How Valuable Is Company's Data?

Organizations consider data one of their most valuable assets, but exactly, how much is that data
worth? Most business leaders can't answer the question yet. But venture capitalists, financial
analysts and board members increasingly want to know.

Direct value-When business leaders and managers ponder the value of data, their first thought
is direct monetization which means selling data they have.
Automation value-More rote and repeatable tasks are being automated using chatbots, robotic
process automation (RPA) and AI. The question is, what is the value of the work employees do in
the absence of automation and what would the value of their work be if parts of their jobs were
automated and they had more time to do higher-value tasks?
Recombinant value-creating an opportunity or an entirely new business model by combining a
company's data with external data.
Algorithmic value-Netflix and Amazon use recommendation engines to drive value. For
example, Netflix increases its revenue and stickiness by matching content with a customer's
tastes and viewing habits. Similarly, Amazon recommends products, including those that others
have also viewed or purchased. In doing so, Amazon successfully increases average order
values through cross-selling and upselling.
Risk-of-Loss value-If a company using an external data source were to lose access to that data
source, what economic impact would it have? Further, given the very real possibility of
cyberattacks and cyberterrorism, what would the value of lost or corrupted data be? Points to
consider would be the financial impact which may include actual loss, opportunity cost, regulatory
fines and litigation settlement values. If the company has cybersecurity insurance, there's a
coverage limit on the policy which may differ from the actual claim settlement value and the
overall cost to the company.

What is Business Intelligence?

The term Business Intelligence (BI) provides the user with the data and tool to answer the questions
which are important to run the business or part of business.In short,the business intelligence is used
for reporting the specified data of any business which is very important and using which  the higher
management of the business will take the decisions for growth of business.Business Intelligence (BI)
is used to take following organization level decisions:

1.BI is used to determine whether the business is running as per plan

2.BI is used to identify which things are going wrong

3.BI is used to take and monitor corrective actions

4.BI is used to identify the trends.

What are different stages of Business Intelligence?

There are following five stages of Business Intelligence:

1.Data Source

2.Data Analysis

3.Decision making support

4.Situation Awareness
5.Risk Management

What are different benefits of Business Intelligence?

Following are different benefits of Business Intelligence:

1.Improving Decision Making

2.Accelerate Decision Making

3.Optimizing internal business process

4.Increase Operational Efficiency

5.Driving new revenues

6.Gaining competitive advantages over competitors

What are different Business Intelligence tools available in market?

There are following Business Intelligence Tools Available in Market:

1.OBIEE

2.Cognos

3.Microstratagy

4.SAS

5.Business Objects

6.Tableau

7.Microsoft BI

8.Hyperion

What Are The Various Business Objects Products?

o User Module
o Designer
o Supervisor
o Auditor
o Set Analyzer
o Info View (Web Intelligence)
o Business Objects Software Development Kit (SDK)
o Broadcast Agent etc.
What Are The Different Multidimensional Analysis Methods Available In
Business Objects?
There are 2 Multidimensional analysis methods available in BO, they are:
1. Slice and Dice
2. Drill Down

Evolution of BI

1980s Executive information systems (EIS), decision support systems (DSS)

1990s Data warehousing (DW), business intelligence (BI)

2000s Dashboards and scorecards, performance management

2010+ Analytics, big data, data science, augmented BI, …

What is Business Analytics?

Business Analytics has emerged as a catch-all term for a variety of different

business intelligence (BI) and application-related initiatives. … Whatever the use
cases, “analytics” has moved deeper into the business vernacular.

Analytics refers to a more systematical, automated, and flexible process of data

analysis for revealing insights and decision support in more extensive application
areas (beyond organizational contexts), e.g. sports, disease, network traffic, etc.

Analytics or BI?

• We tend to call analytics rather than BI in the following scenarios. But their processes
and technologies are very similar.

