Justifying a new budget line item for innovative initiatives can be challenging in today’s complex Human Services industry. However, we have learned through the uncertainty of the past several months and with the beginning of value-based healthcare reform changes, that having the full picture of your organization’s data is critical to your success. When you combine this with the strong return on investment of Business Intelligence, it makes the strategic budget decision a lot easier!
As you crunch the numbers and fine tune budget submissions, carefully consider both the short- and long-term benefits of implementing a Business Intelligence solution. Then, determine how quickly value will be appreciated across the agency. To help you build a case for Business Intelligence, here are three invaluable benefits that your agency will experience in a short time span.
I. Remove Guesswork
Running a non-profit business on opinions, intuition or guesswork can be detrimental to your customers and ultimately, the bottom line. The quickest way to create visibility and knowledge sharing is to integrate disparate data from various systems into a cloud-based Business Intelligence solution. With financial, payroll and HCSIS data in one centralized location, you will eliminate data silos and gain a complete picture of the organization. With data easily accessible via a Business Intelligence solution, leadership will finally have critical intelligence at their fingertips to drive operational enhancements and make fact-based decisions quickly.
II. Gain Time
Can you Imagine a three person project being automated? Business Intelligence solutions eliminate manual data management efforts and enable your staff to stayed focused on mission critical projects that support customers. Automating data management will minimize errors and time spent entering, integrating and reporting data that is scattered across multiple Excel® spreadsheets. With a solid Business Intelligence infrastructure in place, you can streamline and automate operational processes and keep data well organized to support your entire staff. The shift from manifesting data to using data will create significant efficiency, speed to information and organizational knowledge.
III. Elevate Communications
Non-profit leaders regularly communicate updates to their organization’s Board of Directors. With a couple clicks, real-time metrics in visual dashboards are available to accurately report on an unlimited amount of data covering everything from weekly financial dashboards to monthly operational performance reports. Business Intelligence solutions will provide consistent and seamless communication with your Board and create a new level of transparency with key stakeholders who have a significant say in how organizational priorities are managed. With advanced analytics and easy-to-use reporting, everyone is highly-informed and working from one version of the truth to optimize performance and margins.
Need more information to further build your case for a Business Intelligence line item? The BI Collaborative helps non-profit leaders throughout Pennsylvania leverage technology to make faster, more informed decisions.
