As organisations continue to invest in data warehousing and business intelligence management it is increasingly clear that it takes more than just technology to get maximum value out of their investment. A strategic approach is required, to encompass:

• The processes to underpin a sustainable DW/BI solution
• The team structure and skillsets to support them
• Your information needs and how to most effectively manage them as they evolve

The challenges facing an established data warehouse can range from an inadequate BI strategy to moretechnical issues based on:

• Increasing user numbers
• Changing business needs
• Insufficient return on investment

We can help, starting with independent input to help reinvigorate your organisation's vision of information as a strategic asset — providing a clear sense of direction, helping you redefine your data warehouse as a trusted source of empowering information for decision makers.

Analytics8 has many years of experience in providing strategic assessments of the potential — and challenges — of data warehouse investment and strategy. We review and provide recommendations across any or all of the following areas:

• Current state, desired state, and transition state architectures across information management technology and infrastructure, processes, methodology and governance as well as organisational structures and skill sets
• Support processes and structures and how well these meet user needs
• Recommendations and steps to establish and effectively operate a business intelligence competency centre
• Business information requirements analysis, and how effectively these requirements are met
• Technology reviews, recommendations and tool selection as required
• The use of report inventories, data dictionaries, metadata and metadata management
• Management of hierarchical and reference data (master data management)
• Logical and physical data model design, effectiveness and best practice across all the layers of the data warehouse
• The ETL framework and standards
• Consistency of application of standards and conventions
• The BI application portal, user interface design and effectiveness
• Management of development, test and production environments, migration and version control

These criteria are evaluated against known industry best practice and our own real-world experience to provide balanced, realistic, business-driven recommendations you can implement over a realistic timeframe.