A Business Agility Guide

Utlising SharePoint for Reporting

Business Agility is expert in the delivery of solutions built on Microsoft 365 and SharePoint.

We build solutions to both the common and the uncommon. This can be anything from:

• Intranets, Document Management Systems, workflow processes

• Migrating you to a new version of SharePoint

• Planning your information architecture around SharePoint

• Hosted SharePoint, SharePoint Online and Microsoft 365

• Building industry-specific solutions

Table of contents

• Building your business case for upgrading SharePoint............................P4

• Upgrading to SharePoint Online (the Cloud) .......................................................P5

• Upgrading to SharePoint 2016 (on-premises, not in the Cloud) ...........................................................................................P7

• Beyond 2016...SharePoint 2019.............P9

• The practical steps and business case for actual migration .......................................................................................................P10

• Return on Investment ..........................P13

• Conclusion ..............................................P16

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The ability to confidently interpret relevant data and base decisions on that information is the lifeblood of business execution. The pursuit of reliable, correct Business Intelligence is common in all organisations. So why do so many have poor or clunky reporting processes and output?

A good report can come in many forms, which are dependent on the systems upon which data is held, controlled, managed and interrogated. A bad report is too easy to deliver and is commonly the result of a poor (or non-existent) process, relying heavily on manual input.

If the quest of good Business Intelligence practice is to deliver robust, ‘one version of the truth’ type reporting, then we must ensure that systems of control are in place. That means accepting there isn’t a ‘one size fits all’ answer, as well as understanding basic tenets of Information Architecture in your organisation. So, how do you improve your business intelligence? Well, you start by improving your reporting capabilities.

This guide has been written to explain how you can rely on SharePoint for your reporting needs and it illustrates two common SharePoint environments:

1) SharePoint on-premises 2) SharePoint Online (as part of Microsoft 365)

Building your business case for upgrading SharePoint

From our experience, SharePoint is too commonly seen as either a document sharing platform, a collaboration portal, document, calendar, or list creator, or a content management system. Strangely, it’s often overlooked as a robust business intelligence and reporting (BI) platform. This is because many people see SharePoint as only being able to handle lightweight reporting and data analysis – but this couldn’t be further from the truth!

When coupled with other tools in the Microsoft world (making up the Microsoft BI stack), SharePoint can easily go toe to toe with the mature BI systems of the world, such as Cognos, SAP, etc.

And, with the right reporting process and tools in place, regardless of whether your SharePoint environment is on-premises or in the Cloud, you can:

• Report on data across your estate and surface it in SharePoint• Ask questions of your data, rather than spending time searching for it• Get instant and dynamic updates on any device at any time• Gain business insight from your data sources• Take full control of your data

Before we delve into how to leverage reporting in SharePoint, we need to explain a few more elements to Microsoft’s BI offering.

SharePoint as a Reporting tool

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What is the Microsoft BI stack?

A BI/reporting solution is needed if you regularly need to share information with others whose technical skills and security privileges vary. A key point to underline is that this reporting solution needs to be simple to use and maintain.

The Microsoft BI stack is made up of several systems that may already exist within your architecture:• Excel / Power Pivot • SharePoint • SQL Server (your database) + SQL Server Analysis Services (SSAS) (an analytical and data mining tool); SQL Server Integration Services (SSIS) – (a migration and workflow tool); SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) – (a tool that creates and publishes your reports)

In addition (for the Cloud) you would take advantage of:- Power BI- PowerApps- Microsoft Flow

N.B. In the Cloud you wouldn’t use SQL – you’d be using Microsoft’s Azure. Therefore, you wouldn’t rely on SSRS.

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If your SharePoint is held locally in your organisations, i.e., it’s NOT in the Cloud, then you have an on-premises instance. Possibly you have SharePoint 2010, 2013, or maybe 2016 (although we have come across a few instances of SharePoint 2007!)

Managing your SharePoint environment on-premises comes with many advantages, such as all your data being managed on your site and only controlled by you – so effectively the data lives behind your firewall and Business Connectivity Services remain in place and maintained. This on-premises environment can deliver an exceptionally robust reporting function for your organisation. With this SharePoint environment, you will have SQL Server acting as your database. As this is the case you can immediately utilise SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS).

Leverage SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS)SSRS is there to support the publishing, management, creation and delivery of reports. These reports can be delivered to the right users in various ways (viewing the reports in a browser or via an email, or on mobile).You’ll have the ability to create modernised paginated reports with a mobile responsive layout so the reports can be delivered exactly how you want. There are many tools and features in the platform to enable you to tailor your reports however you want.

