Businesses that invest in business intelligence solutions expect to achieve results, become more competitive and improve productivity, but these businesses often fail to understand the need for Mobile BI. Mobile business intelligence should provide all the features and search capability a user needs to perform tasks and get information while on the road, working remotely or visiting a client, partner or regional office.
The focus of this article is on Data Democratization within the business enterprise, but the concepts and approaches involved in implementing this type of initiative are worth considering for any kind of major change within an organization.
If you are considering a modern business intelligence solution, there is a real necessity to choose an option that provides mobile business intelligence access and capability. Today’s workforce is mobile and team members expect to have seamless access, no matter the device they choose to use. Mobile BI solutions enable data sharing, fact-based decision making and optimize productivity. No matter where your team members are, in or out of the office, they should have access to critical business intelligence in order to keep your business moving and fulfill their roles and responsibilities.
If your team is using business intelligence (and it should be), you may be working with a more restrictive business solution that is not designed for a business user. If that is the case, you are missing an opportunity to cascade analytics throughout the organization and to optimize your resources and improve productivity. Self-Serve Business Intelligence solutions are designed with guidance and recommendations to guide a business user with average skills through the process of preparing and analyzing data and to encourage collaboration and data sharing across the enterprise.
If you are thinking that business analytics is too complex for you (or your business users), you may want to take a step back and look at the exciting evolution of business analytics tools. Today’s business intelligence solutions and business analytics software offer easy-to-use tools and features that are suitable for business users at every skill level.
So, you want to use a business intelligence solution but you don’t want to have to customize, spend a lot of money and end up with a solution that is restrictive and does not meet your needs? I don’t blame you.
If your has selected a software product and your users have embraced that product, you do not want to rock the boat! You want to be able to continue using that useful solution. But, you may also need to add features or functionality to improve accurate reporting, to increase productivity and data sharing, to solve problems and identify opportunities or all of the above. So, what do you do?
How can any business today be willing to accept a BI solution that has little or no mobile capability? Not only do most businesses have staff members on the road, but most businesses have staff members who work from home at least part of the time or those who extend their working hours outside the office.
One of the critical factors in BI tools consideration is whether those tools are easily used on mobile devices. Mobile business intelligence tools are crucial to the success of a business intelligence project. Businesses may spend considerable time and effort on data democratization and on providing tools for team members to use in data analysis but if those tools are not mobile, if they are inaccessible to those on the road, out of the office or working from home, business users do not have equal access or adequate tools to perform day-to-day analytics, to share data with other users or to prepare reports or presentations.
