Data-driven management: how Power BI helps you make better decisions

Have you ever felt like making decisions is like navigating a dark, unfamiliar room? You have an idea of where to go, but you lack certainty. Companies today have an incredible amount of data at their disposal, but simply having it is not enough – it is important to skillfully collect, analyze and extract valuable information from it. Growing workloads, new software solutions and the increasing need for effective reporting are forcing managers to look for smarter ways to interpret data.

So what is the role of data in modern business?

Data is one of a company’s greatest assets, but if it’s not easy to interpret, decisions can be based on intuition rather than reality. For example, if a CFO can’t clearly see the company’s spending patterns, they may miss opportunities for savings. If a CFO can’t quickly identify recurring issues, the company could lose customer satisfaction. Timely and accurate data analysis can help prevent these situations and give the company a clear competitive advantage.
This is where Power BI comes into play – Microsoft’s data analytics tool that helps companies collect, process, and visualize data.

What is Power BI and how does it help with decision-making?

Power BI allows companies to turn large Excel tables and complex databases into visually understandable and dynamic dashboards. Instead of manually comparing data, you can get a real-time overview of the company's key indicators and identify trends and anomalies.

Power BI connects data from different systems - such as accounting software, customer management systems, help desk platforms and project management software. This provides a complete picture of business operations, allowing you to make quick and fact-based decisions. Visualizing data in the form of graphs and charts helps to understand complex numbers more easily and makes information accessible even to those who are not data analytics specialists.
In addition, Power BI is flexible - reporting can be customized according to the needs of the company. Automated reports save time and reduce the risk of errors. Since all data is in one environment, collaboration and information flow between teams also improves.

Power BI in practice - how do Primend managers use it?

Primend's CFO Maarika and Technical Manager Rita have experienced the benefits of Power BI firsthand. Maarika uses Power BI to track financial reporting and budgets, while Rita analyzes the quality of customer support service and optimizes the team's workflows.

How does Power BI help Primend's CFO make better decisions?

What financial indicators can be monitored with Power BI?

Primend's CFO Maarika Kuhi uses Power BI mainly to compare the budgeted income statement and actual results. This helps her monitor whether the company is moving towards its set goals or if there is a need to react quickly somewhere. The most important metrics include MRR (monthly revenue), sales, EBITDA (Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization), net profit and margins - both year-on-year changes and comparison with the budget. Future plans also include monitoring liquidity, capitalization and long-term solvency with Power BI to make strategically sound decisions.

How does Power BI help work with financial data?

Data processing is quite simple and logical - general ledger entries are exported as a CSV file to an agreed folder, which Power BI then reads in. But Power BI is not just for viewing the final results. It is also used to perform preliminary analyses before the end of the month to detect potential gaps and make necessary corrections early on. This helps to avoid surprises and ensure that financial reports are accurate.

How does Power BI help with monitoring and reporting new processes?

When a new process is implemented in a company, Maarika’s approach is simple: first, the numbers are added up in Excel to get an initial control number, and then moved to Power BI. This creates accurate input that a Power BI expert can use, saving time and avoiding confusion. Maarika recommends that managers learn to customize the simpler views in Power BI themselves – the expert creates the connections, but often the manager can add the necessary analyses themselves using an intuitive “drag and drop” approach.

How can you use Power BI to discover cost-effectiveness opportunities?

Power BI allows you to view financial data from two perspectives – retrospective and prospective.

• Retrospectively, you can quickly get an overview of budget execution and react in a timely manner if necessary.
• Predictive analysis makes planning easier because past data is quickly and clearly available.

How does Power BI help Primend’s Head of Tech?

What to track with Power BI?

Rita points out that Power BI helps connect data from different systems to get a comprehensive overview of employees’ actual workload. For example, she collects information about employees’ work and rest times from the payroll application and adds to it the time tracking from the ticketing system. This shows exactly how much time is spent solving specific problems, whether the work is paid or unpaid, and where processes can be made faster and more efficient.

Key metrics – what to track?

Rita uses Power BI to track various key indicators that help better manage the work of the help desk and improve the quality of the service:

• Billable and unpaid working time per ticket/per customer – how much time is spent directly on the customer’s problem and how much on learning or other activities.
• Number of calls per specialist/customer – whether the team has an optimally distributed workload and whether certain types of calls could be prevented or solved more efficiently.
• Customer Feedback (NPS) – whether resolved cases meet customer expectations and which aspects of the service need improvement.
• Average case resolution time – how quickly a customer problem is resolved, which helps predict workload and improve service speed.
• Response speed to cases – whether the team responds to customer problems within the agreed timeframes and how long the waiting list is.
• Call response speed – how quickly the customer can be contacted to provide a solution.

How can Power BI help the customer support team improve service quality and transparency? 

Power BI makes the work of the customer support team visible to everyone – the team has a clear overview of how the performance of their work is measured and which indicators need to be improved. Since the results are also the basis for calculating performance payments, Power BI gives the team a clear goal to strive for.

In addition, Power BI helps monitor how many people are needed to serve existing customers and whether it is possible to add new customers without hiring additional resources. The metrics can also be used to assess which areas employees need training in order to develop their professionalism in a targeted and effective manner.

Overall, Power BI is a powerful tool for Rita and her team to make better decisions, maintain high service quality, and ensure that customer problems are resolved quickly and professionally.
 

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