Leverage ExcelYou can make Excel work for you by storing workbooks in SharePoint; so, if you’re not quite Excel-free in your business (who is?!), you can make hook those spreadsheets into SSRS and interrogate your data in different ways.

Leverage Power PivotPower Pivot is an Excel add-in you can utilise to perform data analysis and create sophisticated data models. Power Pivot allows you to combine large volumes of data from various sources and slice and dice that data into meaningful reports. It also allows you to interrogate and analyse data rapidly, and share insights easily.Excel and Power Pivot both allow the creation of a Data Model and a collection of tables with relationships.

Maximise reporting with SharePoint on-premises

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The data model you see in a workbook in Excel is the same data model you see in the Power Pivot window.The difference between Power Pivot and Excel is that you can create a more sophisticated and complex data model by working on it in the Power Pivot window

Using Power Pivot / Excel in a SharePoint environmentYou have more control and advantage by publishing your (Excel) workbook to a SharePoint environment that has Excel Services enabled. On your SharePoint server, Excel Services processes and renders your data in a browser window – allowing others to analyse the data.

On SharePoint, you can add Power Pivot to get additional collaboration and document management support, including:- Power Pivot Gallery- Power Pivot management dashboard in Central Administration- scheduled data refresh- the ability to use a published workbook as an external data source from its location in SharePoint.

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If you have SharePoint Online then you have Microsoft 365. This gives you access to several apps designed to make tasks, such as reporting, exceptionally easy and much more robust. As it’s Microsoft 365, all these apps play well together and they all hook into SharePoint to help drive better working practices and in an appealing way. The most exciting app to immediately take advantage of is Power BI.

Leverage Power BIPower BI is a suite of business analytics tools that can deliver insights from your organisation’s data. It is very, very powerful and, when used correctly, it can provide incredible reporting. It enables you to connect to hundreds of data sources, simplify data preparation (i.e., reducing significant manual effort for reporting), and drive ad hoc analysis.

It can handle a wide assortment of data analytic objectives, going from consuming and modelling data to presenting it as dashboards and sharing this visualised reporting with the people who care about them.

The top advantages of Power BI – Usability, Power, Search capabilities.

‘Usability’: Power BI makes it simple to transform data into meaningful visualised reports quickly. This is made possible by a drag and drop system of creating visuals, pick the visual, choose the data you want in it and it gives you an interactive way of looking at your data. You can have a report or dashboard set-up in minutes after you import your data.

It’s powerful (!): Power BI is a powerful tool for both modelling and visualising data. if you have experience with M or DAX you can start making calculated columns, measures, and even shaping your data before you import it without having to learn an entirely new language.

Search and interrogate your data: Power BI enables you to ask questions of your data, rather than your data presenting you with lots of confusing information.

Maximise reporting with SharePoint Online

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Our main tip here is you should know what you want the data to show you – and cut out everything you’re not interested in. Don’t be tempted to show everything, otherwise you’ll create a new headache of information overload. Once you’ve mastered what you need to see, the rest is fairly easy. Set the data source, then you can drag and drop the field onto the Power BI canvas and you start seeing your results instantly. Data sources aren’t just Excel either. They can include social media statistics as well as common data sources like SQL.

Leverage Power ViewPower View is a data visualisation tool that lets you create interactive charts, graphs, maps, and other visuals that bring your reports to life.

Leverage Power BI’s Reporting Web Part Power BI’s report web part for SharePoint Online, allows you to easily embed interactive Power BI reports in SharePoint Online pages.

To do this you need to use the ‘Embed in SharePoint Online’ option - the embedded reports are then fully secure so you can easily create secure internal portals.

Leverage Mobile functionality Mobile functionality should be expected these days, and when you need easy to interpret reports on the go, SharePoint Online delivers this functionality.

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ConclusionIf your company isn’t likely to be heading in the direction of the Cloud, it doesn’t mean your reporting should be affected. If your data is held in the Cloud, then powerful apps like Power BI can work wonders for your business. If you’re on-premises or have a hybrid setup, you can utilise other platforms like SQL’s SSRS.

Ultimately, your purposes with reporting will be the ability to gain valuable business insight. Whether it’s forecasting or reviewing previous analytics, it’s essential to have reporting tools that work for you. If your business is excel-heavy, it doesn’t mean your reporting needs to look like one giant Excel spreadsheet. You can hook in services like SSRS to get the best reports from your business.

If you’re looking to make the most of the reporting services compatible with SharePoint and within SharePoint and Microsoft 365 itself, get in touch – we’ll be more than happy to help.

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Contact us for support and adviceinfo@business-agility.com

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Business Agility Consulting LtdSpirella Building

Bridge RoadLetchworth Garden City SG6 4ET

01462 476 170info@business-agility.com