It wasn’t long ago that only the elite could afford great BI solutions. The power of great analytics, visualisation and data discovery was only available to large corporations or IT savvy teams with great technical skills. If you were fortunate enough to work for one of the organisations that had a BI tool and roadmap, you were often reliant on the technical expertise in your IT department to generate reports or push data into your BI tool.
Power BI is changing all that.
Most people I speak to have already heard about Power BI. Some have installed it, many have plans to use it. There is a buzz about Power BI for several reasons, a few of which I would like to share.
Microsoft’s roadmap - Would you like BI with that?
Microsoft has been a leader (recognised by Gartner and displayed in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Business Intelligence below) in Business Intelligence for over 10 years now.
Power BI is the latest incarnation of the long legacy of sharing data within the enterprise. For those already using any of the Microsoft stack of solutions, Power BI is now the weapon of choice. It is becoming the embedded tool for Microsoft’s Office 365, CRM and ERP platforms. Add to this the marketplace for data packs or apps and it’s easy to see how universal this technology is becoming.
BI for the masses
Cost - Another aspect that is changing the game is the cost: for less than what most people spend on coffee in a month, Power BI offers insights into your data like never before.
- Cost $12.70 per user per month for Power BI Pro.
This is raising a few eyebrows in the BI landscape.
Ease of use – One thing that Microsoft have done is to keep it simple from a User Interface perspective. It is straightforward to use, which from a change management perspective is good news - it doesn’t require a data science degree to work the dashboards and do some very interesting analysis.
You can start small for free - With Power BI desktop it has never been easier to get going without any investment, steering committee or procurement nightmare. You can quickly load your data, build the basics and get started fast and for free.
Help as you grow
Once you have established the solution, you might need a little technical help connecting multiple databases, doing some complex calculations and comparisons, or rolling things out across the enterprise. That’s where Microsoft’s partner network comes in. At Professional Advantage we have been helping organisations use an array of Business Intelligence tools to make better decision for over 30 years. We were surprised at how fast we could get things going for our clients with Power BI. Once you have the basic data model going, creating visualisations, dashboards and reports is simple.
Gone are the days where reporting and analytics were only available to those with technical skills or deep pockets. Microsoft has changed the game with Power BI, and we are working with our clients to:
- find insights
- drive decision making
- put a world class analytical tool in the hands of those who need it most. Microsoft have built the tool, and we are helping the masses to use it.
Power BI. Power BI to the People!
