Power BI

What’s Microsoft Power BI?

Power BI is a Microsoft Office 365 tool. An intelligence business insight platform that provides business users with various data representations & techniques like aggregating, analyzing, visualizing and sharing data in an easily comprehensive format. Power BI’s user interface is simplistic and familiar with Excel, its knitted integration with other Microsoft products makes it a very dynamic platform that requires little training to use.

It’s subscription is scaled at different levels wherein, a free version is intended for small to midsize businesses. An upscaled professional version than that of the free one is called Power BI Plus which is available for a monthly subscription fee. There is also a downloadable application for Windows 10, called Power BI Desktop. Furthermore, there are native mobile apps for Windows, Android and iOS devices.

Common uses of Microsoft Power BI

Power BI can connect diverse data sets, transform and organize the data into an appropriate data model and create charts or graphs to provide visuals of the data to find intuitive insights within an organization’s data. This is easily shareable with other authorised Power BI users of the organisation.

The data compilations can be used for telling logical stories through charts & visualizations and examining “What If” scenarios within the data. These reports are also dynamic in nature and can answer questions in real time and help with forecasting to help a business meet its key milestones. 

These reports can also be extended to provide executive dashboards for administrators or managers, giving them a streamlined & tailored insight into each department. 

About Power BI key users

Even though using Power BI requires little training, the platform is mostly handled by data analysts and business intelligence professionals who create logical data models upfront before distributing reports throughout the organization. However, those without an analytical background can still navigate Power BI and create reports based on their data understanding.

Some useful reports and forecasts can be created to aid sales and marketing personnel, while also providing management data on department and employee progression toward their key metrics, along with an admin portal for administrators to configure the implementation of Power BI, as well as monitor usage and licenses status.

Power BI’s key features

Microsoft has added a substantial number of data analytics features to Power BI since its discovery, and continues to do so. Some of the most important features include:

  • Artificial Intelligence – accessibility of image recognition and text analytics, creation of machine learning models via automated capabilities and integration with Azure Machine Learning.
  • Hybrid Deployment – embedded connectors that support Power BI tools to connect with a range of data sources from Microsoft, Salesforce and others.
  • Snap Insights – This feature allows users to create subsets of data and automatically apply analytics to that information.
  • Standardised Data Modelling – It supports common data modelling by easily enabling the use of a standardised and extendable collection of data schemas like entities, attributes and relationships.
  • Cortana – Cortana Micrisoft’s digital assistant. Its integration is especially popular in mobile devices allowing users to verbally query data using natural language and access results.
  • Customisation – enables developers to play around with the appearance of default visualization and reporting tools. Also, they can import new tools into the platform, as required.
  • APIs – presents developers with sample code and ‘Application Performance Interfaces’ (APIs) for embedding the Power BI dashboard in other software products.
  • Self Data Prep – Power Query enables business analysts to import, transform, integrate and optimise big data into the Power BI web service. Imported data can be shared across multiple Power BI models, reports and dashboards.
  • Modeling Visualisation – enables users to segregate complex data models by subject area into different diagrams, choose multiple data objects & denote common properties, view & modify properties in the properties pane, and set display folders for simpler accessibility of complex data models.

Key Components of Power BI 

There are some key components of Power BI that enable users to create and share business insights in a tailored manner to suit the users purpose.

These key components are:

  • Power Query- Data mashup & transformation tool
  • Power Pivot- Memory tabular data modeling tool
  • Power View- Data visualization tool
  • Power Map- 3D geospatial data visualization tool
  • Power Q&A- Natural language question & answering engine

Power BI is indeed extremely powerful but its amazing features can only give results if the tool is in the right hands. So if your business is looking for unanswered questions about your key business insights & performance then reach out to us because @Cloudploys we have data experts who can derive logical patterns for your business and provide you with a comprehensive analytical report.

Scrum

What is a Scrum Framework?

Scrum is a framework, agile in nature, for developing, delivering and sustaining complex adaptive business problems, while efficiently and creatively delivering products of the highest possible value. This framework can be elongated to any field from research, marketing and much more. However, this was primarily developed to assist with management of software development and advanced technologies.

