The truth is… you can let your IT team focus on their core mission, not on building reports
Your IT team brings significant value as administrators and managers of the data and analytics stack. They are responsible for balancing data security and access, and optimizing infrastructure investments to manage costs. There’s no need to distract them from their core mission by having them spend countless hours manually producing and reproducing reports.
The creation and upkeep of reports should be with the business—the place where decisions are made. The right analytics platform enables business people to be self-sufficient, accessing and preparing data for analysis independently, without waiting for IT.
Decision intelligence to the rescue
At Pyramid Analytics, we aim to dispel myths about analytics and business intelligence that hold people back and fail to deliver value. While there are many reasons why self-service analytics and BI technology sometimes fall short, there are fewer reasons to continue living with these shortcomings.
With a decision intelligence platform, organizations can benefit from a no-code, point-and-click browser experience that empowers anyone—from novices to data scientists—to make data-driven decisions.
We invite you to read our Mythbusting Business Intelligence vs. Decision Intelligence guidebook to learn more about widely held beliefs about business intelligence and analytics today. The guide breaks down myths related to data, people, and analytics, and shows how a new approach can help you move past limiting beliefs and take your analytics to the next level through decision intelligence.