Whether a database skill is necessary for being a Business Intelligence professional?.
Business
intelligence has different subarea, i.e. business analysis, ETL, reporting
design, etc. There are professionals specialized in each subarea. Which sub
area is good to jump into with database skills? And which subarea is the
essence of business intelligence ?
Ed Todd • By analogy, do you need to be a mechanic to drive a race car? On
the surface, no. But to communicate effectively with the crew (chief, engine
bulder, chassis set-up team) and understand the limits of the vehicle you need
a certain level of mechanical knowledge.
The data model (logical and physical views) is the schematic or blueprint for building the database and for navigating it (BI). Done properly, a data model captures the relationships (the how) between the data entities and attributes (the what).
Data models help the DBA understand things like what data will be joined often, perhaps leading to a decision to de-normalize some data. For the BI user of the data, the model discloses the key structure so you don't write a query that performs full table scans - making you unpopular with the other users of the data infrastructure.
The data model (logical and physical views) is the schematic or blueprint for building the database and for navigating it (BI). Done properly, a data model captures the relationships (the how) between the data entities and attributes (the what).
Data models help the DBA understand things like what data will be joined often, perhaps leading to a decision to de-normalize some data. For the BI user of the data, the model discloses the key structure so you don't write a query that performs full table scans - making you unpopular with the other users of the data infrastructure.
Neil Rivenburgh • Each
of your subareas requires knowledge of data and databases. As Ed mentioned,
data modeling is also an important knowledge area. As far as a career
specialty, they are all in strong demand now so I would choose the one that you
enjoy doing. Building reports and dashboards would be a good area to start in
and see how you like it. That is certainly a key component of BI and will give
you some exposure to the other areas.
It depends...if you are
technical oriented or business oriented. But, firstly, you should have good
understanding of databases, data modelling procedures and how to design and
produce reports and dashboard needed by business people.
You definitely need to have database
skills in order to be a business intelligence developer/professional. Before
you can create a BI model to be able to create reports, you need to understand
the relationships between the tables, views, joins etc and the joins. You also
need to know how to query a database to create databases, tables, views, stored
procedures, functions.summarized or detailed results.
Secondly, you can not create good reports if you can't validate the data the reports are generating, or if you can't create formulas or calculations based on the fields from the database tables. To do all of this you need to know SQL well, then you can move onto to learning the various BI tools.Also to learn how to create Datawarehouses and Datamarts.
Secondly, you can not create good reports if you can't validate the data the reports are generating, or if you can't create formulas or calculations based on the fields from the database tables. To do all of this you need to know SQL well, then you can move onto to learning the various BI tools.Also to learn how to create Datawarehouses and Datamarts.
Bradley Morris •
An understanding of data models and DB's is a critical skillset in becoming a
true BI professional. Without this understanding, it is difficult to understand
users and set expectations as a BA, or transform data into information as a
report professional or data visualization expert, or manipulate data across
sources as an ETL developer. And of course, without DB skills, you can scratch
being a data modeler.
Andre Linssen • If you have database skills you can jump into any sub area of BI, but I would like to add that having database skills alone is not enough. The other question was, 'what is essence of BI?' Well, you can buy reporting tools, and hire as much BI consultants as you might think is necessary, but, without a solid data model and a sound data architecture you will only be able to produce BI reports that are remotely attached to reality.
Andre Linssen • If you have database skills you can jump into any sub area of BI, but I would like to add that having database skills alone is not enough. The other question was, 'what is essence of BI?' Well, you can buy reporting tools, and hire as much BI consultants as you might think is necessary, but, without a solid data model and a sound data architecture you will only be able to produce BI reports that are remotely attached to reality.
