Over more than 30 years, Dynamic Business Informatics’ (DBI’s) team of data specialists have amassed an enormous amount of knowledge and expertise in designing, developing, and supporting business intelligence and data analytics applications for their many customers. These are in a variety of industry sectors, including Retail, Distribution, Pharma, Waste Disposal, Food Service, Packaging and Transport.
We thought it would be a great source of information if we asked some members of the team to share their most valuable insights about various topics related to their experiences in the field.
1. Our first topic “In Our Experience” is: Pitfalls to Avoid in BI & Data Analytics Projects.
(Part 2 – the second 5 team responses )
As it’s the first subject in this series we also asked them all to add what they enjoy most about their jobs working as consultants to the DBI client base.
Here are the second 5 responses from our team.
1. Bob Corr (Managing Director DBI)
Having been working in the IT sector for many years now, and after founding DBI in 2003, I can honestly say that what I enjoy most about the job is the feeling of satisfaction when our team is presented with a difficult or complex project by any one of our customers, and we manage to deliver something unique and valuable to them, often exceeding their expectations. It’s a great feeling when you know that something you or your team has worked on is making life easier for your customers, and often making them more successful.
My key advice about pitfalls to avoid in the kind of projects we are working on is this: always ringfence your goals and agree with all stakeholders on a clearly defined specification before starting work on a new project and agree completion of each section before adding on extras which can muddy the waters. You will never deliver on an undefined project.
2. Paul Duggan (Software Development Manager DBI)
I’ve been specialising in Business Intelligence since I joined DBI over 17 years ago, having been working on Windows desktop, web and database development in several countries prior to settling back down in Ireland. What I like about my current role is the variety of customers we have, and the different business knowledge we acquire over the projects we are working with. Although we always say we can work with any data, we learn so much from our customers about what is important to them for success, and it helps to bring this knowledge into our interactions. I particularly like meeting customers in their own environments, on site , as you get a better understanding of why certain aspects of their processes are so key to their business. It brings the data alive in its unique way.
My piece of advice around the pitfalls you can step into would be to ensure that you involve all the key stakeholders in any new project as early as possible. Include and engage with all levels of users, to give them the opportunity to explain their needs. If you don’t, then no matter how well designed and comprehensive your application is, if it doesn’t meet the needs of the users at all levels then it leads to underutilisation – which is a waste of everyone’s time, effort and ultimately money.
3. YY Tsang (Senior BI Consultant DBI)
Coming into the Diver BI Group from roles in which I was consulting to multinational and government clients in sectors such as telecom, finance and manufacturing, delivering business automation, I was able to apply this experience to BI projects working with DBI from the UK. I guess most of my job satisfaction comes from the opportunity to work on cutting edge projects using the latest ETL technologies, which have come such a long way since I first used them. All the restrictions on data volumes and specialist skills required for the presentation layer are now things of the past, and we can deliver so much more, and faster, to our clients.
My experience in working with huge multinationals has taught me to look out for one of the greatest pitfalls faced whilst implementing a BI solution. It’s equally valid for small and large organisations: make sure that your BI project is bringing you closer to your business goals, which in turn will deliver you a measurable return on investment. Investing in new systems for the sake of vanity can be very costly if they do not add to your business goals, be they financial or operational.
4. Lorenzo Lumanlan (BI Developer/Consultant DBI)
As one of the youngest members of the DBI team, like Anthony I came straight to DBI from university, so I’ve been immersed in BI and Data Discovery techniques from the word go. Having a great technical grounding from my university days, what I’ve enjoyed most about my first few years here is learning about so many different businesses, and how they work. I’ve also picked up so many new data integration and transformation techniques working at DBI and through our annual distributor conference with Dimensional Insight. There’s always something different to work on which keeps me learning – and I’m enjoying passing that on to even newer colleagues and customers as I also do quite a bit of technical training.
As I’ve been heavily involved in DBI’s customer performance monitoring, I would say that a big part of delivering a great BI application is in the continued monitoring of query time, response times and fine tuning wherever possible. It’s a misconception to think that the initial delivery is the end of your responsibility. Data volumes, machine capacity and user numbers can all change dramatically over time, so it’s vital that you keep referencing performance logs and set up alerts to ensure that everything is running smoothly.
5. James Grace (BI Consultant DBI)
I have a background in User Experience Design and again, like Anthony and Lorenzo, came straight to DBI after university. I enjoy the variety and scope of my responsibilities at DBI. My job allows me to learn about diverse business practices, exploring data related to sales, employees, customers, suppliers, and logistics and work on anything from data transformation to web development. This variety keeps me engaged.
I’ve learned that data migrations and transformations are often more complicated than they seem: it’s easy to underestimate this. It’s not enough to just pull raw data—you have to apply specific business rules to make it useful. This becomes even trickier when you’re combining data from both old and new systems, making sure everything fits together smoothly. A lot of our work involves transforming the data so that it’s clear and accurate for the business users who rely on our reports to make informed decisions.
In part 1 we heard from John Spillane, Anthony Wright, Debbie Lonsdale, Olatz Iturbe and Jer Colbert.
