Strong business decision-making is driven by easy to access, easy to read data that provides accurate and up-to-date insights about a business’ operations. Software that collates this critical business data into simple yet engaging visual displays allows decisionmakers to quickly judge business and industry trends gleaned from their internal datasets, to share with internal and external stakeholders quickly, and to understand at a glance the situation on a particular team or project within their organisation. 

Microsoft Power BI offers all of this as part of its Dynamics 365 package, allowing users to pull data from across their organisation’s existing Microsoft ecosystem into a centralised dataset, nicely visualised for ease of communication and sharing. 

But is Power BI right for your business? In this article, we’ll take a look at some of the pros and cons of the software, to help you decide if Power BI can address your data visualisation needs. 

What is Power BI?

Power BI is a data analytics suite offered by Microsoft to enable users to visualise and share insights pulled from their own sets of data. It is divided into three components: BI Desktop; BI Service; and BI Mobile. Power BI Desktop allows users to create detailed reports and dashboards out of their data, while Power BI Service allows for the easy sharing of and collaboration on those datasets through the cloud. Power BI Mobile, finally, allows users to access and track insights on the move. Power BI’s ability to pull data from multiple sources, from Excel spreadsheets to physical IoT sensors on machinery, makes it an indispensable tool for businesses seeking to acquire a greater oversight on their core metrics and KPIs. 

Pros of Power BI

• User-Friendly Interface: Power BI’s intuitive and easy-to-use interface cuts down on the time spent to get to grips with the system, and allows anybody from across the organisation to tap into a dashboard to glean valuable insights that will help them in their work. 

• Integration Capabilities: Power BI can be plugged into multiple data sources to pull information from, including Microsoft Excel; cloud-based services; and IoT sensors for up-to-date physical data from machinery or other devices. 

• Data Visualization: Data collated in Microsoft Power BI can be customised however the user wants the data to be displayed or compared, giving them full control of the data presented and the insights showcased. 

• Cost-Effective: As part of the Dynamics 365 package, Power BI is a cost-effective solution for businesses looking to maximise bang for their buck. 

Cons of Power BI

• Learning Curve: For users looking to delve deeper into Power BI’s suite of customisation and visualisation options, there is of course a learning curve – as with any new piece of software – in getting up to speed on the ins and outs of everything the program is capable of doing. 

• Performance Issues: Particularly exhaustive datasets may encounter difficulty with performance issues in Power BI, slowing down implementation of new visualisations or causing the program to stutter. 

• Dependency on Microsoft Ecosystem: As a Microsoft product, Power BI as it comes out of the box is primarily tooled for use with other Microsoft systems. This could be a limiting factor for some organisations’ existing data ecosystems, and require some custom development to work around. 

A Built-In Solution

With so many office digital infrastructures already running Microsoft ecosystems, Power BI is an obvious choice for a data visualisation suite. Not only does it run off most of the programs that are likely already in use around your workspace, but if it isn’t already included in your active package, it is only a quick upgrade away from full implementation. 

This makes it an attractive proposition for companies looking to glean greater insights into the data they collect, to arm their decisionmakers with the knowledge and confidence to make informed, data-driven decisions to fuel the growth of their businesses.