I just got an email from a colleague
from Singapore where a close colleagues had gone to perform a 'BI HealthCheck'
for a Fortune 100 company's new BI initiative in one of their divisions.
The customer used Cognos so gave
their contract to an offshore company with the following assumptions:
1. As the requirement was to
replicate Cognos reports there was no need for an onsite resource
2. The requirement was to copy the
Cognos reports exactly
3. This despite moving a lot of the
source system from legacy apps to SAP.
This is like my rich grandfather (Iwish I had one) going to
a Toyota store and demanding a Ford T Series as of today. When the dealer says it
will cost more, my grandfather says thats no problem, when he is told that Toyota can
place a Prius engine in a Ford T Series exterior chassis -Grandpa again says
no again. This is certainly not a recommended path and this is exactly what happened
in the above case. He not only wants it for homself but for all the employees in this company - compulsory.. Our above case is no diffwrent - we are using a 2012 technology to try and copy a 1998 design
in totality..
So what is wrong in this scenario,
to some it should sound as very familiar...
Rule
1: If you are coming from legacy to
SAP ECC do not try to replicate the reports as CC can deliver so much more
Rule
2: When you move from ECC to BW do not
try to duplicate the ECC reports 1:1 in BW
Rule
3: If you are coming from Legacy to
BOBJ 4.0 do not try to replicate the legacy reports as is to BOBJ 4.0
The key here is the difference
between the technocratic view of report delivery vs. the BVA concept that we
should not be delivering reports in the first place. A DW, BI or HANA is not
there to deliver reports it is there to ehance the decision capabilities of the
users and thereby the organization.
Thus the company above should have analyzed what decisions
each of the reports assisted with and then chosen the best BOBJ OLAP tool to
deliver that decision assistance.
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