• Non-business activities such as

– Learning analytics

– Talent analytics

– Web analytics

– Sports analytics

• Non-organizational contexts; mainly used by individuals or groups for public

communication.
BI Systems and Platforms
• A BI system is a computer information system that implements (part or whole) BI capabilities and
processes

• The values of BI Systems

– Provide an integrated data (analytical) processing platform

– Enable easy and fast access of data and information at all levels (raw data, analysis results, metrics,
etc.)

– Streamline a controlled and managed process of data driven decision making

• Enterprise level vs. personal level

– An enterprise level BI system emphasizes more on control and performance.

– While a more user-oriented analytics platform enables nontechnical users to autonomously

execute full-spectrum analytic workflows from data access and preparation to interactive analysis
and the collaborative sharing of insights.

Basic Techniques in Business Analytics

• Regression
– Reasoning, estimating the relationships among variables
• Forecasting
– Trend analysis, based on extrapolation of historical data
• Correlation
– Relationship discovery between factors (but not causal relationship)
• Factor analysis – Determine impacting variables and their variability

Advanced Analytics
• Advanced Analytics is the autonomous or semi-autonomous examination of data or
content using sophisticated techniques and tools, typically beyond those of traditional
business intelligence (BI), to discover deeper insights, make predictions, or generate
recommendations.
• Advanced analytic techniques include those such as
– Data/text mining: using sophisticated statistical and mathematical techniques to find
patterns and relationships among data
– Predictives
– Machine learning
– Complex statistical methods
– Pattern matching, forecasting, visualization, semantic analysis, sentiment analysis,
network and cluster analysis, multivariate statistics, graph analysis, simulation, complex
event processing, genetic algorithm, neural networks

Data Visualization
• Data visualization is the graphical representation and presentation of data for the purpose
of perception and understanding
• Visualizing is basically a human physiological and psychological capability, and plays an
important role in human information behavior and decision making
– Recall or memorize data more effectively
– Enable fast perception based on instinct (see the figure on the right)
– Helps data comprehension and enhance problem solving capabilities (cognition)
– Extract/provoke additional (implicit) perspectives and meanings
– Ease the cognitive load of information processing and exploration
– Help to shape the attention and focus
– Effective communication (story telling)
• Data visualization in BI
– Data visualization is an important part of data exploration and decision making. Given the
power of visualization, it is only natural to apply the rich communication techniques in the
field of BI and analytics.
– As organizations seek to empower non‐technical users to make data‐driven decisions, they
must consider the powers of data visualization in delivering digestible insights.
– Visualization tools have become increasingly important to business intelligence, in which
people need technology support to make sense of and analyze complex data sets and all
types of information.
– Visualization can also be part of the analysis process (visual analytics)
BI Components-
Business intelligence is made up of an increasing number of components including:
• Multidimensional aggregation and allocation
• Denormalization, tagging and standardization
• Realtime reporting with analytical alert
• A method of interfacing with unstructured data sources
• Group consolidation, budgeting and rolling forecasts
• Statistical inference and probabilistic simulation
• Key performance indicators optimization
• Version control and process management
• Open item management

Applications of BI in an Enterprise
Business intelligence can be applied to the following business purposes, in order to drive
business
value.
1. Measurement – program that creates a hierarchy of performance metrics and
benchmark-
ing that informs business leaders about progress towards business goals (business process
management).
2. Analytics – program that builds quantitative processes for a business to arrive at optimal
decisions and to perform business knowledge discovery. Frequently involves: data min-
ing, process mining, statistical analysis, predictive analytics, predictive modeling, business
process modeling, data lineage, complex event processing and prescriptive analytics.
3. Reporting/enterprise reporting – program that builds infrastructure for strategic reporting
to serve the strategic management of a business, not operational reporting. Frequently
involves data visualization, executive information system and OLAP.
4. Collaboration/collaboration platform – program that gets different areas (both inside and
outside the business) to work together through data sharing and electronic data inter-
change.
5. Knowledge management – program to make the company data-driven through strategies
and practices to identify, create, represent, distribute, and enable adoption of insights and
experiences that are true business knowledge. Knowledge management leads to learning
management and regulatory compliance.

