There are many kinds of intelligences out there: Emotional Intelligence, Business Intelligence, Creative Intelligence, you name it. And don’t forget my former employer, the Secret Intelligence Service. IQ, EQ, BI & KPI – Intelligence is being measured and analyzed. And when it comes to business the analysis and indicators are worth it: Any strategic planning process and intelligent business decision relies on facts and numbers.
Know your KPI!
Say that again? You don’t even know what KPI means? Never heard of Business Intelligence? I’m guessing you must be one of the creative people out there, preferring form and design to numbers. Not to worry: You are not alone. A very big number of iPros, as we are sometimes called, is professionally creative. But even a creative one-woman-business is a business and as such relies on numbers and data analysis. But again, no worries: We have made it very easy for you. Just take your seat behind the zistemo Dashboard and you’ll see: Playing with numbers is fun!
Business Intelligence 101
What is Business Intelligence also known as BI? The term has been coined by Hans Peter Luhn, a German IT pioneer, nearly 70 years ago when he published an article in the IBM journal called „A Business Intelligence System“. The concept of Business Intelligence goes together with the invention of computers. All the data a computer processes and generates enable a new kind of understanding of business performance – that’s the keynote of BI. Integrated data analysis and data visualization create a new strategic planning process based on an intelligent system.
Key Performance Indicators (KPI)
The key to measure business performance are the KPI or Key Performance Indicators: Numbers that give critical information about the development of projects and processes. Thanks to clever interconnections these numbers allow you to actually see how your business performs. Take for example the revenue: A basic KPI for most businesses. A simple enough number, specifying the income of a business. But as we all know, revenues are not that simple. Thanks to Business Intelligence we can match revenue to clients. Or billed hours. Or team members. Per day, per week or per month. The possibilities are endless. Feel free to fool around with them in your zistemo Dashboard. Have fun – and enjoy the simplicity of our data visualization.
Visual Data Analysis
As the saying goes, a picture is more than a thousand words. This is true for numbers, too: One picture tells you more than a thousand numbers. That’s why we have created many different possibilities to visualize your data. Flexible diagrams in many forms and colors: You choose the chart that fits your needs. And if you’re not sure which one that is, ask yourself the following questions: What do I want to show? Do I want to compare data, show a distribution or understand relationships and processes? A quick look at the very handy Chart Chooser might help you with your decision (in form of a flow chart, by the way, the best way to vizualize a decision process).
Reports from the Data Warehouse
In fact, zistemo is your personal Data Warehouse – strictly confidential and using only your own data, of course. And a very secure warehouse, it is: My former boss and his secret intelligence would be proud of it. The zistemo Dashboard shows all relevant data on one screen, in any date range: Even the creative business-illiterates can get a whole lot of information out of that. You can see how well a project performs and compare it to similar projects or match it to clients. Does the same process tend to take longer with client A than with client B? Maybe it’s time to have a closer look. Maybe even invite client A to a nice lunch, talk things over and solve problems from their source. Are projects more profitable when team member X is in charge? Maybe it’s time for a promotion.
Smart strategic planning process
Whatever it is: streamline your strategic planning process with Business Intelligence. It has never been as easy – and intelligent. Whatever that really means. As much as intelligence is being measured, there is no real definition of the word yet. To my eyes, intelligence means to be able to integrate data and facts quickly and creatively. That’s why my virtual zistemo is a very intelligent woman, trustworthy of your business. But keep in mind: zistemo is only as creative as you are. We have created a flexible tool for Business Intelligence and data analysis – now it is up to you to make to most out of it, to match and create new connections and interpretations.
This is actually good news for all of you users from the creative community out there: You creatives are used to think outside the box, where no-one has dared to think before them. That’s your job.
With this in mind: Keep up the good work – and embrace your intelligence!
Sincerely, zistemo
