The Benefits of Power BI

At the start of most ERP implementations, a discussion takes place about the improved insights the business wants to gain. Through the course of the implementation the team typically and understandably gets bogged down in all the detail necessary to enable business processes and workflow. To drive improvement in a process you must be able to measure it. At Adroit we first focus on defining the correct set of metrics to provide a true view into the business. Next, we leverage our technical team to build out the metrics in Power BI. Furthermore, when dealing with large datasets our team will construct a data warehouse that is populated from the transactional database. Continue to read to explore the benefits of Power BI and how Adroit’s team can help you realize the value of your ERP investment.

Key Performance Indicators

For the typical manufacturing company leveraging Business Central, we like to take a top-down approach to define a company performance scorecard. This includes:

  1. Identify business objectives: We start by identifying the key objectives of the company. This can include revenue growth, customer satisfaction, operational efficiency, employee productivity, and other areas that are critical to the success of the business.
  2. Determine key performance indicators (KPIs): Pinpoint key objectives and then we can determine the related KPIs that will be utilized to measure progress toward those objectives.
  3. Prioritize KPIs: Not all KPIs are equally important. We work to really minimize the number of indicators and ensure that they are actionable.
  4. Define targets: We help you to set targets for each KPI based on historical data, industry benchmarks, and the company’s objectives.
  5. Define data sources and reporting frequency: Definitions of metrics can be a challenge. We define the specific data sources for each KPI and the frequency of reporting. This can range from daily to monthly, depending on the KPI and its relevance to business operations. The data sources can be from Business Central and other sources.

What is Power BI?

Power BI is a business analytics service by Microsoft that allows users to connect to different data sources, visualize data, and share insights with others. When integrated with Microsoft Dynamics Business Central ERP, Power BI provides you with a powerful toolset for analyzing and reporting on financial and operational data. Connecting Business Central data to Power BI you are able to build interactive dashboards and reports that enable them to gain valuable insights into their business operations in real-time. These insights can help you to identify trends, track KPIs, monitor performance, and make informed decisions quickly. Power BI’s integration with Business Central also makes it easy to share data and insights with others, including employees, stakeholders, and customers, leading to improved collaboration and better business outcomes.

How to Install Power BI and Connect to Business Central

To install Power BI and connect it to Business Central is a straightforward process that we can help with:

  1. Install Power BI Desktop: Download and install Power BI Desktop from the Microsoft website.
  2. Connect to Business Central: In Power BI Desktop, select “Get Data” and search for “Dynamics 365 Business Central”. Choose the connector for “Dynamics 365 Business Central” and click “Connect”.
  3. Enter Business Central connection details: We enter your Business Central URL and sign in with our Business Central credentials.
  4. Select data: Choose the data you want to import from Business Central, including tables, fields, and filters. You can also choose to import data from other sources, such as Excel or CSV files.

Once connected we select the tables, fields, and filters needed for the report. Sometimes we need to transform the data to make it match up with data from other sources. For that, we can use Power Query. Power BI provides a great tool kit with a wide range of visualizations, including tables, charts, maps, and more. Adroit can customize each visualization to meet your specific reporting needs. We can add filters in addition to drill-downs as well to enable the slicing and dicing of the data. Finally, we can publish, share and distribute reports on schedule.

What is a Data Warehouse?

It’s important that the KPI strategy includes a data management strategy as well. As time passes, large amounts of data accumulate in the ERP transactional database. This can cause reporting performance to degrade and impacts the overall ERP response times. For large data sets it’s common to need to create a data warehouse. A data warehouse is a separate database that is tuned for large data extractions. Data can be organized into cubes with facts and dimensions to facilitate large-scope slicing and dicing. Think Excel pivots on steroids.

In summary, it’s important to incorporate analytics and reporting during ERP implementations to fully realize the value of the ERP investment. To drive improvement in a process, it’s necessary to measure it with the correct set of metrics. We recommend a top-down approach to identify the correct KPIs. Microsoft Power BI is our tool of choice for analytical reporting Microsoft Dynamics Business Central. It’s a powerful toolset for analyzing and reporting financial and operational data, providing interactive dashboards and reports to gain valuable insights into business operations in real-time. Installing Power BI and connecting it to Business Central is straightforward. Data management strategies are important to the long-term responsiveness of the ERP system. By incorporating the proper KPIs and technology, for a modest investment, you can more fully realize the value of your ERP investment.