Planning for a Successful Warehouse

1
Chapter 5

• Planning for a Successful Warehouse

2
Financial Justification

• Intangible Benefits
• (45)
• - Remain
• competitive
• - Respond to
• changing business
• conditions
• - Support
• reorganization

• Better Data and Better Decision Making (25)
• - Reduce IS costs
• - Better response time
• - Rigorous reporting
• Productivity or ROI (30)
• - For internal users
• - For external users

3
ROI and Associated Costs

• Build a strong case
• - Costs
• - ROI
• - Profitability
• - Efficiency
• - Objectives

• Consider
• - Impact of time
• for ETT
• - Additional storage
• requirements
• - Cost of redundant data
• - Cost of database,
• software licenses,
• labor

4
Funding the Project

• State that initial systems integration costs are
  high.
• Determine who funds the project
• - Information systems--development group
• - Department--users

Department
Selected subject for pilot
Information systems
Department
Department
Small staff Short duration
More subjects funds by end-user organizations
5
Charging Back Costs

• Some warehouses do not charge initially.
• Benefits - Encourages efficient use
• - Provides shared costs
• Drawbacks
• - Users cannot dwell on detail
• - Users try to reduce costs
• - Machine resources are taken up
• monitoring use.

6
Obtaining Business Commitment

• Ensure that the warehouse
• - Has total support
• - Is driven by the business
• Research the problem
• Identify goals, visions, priorities
• Research the solution
• Identify the benefits
• Identify the constraints

7
Data Warehouse Champion

• Maintains intergroup communication
• Settles conflicts
• Identifies and solves issues
• Articulates the vision
• Brings in business expertise
• Organizes and supports the team
• Communicates progress
• Brings the data warehouse to life

8
Steering Committee

• Business executives
• Information systems representatives
• Knowledge workers

• Provides direction
• Decides upon implementation issues
• Sets priorities
• Assists with resource allocation
• Communicates to all levels at all times

9
Warehouse Data Ownership

• Users must own the data
• Users must be involved throughout
• Users must be part of the steering committee
• - Enhances cooperation
• - Reduces friction
• - Helps meet requirements
• - Enhances feedback

10
Managing a Warehouse Project

• Determine organizational readiness for the
  warehouse
• Adopt an incremental approach to warehouse
  development
• Set expectations
• Manage expectations
• Assemble the project team
• Estimate the data warehouse project
• Recognize critical success factors

11
Determining Organizational Readiness for the
Warehouse

• 1.Are the objectives and business drivers clearly
  defined, compelling, and agreed upon?
• 2. Have you selected a methodology for design,
  development, and implementation?
• 3. Is the project scope clearly defined, with a
  focus on business rather than technology?
• 4. Is there strong support from a business
  management sponsor?
• 5. Does the business management sponsor have
  specific expectations?

12
Determining Organizational Readiness for the
Warehouse

• 6. Are there cooperative relations between
  business and Information Systems staff?
• 7. Have you identified which source data will be
  used to populate the data warehouse?
• 8. What is the quality and cleanliness of the
  source data?
• 9. Are you authorized to choose and acquire
  hardware and software to implement the warehouse?
• 10. Are you prepared to select and train your
• implementation team?

13
Setting Expectations
Incremental Scope Rollout time Phases
14
Managing Expectations

• Documenting
• Informing sponsors
• Reporting progress to end users

15
Assembling the Project Team

• Project manager/Project leader
• Architect
• Executive sponsor
• Data analyst
• Database or system administrator

16
Estimating the Data Warehouse Project
Bottom-Up Project Estimate
17
Recognizing Critical Success Factors

• Focus on the business, not the technology
• Use an iterative development methodology
• Include end users on the project team

18
Identifying Planning Phases
Strategy
Scope
Analysis
Design
Build
Production
19
Strategy Phase Deliverables
The Strategy Phase
Phases
Strategy
Business goals and objectives
Data warehouse purpose, objectives, and scope
Scope
Analysis
Incremental milestones
Design
Source system data flows
Subject area gap analysis
Build
Data acquisition strategy
Production
20
Strategy Phase Deliverables
The Strategy Phase
Phases
Strategy
Data warehouse architecture
Technical infrastructure
Scope
Data quality strategy
Analysis
Data warehouse administration strategy
Design
Metadata strategy
Build
Training strategy
Production
21
Defining the Warehouse Project Scope

• Focus on the business, not the technology
• Break down the project into manageable phases
• Encourage rapid turnaround on deliverables
• Always include the end users on the team

Phases
Strategy
Scope
Analysis
Design
Build
Production
22
Scope Phase Deliverables
The Scope Phase
Phases
Strategy
Business requirements definition
Scope
Data sources
Analysis
Load and refresh plans
Design
Technical architecture
Build
Data warehouse architecture
Production
23
Scope Phase Deliverables
The Scope Phase
Phases
Strategy
Business requirements definition
Scope
Data sources
Analysis
Load and refresh plans
Design
Technical architecture
Build
Data warehouse architecture
Production
24
Scope Phase Deliverables
The Scope Phase
Phases
Strategy
Data Quality
Warehouse administration plan
Scope
Analysis
Metadata integration plan
Design
Data access plan
Build
Training plan
Production
25
Summary

• This lesson discussed the following topics
• Cultivating management support, both financial
  and political, for the warehouse
• Developing a realistic scope that products
  deliverables in short time frames to help ensure
  success
• Assessing your organizations readiness for a
  data warehouse
• Setting realistic expectations