What can be visualized?

– Visible reality: person, animal, building, mountain
– Hidden reality: earth core, blood vessel, universe
– Invisible reality: wind, air, heat, electron, sound, smell, magnetic fields
– Abstract entity: data, information, idea, hierarchy, process, relationship

Data Visualization Purposes

• The general purpose of data visualization is to provide a better way of presentation and
interaction; more specifically, we use data visualization for these purposes (different types
of data visualization will serve different purposes):
– Understanding and cognition - comprehension of abstract ideas and processes
– * Information seeking - browsing, navigation, exploration,discovery
– * Data analysis and insight generation
– * Decision support
– * Event or operation monitoring
– Communication, presentation, story telling, impression/persuasion
– Artistic (beauty) expression and appreciation
– Entertaining and for fun

Visualization Needs and Usages

• Visualization is needed in many cases. Depending on the use case, we may need different
tools with different features.
• Major use cases
– Presentation: static presentations in meetings – PowerPoint
– Reporting
• Regular/seasonal reports for casual business users - reports
• Real-time or near real-time reporting - dashboard
• Interactive reporting and exploration by power users – interactive reports or
dashboard.
• Executive reporting and decision making - dashboard
– Analytical
• Used in the process of analysis, accompanying queries and calculations - Excel
• Advanced visual driven analysis, often used for research – Power BI/Tableau
– Monitoring: real-time operational monitoring (driving, manufacturing) - dashboard
– Public communication/journalism
• Tell a story to the public
– Demonstration/simulation: interactive demonstration for complex scenarios

Information Design and Visualization

• Information design is the practice of presenting information in a way that fosters an
efficient and effective understanding of the information.
– These include elements like layout, flow, use of text style, bullets, spacing, etc.
• Information visualization is the study of visual representations of information or data to
reinforce human cognition. The data include both numerical and non-numerical data, such
as text and geographic information.
– A very close field, and very often used as the synonym for, or even include, data
visualization
– Often in the form of illustrations and infographics
• Infographics is a specific type of information visualization that are usually a mixture of
texts, graphics, and data visual forms (charts, diagrams, tables, maps, etc.) to quickly and
vividly communicate complex information (multiple variables or dimensions).
– Often used in mass communication (e.g. journalism) and marketing

Infographics vs. Data Visualization

• Major differences vs. data visualization
– One time creation and use; mostly created using graphic design tools rather than using
data processing tools
– Information often is more general and can be more qualitative.
– Utilizes more free forms (non standard) of visual diagrams or illustrations (illustrational
diagrams); emphasizes creativity and artistically expression to communicate or impress
casual viewers
– Often hand-crafted instead of automatically populated from a data source.
– Not for interactive exploration or decision making; intended for more casual use
(informational) for general people.

Business Data/Information Visualization

• Business is a general term to describe activities, events, and operations that make an
system running (more like the term field or domain)
– Business includes many activities directly associated with human, like commerce,
government, education, sports, charity, entertainment, etc.
– Or events that impact human, such as weather, earthquake, etc.
– Business data or information records various aspects of these activities.
• Main features of business data
– Abstract: data is not directly defining or visualizing (simulating) a real world phenomenon
as close as possible, but just representing abstractly an activity, patterns, trends, clusters,
outliers, and gaps
– Often quantitative
– Often structured or semi-structured, repeated
– Multidimensional
– Directly comprehendible by average human (in a particular “business”)
• Business data visualization features
– Main purposes are information seeking, analysis, decision support, monitoring, and
communication.
– Using simple, standard, and abstract images (symbol/chart/diagram/map)
– Highly reused and commonly accepted visualization forms –
– Utilizes data binding techniques to generate visualizations in an automated way (as part of
an analytics software application)
• Where is data visualization used in businesses?
– Part of a BI or analytics process especially in self-service
– Communication of results all kinds of reports (periodical/seasonal or real time) and
presentations (e.g. PowerPoint)
– Presentation of results in statistical analysis, data mining or other advanced analytics.
– Visual analytics
– Operational or administrative monitoring