It is more of a framework wherein processes and methodologies can be set up rather than building of products. This framework clearly highlights the effectiveness of a business’s product management & development practices and flags a need for improvement.

Key points about Scrum: 

  • The Scrum framework consists of “Scrum Teams”. Along with associated roles, events, artifacts, and rules. 
  • Each defined role within the framework has a precise agenda and its implementation is absolutely critical to Scrum’s success and usage.
  • The rules of Scrum hold the events, roles, and artifacts together while supervising the relationships and interaction between them. 
  • Listed events are used to create regularity. All events have a deadline. 
  • FYI – there is a widely believed misconception that Scrum = no documentation, scrum team consists of only developers, and so on. But this is not entirely true!

In Scrum what is Sprint?

Sprint is the most vital aspect of scrum framework. It’s a timeline of two weeks or one month during which a feasibly deliverable product progress is created. 

It is a simultaneous process wherein a new Sprint starts immediately after the closure of the previous one. 

Sprints consist of: 

  • Sprint planning – The work to be performed in the Sprint is planned cohesively by the Scrum Team.
  • Daily Scrum – 15-minute meeting for the Scrum Team to align the activities and create a plan for that day.
  • The development work – Actions of the Sprint plans are performed
  • A Sprint Review – An end of day meeting, to inspect the progress and make the needed changes to the Product Backlog.
  • The Sprint Retrospective – Occurs after the Sprint Review and before the next Sprint Planning. Here, the Scrum Team reflects on itself and creates an improved plan for the following Sprint.

To sum it up, Scrum is a process framework that outlines certain rules, events, and roles to bring a cyclical workflow. It is flexible & dynamic and can be adapted by any organization, based on their needs, keeping in mind that the basic scrum rules are not compromised in order to get efficient results out of it.

But, it is easier said & read than done, theory often undermines practicality! And that’s when you reach out to @CloudPloys and seek advice from our management experts with experience in diverse fields to build the right Scrum Sprint for your company.

WFH

Permanent Work From Home – New HR Contract Model

The most trending HR employee contract model now includes “Work from ANYWHERE” apart from the usual “Permanent |  Full-Time | Causal | Part-Time | etc.” This model essentially allows employees to choose whether they want to be full time at the Office | Home | Office and Home.

Spotify is the latest tech company which has recently adapted this model. The company will adhere to implementing extreme flexibility even around locations, giving employees the freedom to even choose the country and city where they would like to work from. The company has decided to provide co-working space memberships for its employees who choose to work remotely and at the same time desire for a dedicated workspace. Hence, giving them the best of both worlds!!!

We are seeing more and more big-scale companies adopting the remote work model as a more permanent and concrete option due to adversities caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. This framework will give more assurance to companies in leading a more persistent growth. 

With this dynamic shift in workplace concept, companies are at the forefront of reassessing their office spaces across the globe for increased perseverance, flexibility and prosperity to ensure that all of their operations, regardless of the situation, goes on unobstructedly, comfortably and efficiently. The main objective of this new employee roadmapping approach is to ensure that employees in the uncertain long-run have a permanent & backup place where they can perform with focus, collaborate without obstruction, innovate and recreate and the possibility of this should prevail whether at an office/home desk, in a conference room, a cafe or a co-working space.

Spotify is not the only tech company, there are other significant companies like Microsoft, Salesforce, Twitter, Square, etc. who have considered and implemented this dynamic employee contractual setting. Salesforce recently announced to let its employees choose whether they would consider coming into the office again? While Simultaneously emphasizing that the 9-to-5 workday routine is dead. Square and Twitter are letting employees work from home #wfh FOR GOOD! And lastly Microsoft also offered its workers high flexibility to work from home.

 

 

As evidently seen that we have a rising number of companies who are proactively considering remote work as a more permanent option due to the Covid-19 pandemic. I think it is time that all companies should prepare for the same and evolve with the changing time. The world is not the same anymore. In this world only the digitally adept will survive. @CloudPloys we help companies in upscaling and proofing their business against such adversities, so please reach out for a consultation and a relaxed discussion!