In SAP BusinessObjects Portfolio 101 - Part 1 of my "SAP BusinessObjects Portfolio 101" blog, I included a few short videos from Isabelle Nuage, SAP BusinessObjects Portfolio Marketing Manager, that discussed the challenges facing most organizations:
- Strategy gap
- Imbalance between risk and opportunity
- Lack of visibility throught the business cycle
And the benefits that the SAP BusinessObjects Portfolio of solutions provide:
- Strategic alignment
- Predictable performance
- Confident decisions
Best Practices with the SAP BusinessObjects Portfolio (duration 1:02)
In these next set of short videos, you'll get a clear understanding of how to achieve these benefits with 3 key actions or best practices.
Best Practice 1: Ensure Trusted Information (duration 1:10)
Best Practice 2: Proactively Manage Risk (duration 1:05)
Best Practice 3: Create Enterprise Visibility (duration 1:22)
Here's my take on these 3 best-practices:
All 3 steps are important, and required, to fully realize the benefits listed above. As a business manager, I've seen peers and executives praised for using their intuition in making tough business decisions. There is something to be said about intuition and how its related to actual experience, but in the 'Information Age' we live in, making decisions based on 'gut-feel' doesn't cut it any more. Some will argue that we will never have all the information we need to make the best decision so a bit of 'gut' is acceptable. My perspective is that we have more than enough information. We may have too much information, and knowingly or unknowingly filter out data we're not use to seeing (like unstructured data from customer emails, discussion forums, etc). I will save this for another blog post.
The scary part of decision making is using information you don't trust. How can you trust your decision if you don't trust the information on which your decision is based? I think you'll agree that being able to trust the information you have is a good thing!
I think the best practice of "Proactively Manage Risk" is fairly self-explanatory, and is a logical step following "Ensure Trusted Information." Data corruption is one risk, and there are many more business-related risks that need to be mitigated along with the careful development of controls and contigency plans.
The best practice to "Create Enterprise Visibility" affects me the most. As a worker in my organization (do I call myself a "business user," or a "enterprise information worker?") I need access to information to make proper business decisions. For example, if I consider SCN as the Enterprise, I need to know whether our discussion forums are actively being used, the average response time to questions, and impact to member satisfaction if we had one more moderator per forum. Getting clarity on these data ensures I understand the impact of my actions on the way value is being delivered to the community.
Watch these videos, then let me know whether you relate to these SAP BusinessObjects Portfolio Best Practices, and what challenges you've seen when organizations don't give enough attention to any one of these 3 areas.
Follow the BusinessObjects blog posts, where SAP BusinessObjects Solutions Managers and other experts in the community will discuss how specific solutions within the SAP BusinessObjects Portfolio support these best practices.
Best regards,
Jason
