The Who's Who of the BICC

Meet the members of a typical Business Intelligence Competency Center

What kinds of people does a Business Intelligence Competency Center (BICC) need? And what skills, knowledge and qualities should those people possess? At an absolute minimum, the BICC should comprise a BICC manager, a business analyst, a chief data steward and a technical consultant. As business priorities evolve over time, the BICC can expand by adding more roles and more functional areas, including some of those seen here. Larger BICCs can also include product managers, internal communicators, application designers, warehouse consultants, license administrators, statisticians and training consultants.

	Roberto is a Warehouse Architect. He plans the overall architecture of the solution, including performance considerations, storage repository selections, data schemas and subject definitions.
	Anna is the BICC Manager. She promotes the value and the potential of BI in the organization and ensures that BI projects align with corporate strategy.
	Claudio is an Analytical Consultant. He understands models and analytical reports, and applies the results of statistical analyses to business problems. He helps develop and implement BI solutions, and supports users with more advanced tasks that are beyond their skill levels.
	Euan is the Chief Data Steward. He identifies and manages data issues throughout the organization. He promotes and advocates sound practices in the capturing, managing, disseminating, manipulating and preserving of data to enable BI.
	David is a Business Analyst. He understands the business rules and processes of the organization, and knows how the organization uses data, including any transformations or business rules that are applied to data.
	Ilona is a Technical Consultant. She ensures correct technical setup and implementation of BI solutions. She advises the project team on any connectivity, security, or technical requirements and related topics.
	Monté is a Project Manager. He manages the day-to-day direction and coordination of the project team, and reports project status to sponsors. He also obtains resources for the project, including equipment, software, user accounts and office space.

* The text of this article is adapted from Business Intelligence Competency Centers: A Team Approach to Maximizing Competitive Advantage;
Gloria Miller, Dagmar Brautigam and Stefanie V. Gerlach; Copyright © 2006, SAS Institute. Reprinted with permission of John Wiley & Sons Inc.