The company needed to take the efficiency of working with corporate data to a new level: it was necessary to speed up the formation of reports, make the analytics of the processes more transparent and lay the foundation for new showcases.
At the same time, the previously formed storage needed to be adapted to new tasks: it was important for the business to receive reports faster, and the IT infrastructure to be more aligned with strategic goals.
To ensure the result, the customer needed a partner who equally well understands both business requirements and technical implementation. The ICL Services team took on this role, turning business requests into structured documents and practical recommendations.Key Challenges
- Collect and record business requirements. It was important to take into account the requests of different departments and describe them in a single format understandable to both business and IT.
- Form business functional requirements for data marts. Including the structure of objects, key attributes and scenarios for their use in daily work.
- Prepare methodological materials. Separately - for end users, to simplify work with marts, and for administrators/developers, to describe improvements and checks.
- Develop recommendations for the development of DWH. So that the warehouse supports not only current reporting tasks, but also the strategic goals of the company.
- Conduct a review of BI solutions for business. We prepared a comparative analysis of current platforms, identifying their strengths and weaknesses so that the customer could make decisions based on an objective picture of the market.
The team was tasked with helping the customer transform disparate business requests into a clear and structured basis for further development of data marts and the development of an analytical system.
Project progress
To prepare high-quality business requirements, the ICL Services team began with a detailed dive into the current reporting system.
We studied which showcases are already in use, how reports are generated, what difficulties users encounter, and where the business sees areas for improvement. This analysis allowed us to record the real state of processes and highlight areas requiring development.
Next, we organized a series of working sessions with representatives of different departments of the customer. This format made it possible to hear from all sides: business experts, IT specialists, analysts. Based on these meetings, we collected a full list of requirements and formalized them into a set of documents understandable to both the business and technical teams.
In parallel, experts developed methodological materials:
• for users — so that new showcases could be quickly implemented into daily work;
• for administrators and developers — with a description of the necessary modifications and checks.
A separate block of work was devoted to strategy: we prepared recommendations for the development of DWH so that the system not only covered current requests, but was also ready for future business tasks.
The final step was an analytical review of the BI market: we analyzed modern solutions, identified their strengths and weaknesses, as well as possible implementation risks.
Project Prospects and Results
The project has combined several areas at once: from deep analysis of the current state to the development of practical solutions and strategic vision.
The joint work of ICL Services and the customer's team has demonstrated the high efficiency of the partnership approach: the project not only completed current tasks, but also set benchmarks for the long-term development of analytics.
Results
- Formed a single set of requirements for analytical showcases so it became the foundation for further development and minimized the risk of errors at the next stages.
- Developed methodological materials for users and administrators, which ensured rapid development of new tools and reduced the load on support teams.
- Prepared recommendations for the development of a data warehouse, which helped the customer build a foundation for future scaling and integration of additional business areas.
- Conducted an analytical review of the BI market: the customer received an objective picture of modern solutions and arguments for a strategic choice of platform.