Data Visualization in BI/Analytics

• Data visualization is an important part of data exploration and decision making. Given the
power of visualization, it is only natural to apply the rich communication techniques in the
field of BI and analytics.
• Visualization has been considered as a separate field from BI in the early days (prior to
2010), but it quickly brought the traditional business intelligence to life
– As organizations seek to empower non‐technical users to make data‐driven decisions, they
must consider the prowess of data visualization in delivering digestible insights.
– Visualization tools have become increasingly important to business intelligence, in which
people need technology support to make sense of and analyze complex data sets and all
types of information.

Dashboard
A dashboard is a visual-oriented display of the most important data and information needed
to achieve defined goals and objectives; consolidated and arranged on a single screen so the
information can be viewed at a glance.

• Elements of a dashboard
– Data/information: the most important element
– Visual: data visuals (charts, etc.) provide an high level at-a-glance view
– User interface
a clean UI that unifies all elements to work together as a whole

supporting interactions as needed

• The Values of Dashboard

– Dashboards are a data visualization tool that allow all users to understand the analytics.
For non- technical users, dashboards allow them to participate and understand the analytics
process by compiling data and visualizing trends and occurrences.
– Provides a one-place presentation of critical information
– Allow decision makers to see a variety of data that affects their divisions or departments
This allows decision makers to focus only on the items over which they have control

The dashboard is generally customized for each user

– Quickly understand data and respond quickly at one place

Save time over running multiple reports

Dashboard vs. Report

• Reports

– A report is the presentation of detailed data arranged in defined layouts and formats

– Based on simple and direct queries: usually involves simple analysis and transformation of data
(sorting, calculating, filtering, filtering, grouping, formatting, etc.)

• Traditional reports contain detailed data in a tabular format and typically display numbers and text
only.

– It is geared towards people who need data rather than a direct understanding or interpretation of
data.

– Its purpose is mainly for printing (with styling) or exporting (raw data).

• Modern reports can be interactive and visual but the focus is still on detailed data. Sometimes the
distinction is a bit blurred with dashboards in some practical cases.

– A report style “dashboard” (or more like a visual intensive interactive report):

– Magic Quadrant report vs.

– Dashboard or report?

Data Visualization Tools

• Visualization products have been evolving fast, and there is increasing overlap. But they generally
fall into three major categories.

• Standalone tools

– They are specifically designed to produce stunning visualizations, and can work with multiple
platforms and data sources.

– Some of them are growing to more full stack analytics tools.

– Examples include Tableau, Power BI, Qlik, SpotFire, and others. They can be desktop based or
cloud based

• Embedded tools

– Broader analytics, business intelligence, and reporting platforms that often incorporate
visualization capabilities. These products can address more complex data platform needs and often
provide wide-ranging capabilities but may require more training in order to exploit their full
potential. In some cases, IT may need to be looped in to assist in integrating these tools with
underlying data and related applications.

– Examples like SSRS, IBM, Oracle, MicroStrategy, SAP Crystal, and others.

• Visualization libraries or services

– These tools are offered as programming libraries or services for general applications (web,

mobile, etc.).

– These tools can be useful when the visualization requires complete customization,

substantial interactivity, or for developing a framework that allows you to reuse code.

– Examples include D3.js, Google Charts, dotNetCharting, Telerik, Nevron, amCharts, etc.

