Chapter 2: Planning Projects with Power BI

Power BI projects are essentially the same as business intelligence projects involving alternative tools such as Tableau, Qlik, MicroStrategy, SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS), or even Crystal Reports. In fact, all business intelligence projects follow, or should follow, a similar process, with only minor variations depending upon the specific technology being implemented.

In this chapter, we explain the general process for business intelligence projects with specific callouts for planning considerations specific to Power BI. In addition, we introduce the specific business scenario that is used throughout this book.

The following topics will be covered in this chapter:

• Planning Power BI business intelligence projects
• Explaining the example scenario

Planning Power BI business intelligence projects

As explained in the previous chapter, in the Power BI Desktop section, Power BI business intelligence projects involve getting data from data sources, creating a data model, and then creating and publishing reports and dashboards that are consumed by the business and used to answer specific questions or support the analysis of the efficiency, effectiveness, and profitability of the business. However, successfully delivering the desired insights and analysis to the business requires careful planning and should include the following activities:

• Identifying stakeholders, goals, and requirements
• Procuring the required resources
• Discovering the required data sources
• Designing a data model
• Planning reports and dashboards

Identifying stakeholders, goals, and requirements

Business intelligence projects are most often driven by the business as opposed to IT. This means that one of the business domains, such as...

Explaining the example scenario

The following chapters of this book primarily focus on a single, real-world scenario. This section introduces the scenario and implements the planning process introduced in this chapter for the example scenario.

Background

The organization at the heart of this scenario is a regional professional services firm with offices located in Charlotte, Nashville, and Cleveland providing professional services related to technology, accounting, and management consulting. This firm recently conducted a yearly employee survey that highlighted a strong employee demand for increased flexibility regarding Personal Time Off (PTO). As a result, human resources have decided to implement unlimited PTO. While time off still needs to be approved, employees no longer have a set amount of days of PTO per year. This is an enormous benefit to employees but, in order to stay profitable, it is now imperative that the organization is able to closely track and report on utilization...

Summary

In this chapter, we introduced the planning process for Power BI business intelligence projects. Upfront requirements such as gathering, planning, and design are critical steps in ensuring the success of any business intelligence project, and projects involving Power BI are no exception. We then introduced the specific scenario that will be used throughout the rest of this book. As Pam, you have been tasked with creating a data model and report that will assist a regional consulting firm in visualizing and analyzing the % utilization of employees across divisions, branches, and projects.

In the next chapter, we will install Power BI Desktop, explore its interface, and familiarize ourselves with some of its functionality.

Questions

As an activity, try to answer the following questions on your own:

• A project stakeholder that helps procure funding and prioritize resources is called what?
• What are the three roles required for Power BI projects?
• What is the difference between facts and dimensions?
• What visual tool is used to design and organize a data model?
• What are the three dataset modes that Power BI supports?

Further reading

To learn more about the topics that were covered in this chapter, please take a look at the following references:

• Implementing different calendars in reporting: https://www.sqlshack.com/implementing-different-calendars-in-reporting/
• The matrix: https://www.kimballgroup.com/1999/12/the-matrix/
• The matrix: revisited: https://www.kimballgroup.com/2005/12/the-matrix-revisited/
• Dataset modes in the Power BI service: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/power-bi/connect-data/service-dataset-modes-understand
• Manage data storage in Power BI workspaces: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/power-bi/admin/service-admin-manage-your-data-storage-in-power-bi