In today's competitive landscape, organisations need to get closer to their customers, explained Bruce Bond-Myatt, national consulting manager of SAS Institute.
He was speaking on behalf of event sponsor and partner Sasuka at the Gauteng Shared Services Centre (GSSC) conference held in Sandton last week.
The key to this is in the information they collect on a daily basis, which is repackaged and delivered within a business intelligence (BI) environment in a sustainable manner, he said.
In his workshop, entitled "Key steps for implementing a BI Competency Centre (BICC)", Bond-Myatt provided an overview of BI and its use, a clear vision of what a BICC is and how organisations can capitalise on its effectiveness. He also provided evidence of the organisational value of a BICC, the function and responsibilities of a BICC and, finally, the steps to implementing a BICC.
Said Bond-Myatt: "According to a recent survey by Gartner, the key business priorities for CIOs include: strengthening the 'information value chain'; building IT business skills; and getting closer to business. On the flip side, the most important technology priority for them is BI, showing how important taking control of your organisation's data really is."
Bond-Myatt sums up BI as getting the right information to the right people at the right time, to support better decision-making and gain competitive advantages. To ensure BI success, business and IT must marry their competencies and strive towards a common goal. This is where the BICC comes into practice, he said.
Sam Tsitsi Motsumi, MD of Sasuka, event sponsor and public sector partner of SAS Institute, said: "We have a number of BI customers in government that are using the SAS software to great effect. However, should they embrace the notion, and adopt a BICC approach to their BI deployment, they would triple the results of a system already yielding great benefits for their organisations."
A BICC is a formal organisational structure that is set up as a permanent committee or group, staffed internally from people within business and IT roles in an organisation. They are assigned defined tasks, roles, responsibilities and processes. The end result is that a BICC should support and promote the effective use of BI to drive the business strategy.
"When effectively deployed, a BICC can leverage the investment in your existing BI implementations, making that investment sustainable. It's about ensuring the organisation will continue to benefit from the time, money and resources it has invested in to continuously deliver value with its BI initiatives," he concludes.
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