Steps for implementation of Business Intelligence systems

Step 1) Raw Data from corporate databases is extracted. The data could be spread across
multiple systems heterogeneous systems.
Step 2) The data is cleaned and transformed into the data warehouse. The table can be
linked, and data cubes are formed.
Step 3) Using BI system the user can ask quires, request ad-hoc reports or conduct any other
analysis.

Four types of BI users

Following given are the four key players who are used Business Intelligence System:
1. The Professional Data Analyst:
The data analyst is a statistician who always needs to drill deep down into data. BI system
helps them to get fresh insights to develop unique business strategies.
2. The IT users: The IT user also plays a dominant role in maintaining the BI infrastructure.
3. The head of the company: CEO or CXO can increase the profit of their business by
improving operational efficiency in their business.
4. The Business Users":
  Business intelligence users can be found from across the organization. There are
mainly two types of business users
 Casual business intelligence user
 The power user.
 The difference between both of them is that a power user has the capability of
working with complex data sets, while the casual user need will make him use
dashboards to evaluate predefined sets of data.

The Major Components of Business Intelligence (BI)

The five primary components of BI include:
OLAP (Online Analytical Processing)

 This component of BI allows executives to sort and select aggregates of data for
strategic monitoring. With the help of specific software products, a certification in
business intelligence helps business owners can use data to make adjustments to
overall business processes.
Advanced Analytics or Corporate Performance Management (CPM)

 This set of tools allows business leaders to look at the statistics of certain products or
services. For instance, a fast food chain may analyze the sale of certain items and
make local, regional and national modifications on menu board offerings as a result.
The data could also be used to predict in which markets a new product may have the
best success.
Real-time BI

 In a mobile society, this particular component of BI is becoming increasingly popular.

Using software applications, a business can respond to real-time trends in email,
messaging systems or even digital displays. Because it’s all in real-time, an
entrepreneur can announce special offers that take advantageof what’s going on in
the immediate. Marketing professionals can use data to craft creative limited-time
specials such as a coupon for hot soup on a cold day. CEO’s may be interested in
tracking the time of day and location of customers as they interact with a website so
marketing can offer special promotions in real-time while the client is engaged on
the website.
Data Warehousing

 Data warehousing lets business leaders sift through subsets of data and examine
interrelated components that can help drive business. Looking at sales data over
several years can help improve product development or tailor seasonal offerings.
Data warehousing can also be used to look at the statistics of business processes
including how they relate to one another. For instance, business owners can
compare shipping times in different facilities to look at which processes and teams
 work most efficiently. Data warehousing also involves storing huge amounts of data
in ways that are beneficial to different divisions within the company.

Data Sources

 This component of BI involves various forms of stored data. It’s about taking the raw
data and using software applications to create meaningful data sources that each
division can use to positively impact business. BI analysts using this strategy may
create data tools that allow data to be put into a large cache of spreadsheets, pie
charts, tables or graphs that can be used for a variety of business purposes. For
example, data can be used to create presentations that help to structure attainable
team goals. Looking at the strategic aspect of data sources can also help
organizations make fact- driven decisions that take into account a more holistic view
of the needs of the company.

CHARACTERISTICS OF VALUABLE INFORMATION.

In order for information to be valuable it must have the following characteristics, as adapted
from Ralph M. Stair's book, Principles of Information Systems:

 Accurate. Accurate information is free from error.

 Complete. Complete information contains all of the important facts.
 Economical. Information should be relatively inexpensive to produce.
 Flexible. Flexible information can be used for a variety of purposes, not just one.
 Reliable. Reliable information is dependable information.
 Relevant. Relevant information is important to the decision-maker.
 Simple. Information should be simple to find and understand.
 Timely. Timely information is readily available when needed.
 Verifiable. Verifiable information can be checked to make sure it is accurate.

