Birsting with BI Success
Updated October 01, 2015
Birsting with BI Success
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Software Version
5.18 Cloud SAS
Overall Satisfaction with Birst
Birst was selected as our single business intelligence solution solving our "single source of truth" challenge moving away from spreadmarts and individual definitions of the truth. We started our Birst development as support for individual functional departments [Sales Analytics, Team [HR], Finance and Service/Warranty]. The current year objective is to pull together the integrated organizational view across functional areas.
- Single solution, integrated end to end [ETL, database, Administration, Design, Dashboards presentation].
- Very stable application - uptime is great, software upgrades seamless.
- Administration Tools: users, groups, security, customization very intuitive.
- Quick start.
- Pace of introduction of new features.
- Community sharing portal is an excellent resource of Knowledge Base documentation, and discussions of challenges/resolutions by other customers.
- Community is also used to submit ideas and enhancement requests, so that voting raises top recommendations, Birst listens and responds.
- Birst defines their success as achieved by our success.
- Ability to find things in Think Tank Community, need a better way to keep similar topics grouped, inconsistent tags.
- Community: assumption that this is the first place for answers to issues; which causes time extension for resolution of business challenge.
- Training: need some freebee's like single topic Lunch & Learn webinars
Five years ago when we were researching our BI options, we considered Pentaho and Jaspersoft.
No comparison, as they were more programmatic centered and also involved independent modules, so would require multiple components for a total solution.
In the first hour of testing Birst, we knew it was the one, very intuitive!
No comparison, as they were more programmatic centered and also involved independent modules, so would require multiple components for a total solution.
In the first hour of testing Birst, we knew it was the one, very intuitive!
Infor Birst Feature Ratings
Using Birst
32 - Individual functional departments [Sales Analytics, Team [HR], Finance and
Service/Warranty]. Individuals who use Birst are Administrative Reporters and Business Analysts. Future use will include the deployment of a cross business executive dashboard which will be geared to High Level Exec Team viewpoints.
Service/Warranty]. Individuals who use Birst are Administrative Reporters and Business Analysts. Future use will include the deployment of a cross business executive dashboard which will be geared to High Level Exec Team viewpoints.
2 - 2 People - One 90% Administration and Designer, one 5% occasional Designer and backup Administrator
Support of the Birst infrastructure is random, once established it is pretty stable.
Support of the Design deliverables is dependent upon your company objectives for BI.
Support of any technical cases requires ability to clarify issue, offer hypothesis based on what has been tried, specifics about where failure occurred.
I believe it is more important to have the knowledge of business objectives and root data. Aptitude for self discovery, and continuous presentation of the "Five Why's" until the root cause is reached. The BQL used to define custom advanced expressions is very logical, so if you can understand the structure of the expression, you will do okay.
Support of the Birst infrastructure is random, once established it is pretty stable.
Support of the Design deliverables is dependent upon your company objectives for BI.
Support of any technical cases requires ability to clarify issue, offer hypothesis based on what has been tried, specifics about where failure occurred.
I believe it is more important to have the knowledge of business objectives and root data. Aptitude for self discovery, and continuous presentation of the "Five Why's" until the root cause is reached. The BQL used to define custom advanced expressions is very logical, so if you can understand the structure of the expression, you will do okay.
- Interactive standardized view for a Sales Managers dashboard: specific for their Region, focusing in on right data, right format, right timing so that they can take action and effect the future results rather than just dealing with static reports of what has happened
- Cross functional analysis
- Mobile, dependent upon organizational objectives
- Comparison of Actuals to Plan, is the variance increasing or decreasing
- Historical Trends: what does history tell us about a specific element or in comparison to other elements
- Projections: what's on the books scheduled for when
- Efficiencies of reporting, Automatiion of report distribution: having the ability to create it once but view it via many parameters, auto distributing of reports to those not directly on Birst
- Not unexpected nor innovative, but valuable to us - ability to support a fact driven sales planning cycle [sales rep specifics, Region overview, Total Sales Plans]
Evaluating Birst and Competitors
Yes - Excel spreadmart extracts from our operational system, caused multiple different views of values that should be consistently the same. By having Birst as our single source of truth and common definition of filters for inclusion/exclusion, all are reporting same number for chosen points.
- Price
- Product Features
- Product Usability
- Vendor Reputation
- Analyst Reports
- Third-party Reviews
We found Birst because of a white paper. Now that we had their name we were able to find references by Analysts and Third-party reviews of their rise in features and recognition as a viable solution provider.
Product Usability was probably our most important factor of our decision: how easy was it to use and could the work be handled by a single Administrator/Designer or were multiple staff positions required?
Product Usability was probably our most important factor of our decision: how easy was it to use and could the work be handled by a single Administrator/Designer or were multiple staff positions required?
We matrixed key features and functionality and as stated earlier within an hour we were confident that we had found the right solution provider for our company.
Birst Implementation
- Vendor implemented
- Implemented in-house
Yes - We started with a pilot project where Birst Professional Services was in partnership with us to teach while they instructed us on the steps to perform. Then they coached us as we implemented our first space.
We have also used a Birst Partner, Cervello to help us with our Team space implementation.
We have also used a Birst Partner, Cervello to help us with our Team space implementation.
Change management was minimal - Since we have taken our time with implementation, we try to find the value exchange of why to use Birst and new data visualization; so the user connects with the new methodology. So yes change is a paradigm that constantly is there, we handle it okay.
- Internal data cleanzing! This is a huge component that tends to get overlooked. Data visualization can uncover a lot of junk data.
Birst Support
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
Quick Resolution Knowledgeable team Problems get solved Kept well informed No escalation required Immediate help available Support understands my problem Support cares about my success | None |
Yes - To the non-technical user you're not sure if it is a bug, a gap in functionality, or plain user error. Birst will retest to replicate issue, then have an internal escalation between Tech Support and Engineering. Once the Engineering ticket is closed by code in new version, Tech support follows up with Customer.
Yes, resolution occurs timely, as we can count on maintenance releases between major releases.
Yes, resolution occurs timely, as we can count on maintenance releases between major releases.
Too many to select just one. Birst Tech support partners with customer to understand the challenge and then to teach with explanation of resolution. If the topic has not yet been covered in The Think Tank Community, they will also create a Knowledge Base document so that others may benefit from the efforts.
Using Birst
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
Like to use Relatively simple Easy to use Technical support not required Well integrated Consistent Quick to learn Convenient Feel confident using Familiar | None |
- Dashboard designs, especially with Dashboards 2.0, exceptionally easy
- Data refresh, whether manual upload or automatic with BirstConnect, easy to understand
- Love the toggle between chart and data, allows us to present data as data visualization form, but allows end user comfort of quick access to rows/columns view too
- When building custom expressions - error alerts don't guide you understanding or discovering corrective actions [e.g. missing punctuation settings]
Yes, but I don't use it