While 57% of the 227 respondents to ITWeb`s fifth annual Business Intelligence (BI) Survey claim to be at a mature stage of BI implementation, the study also highlighted many pitfalls faced by local organisations in the BI space.
The results of the survey were presented yesterday in Johannesburg.
The biggest problem, according to 41% of respondents, was that of software not meeting requirements, while 72% were disappointed in the time to implement versus expectation. A further 33% felt they had taken an incorrect BI architecture approach.
"Businesses are urged not to be swayed by the vendor hype," stressed Sabir Munshi, executive for corporate markets at Sanlam Capital Markets.
No single solution
"You need to be able to customise the classic BI solution to achieve your 'ideal world of IT`. No single solution is right - it is not up to the vendor to determine what you need. Do your research."
In fact, he added, a fully-fledged BI tool would have caused Sanlam some complexity, with little added benefit.
This echoes the survey results, where 32% of respondents reported concern over the lack of flexibility in their BI solutions, and 27% felt their BI solution was too complicated.
The answer, said Munshi, is that the gap between vendor promise, hype and a practical solution should be managed effectively.
Not enough impact
According to the survey results, BI does not have enough impact on the bottom line. When asked if they had received return on investment (ROI), 45% of respondents replied "no".
But, noted Munshi, ROI is a difficult factor to determine, despite its importance.
"A good idea is to weigh up your problems. If problems go away because of BI implementation, then there is your ROI."
Indeed, the survey found the majority of respondents who achieved ROI from their BI implementation said it was through seeing a reduction in problems, and 14% said they had experienced quicker decision-making abilities.
Munshi and Nick Whitehead, sales director, BI and data warehousing solutions for Europe, Middle East and Africa at Oracle, agreed that one of the most important factors of BI is controlling business and information risk.
The survey, however, revealed that only 6% of respondents use BI for this. The higher ranked reasons were month-end reporting (52%), controlling costs (45%) and understanding business cost dynamics (45%)
Other BI challenges
The BI event also identified many other challenges to the current state of BI implementation in this country.
"BI is seen as an afterthought on top of operations, and this leads to fragmented BI," explained Whitehead.
"Too many BI solutions/applications are incomplete, inconsistent and difficult to use. Information needs to be consolidated."
According to the survey, half of the respondents said their data is doubling or tripling every year.
"People are being bombarded by information," Whitehead stated. "BI needs to find a way to alert business users and distinguish the difference between important information and useless information."
The survey found the top three challenges to successful BI strategies are insufficient reporting and analysis processes, which lead to delays in delivering timely information, too much information in personal spreadsheets and people`s heads, and financial professionals who have insufficient time for strategic decisions.
According to Whitehead, the solution lies largely in information integration.
"Good integration leads to good BI, as it gives you scalability, security, simplicity and a single version of the truth," he explained.
"Only once this is achieved properly, does BI start to become a company asset."
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