Advantages of Business Intelligence

Here are some of the advantages of using Business Intelligence System:
1. Boost productivity
With a BI program, It is possible for businesses to create reports with a single click thus
saves lots of time and resources. It also allows employees to be more productive on their
tasks.
2. To improve visibility
BI also helps to improve the visibility of these processes and make it possible to identify any
areas which need attention.
3. Fix Accountability
BI system assigns accountability in the organization as there must be someone who should
own accountability and ownership for the organization's performance against its set goals.
4. It gives a bird's eye view:
BI system also helps organizations as decision makers get an overall bird's eye view through
typical BI features like dashboards and scorecards.
5. It streamlines business processes:
BI takes out all complexity associated with business processes. It also automates analytics by
offering predictive analysis, computer modeling, benchmarking and other methodologies.
6. It allows for easy analytics.
BI software has democratized its usage, allowing even nontechnical or non- analysts users to
collect and process data quickly. This also allows putting the power of analytics from the
hand's many people.

BI System Disadvantages
1. Cost:
Business intelligence can prove costly for small as well as for medium-sized enterprises. The
use of such type of system may be expensive for routine business transactions.
2. Complexity:
Another drawback of BI is its complexity in implementation of datawarehouse. It can be so
complex that it can make business techniques rigid to deal with.
3. Limited use
Like all improved technologies, BI was first established keeping in consideration the buying
competence of rich firms. Therefore, BI system is yet not affordable for many small and
medium size companies.
4. Time Consuming Implementation
It takes almost one and half year for data warehousing system to be completely
implemented. Therefore, it is a time-consuming process.

Key Responsibilities of a Business Analyst

The responsibility set of a business analyst would require him to fulfill different
duties in different phases of a project and they are elucidated below −
Initiation Phase
This phase will mark the beginning of a new project and a business analyst will vary
out the following responsibilities −

 Assist in carrying out the cost-benefit analysis of the project.

 Understand the business case.
 Ascertain the feasibility of the solution/project/product.
 Help in creating the project charter.
 Identify the stakeholders in the project.
Planning Phase
This phase will involve gathering the requirements and planning, how the project will
be executed and managed. His responsibilities will include the below functions −

 Eliciting the requirements

 Analyze, organize and document requirements.
 Manage requirements by creating Use-cases, RTM, BRD, SRS, etc.
 Assess proposed solutions.
 Liaise and enhance communications with stakeholders.
 Assist in formulating the project management plans.
 Help in finding the project’s scope, constraints, assumptions and risks.
 Assist in designing the user experience of the solution.
Executing Phase
This phase marks the development of the solution as per the requirements
gathered. The responsibilities include −
 Explain requirements to the IT/development team.
 Clarify doubts, concerns regarding the proposed solution to be developed.
 Discuss and prioritize project scope changes and gain agreement.
 Create beta tests scripts for initial testing.
 Sharing the developing modules with stakeholders and solicit their feedback.
 Following deadlines and manage stakeholder’s expectations.
 Resolving conflicts and manage communications with the project team.
Monitoring and Controlling Phase
In this phase, the project is measured and controlled for any deviations from the
initial plans. This phase runs simultaneously to the execution phase.
 Developing test scripts and conducting comprehensive module and integration testing.
 Conducting UAT (use acceptance testing) and creating testing reports.
 Gain acceptance/approval of the deliverables from the client.
 Explain the change requests to the development team.
 Monitor the development of the change requests and verify their implementation as per
the project’s objective.
Closing Phase
This phase marks the closure of the project. The responsibilities are −
 Presenting the completed project to the client and gain their acceptance.
 Create user-training manuals, any functional material and other instructional guides.
 Conduct elaborate integration testing in production environment.
 Create final product documentations, document project lessons learned.

Who is a Business Analyst?

A business analyst is someone who analyzes an organization or business domain
(real or hypothetical) and documents its business, processes, or systems,
assessing the business model or its integration with technology. However,
organizational titles vary such as analyst, business analyst, business systems
analyst or maybe systems analyst.

What is an Expert System?

