Digital Dashboards for Performance Reporting by a manufacturing giant using Cognos Tools

Business Need
The IT department of a high profile manufacturing company required a simple visual method of reporting performance data for their Senior Executives. The most important criteria was that the tool needed to be 'Corporate User' friendly, with an ability to link to their existing multi-dimensional cubes developed in Microsoft Analysis Services.

Solution
Cognos Visualizer and PowerPlay provided an ideal combination for them to achieve the following advantages:

• PowerPlay was easily able to connect to Microsoft cubes and linked seamlessly by creating pseudo Cognos cubes
• With the help of Visualizer, a series of dazzling Dashboards were created that included Corporate themes and graphics. Drill down graphical and text reports were designed to analyze key performance metrics, allowing executives to easily identify successes and areas requiring immediate attention. Initial reporting mechanisms were in place within a few hours, which is a tall achievement
• Executives were themselves able to create visualizations from various cubes with minimal training. This met the 'Corporate User' friendly requirement and the product was readily accepted and deemed as a huge success.

Web version deployment is underway to provide remote line managers with a 'Visual Reporting' environment.