An Expert System is defined as an interactive and reliable computer-based decision-
making system which uses both facts and heuristics to solve complex decision-
making problems. It is considered at the highest level of human intelligence and
expertise. It is a computer application which solves the most complex issues in a
specific domain.

The expert system can resolve many issues which generally would require a human
expert. It is based on knowledge acquired from an expert. It is also capable of
expressing and reasoning about some domain of knowledge. Expert systems were
the predecessor of the current day artificial intelligence, deep learning and machine
learning systems.

Examples of Expert Systems

Following are examples of Expert Systems

 MYCIN: It was based on backward chaining and could identify various

bacteria that could cause acute infections. It could also recommend drugs
based on the patient's weight.
 DENDRAL: Expert system used for chemical analysis to predict molecular
structure.
 PXDES: Expert system used to predict the degree and type of lung cancer
 CaDet: Expert system that could identify cancer at early stages
Following are Important characteristic of Expert
System:
 The Highest Level of Expertise: The expert system offers the highest level
of expertise. It provides efficiency, accuracy and imaginative problem-solving.

 Right on Time Reaction: An Expert System interacts in a very reasonable

period of time with the user. The total time must be less than the time taken
by an expert to get the most accurate solution for the same problem.

 Good Reliability: The expert system needs to be reliable, and it must not

make any a mistake.

 Flexible: It is vital that it remains flexible as it the is possessed by an Expert

system.

 Effective Mechanism: Expert System must have an efficient mechanism to

administer the compilation of the existing knowledge in it.

 Capable of handling challenging decision & problems: An expert system

is capable of handling challenging decision problems and delivering solutions.

Components of the expert system:

User Interface

The user interface is the most crucial part of the expert system. This component
takes the user's query in a readable form and passes it to the inference engine. After
that, it displays the results to the user. In other words, it's an interface that helps the
user communicate with the expert system.

Inference Engine

The inference engine is the brain of the expert system. Inference engine contains
rules to solve a specific problem. It refers the knowledge from the Knowledge Base.
It selects facts and rules to apply when trying to answer the user's query. It provides
reasoning about the information in the knowledge base. It also helps in deducting the
problem to find the solution. This component is also helpful for formulating
conclusions.
Knowledge Base

The knowledge base is a repository of facts. It stores all the knowledge about the
problem domain. It is like a large container of knowledge which is obtained from
different experts of a specific field.

Thus we can say that the success of the Expert System mainly depends on the
highly accurate and precise knowledge.

Participant in Expert Systems Development

Participant Role

Domain Expert He is a person or group whose expertise and

knowledge is taken to develop an expert system.

Knowledge Engineer Knowledge engineer is a technical person who

integrates knowledge into computer systems.

End User It is a person or group of people who are using the

expert system to get to get advice which will not b
provided by the expert.

The process of Building An Expert Systems

 Determining the characteristics of the problem
 Knowledge engineer and domain expert work in coherence to define the
problem
 The knowledge engineer translates the knowledge into a computer-
understandable language. He designs an inference engine, a reasoning
structure, which can use knowledge when needed.
 Knowledge Expert also determines how to integrate the use of uncertain
knowledge in the reasoning process and what type of explanation would be
useful.

Conventional System vs. Expert system

Conventional System Expert System
Knowledge and processing are combined in one unit. Knowledge database and the processing mechanism a
two separate components.

The programme does not make errors (Unless error in The Expert System may make a mistake.
programming).

The system is operational only when fully developed. The expert system is optimized on an ongoing basis an
can be launched with a small number of rules.

Step by step execution according to fixed algorithms is Execution is done logically & heuristically.
required.

It needs full information. It can be functional with sufficient or insufficient informa

Human expert vs. expert system

Human Expert Artificial Expertise

Perishable Permanent

Difficult to Transfer Transferable

Difficult to Document Easy to Document

Unpredictable Consistent

Expensive Cost effective System

Benefits of expert systems

 It improves the decision quality
  Cuts the expense of consulting experts for problem-solving
 It provides fast and efficient solutions to problems in a narrow area of
specialization.
 It can gather scarce expertise and used it efficiently.
 Offers consistent answer for the repetitive problem
 Maintains a significant level of information
 Helps you to get fast and accurate answers
 A proper explanation of decision making
 Ability to solve complex and challenging issues
 Expert Systems can work steadily work without getting emotional, tensed or
fatigued.

Limitations of the expert system

 Unable to make a creative response in an extraordinary situation
 Errors in the knowledge base can lead to wrong decision
 The maintenance cost of an expert system is too expensive
 Each problem is different therefore the solution from a human expert can also
be different and more creative

Applications of expert systems

Some popular application where expert systems user:

 Information management
 Hospitals and medical facilities
 Help desks management
 Employee performance evaluation
 Loan analysis
 Virus detection
 Useful for repair and maintenance projects
 Warehouse optimization
 Planning and scheduling
 The configuration of manufactured objects
 Financial decision making Knowledge publishing
 Process monitoring and control
 Supervise the operation of the plant and controller
 Stock market trading
 Airline scheduling & cargo schedules

Attributes of a DSS
 Adaptability and flexibility
  High level of Interactivity
 Ease of use
 Efficiency and effectiveness
 Complete control by decision-makers
 Ease of development
 Extendibility
 Support for modeling and analysis
 Support for data access
 Standalone, integrated, and Web-based

Characteristics of a DSS
 Support for decision-makers in semi-structured and unstructured problems.
 Support for managers at various managerial levels, ranging from top executive to line
managers.
 Support for individuals and groups. Less structured problems often requires the
involvement of several individuals from different departments and organization level.
 Support for interdependent or sequential decisions.
 Support for intelligence, design, choice, and implementation.
 Support for variety of decision processes and styles.
 DSSs are adaptive over time.

Benefits of DSS
 Improves efficiency and speed of decision-making activities.
 Increases the control, competitiveness and capability of futuristic decision-making of the
organization.
 Facilitates interpersonal communication.
 Encourages learning or training.
 Since it is mostly used in non-programmed decisions, it reveals new approaches and
sets up new evidences for an unusual decision.
 Helps automate managerial processes.

Executive Support System

Executive support systems are intended to be used by the senior managers directly
to provide support to non-programmed decisions in strategic management.
These information are often external, unstructured and even uncertain. Exact scope
and context of such information is often not known beforehand.
This information is intelligence based −

 Market intelligence
 Investment intelligence
 Technology intelligence
Characteristics of Business Intelligence System:
 It is created by procuring data and information for use in decision-making.
 It is a combination of skills, processes, technologies, applications and practices.
 It contains background data along with the reporting tools.
 It is a combination of a set of concepts and methods strengthened by fact-based support
systems.
 It is an extension of Executive Support System or Executive Information System.
 It collects, integrates, stores, analyzes, and provides access to business information
 It is an environment in which business users get reliable, secure, consistent,
comprehensible, easily manipulated and timely information.
 It provides business insights that lead to better, faster, more relevant decisions.

Features of Executive Information System

Advantages of ESS
 Easy for upper level executive to use
 Ability to analyze trends
 Augmentation of managers' leadership capabilities
 Enhance personal thinking and decision-making
 Contribution to strategic control flexibility
 Enhance organizational competitiveness in the market place
 Instruments of change
 Increased executive time horizons.
 Better reporting system
 Improved mental model of business executive
 Help improve consensus building and communication
 Improve office automation
 Reduce time for finding information
 Early identification of company performance
 Detail examination of critical success factor
 Better understanding
  Time management
 Increased communication capacity and quality

Disadvantage of ESS
 Functions are limited
 Hard to quantify benefits
 Executive may encounter information overload
 System may become slow
 Difficult to keep current data
 May lead to less reliable and insecure data
 Excessive cost for small company