Data Warehousing Solutions: A Guide to Storing and Organizing Your Business Data

Data Governance pertains to the policies and procedures around your organization’s handling of data. However, Data Warehousing is a more technical topic that focuses on the storage, organization, and management of large volumes of structured data to support reporting, analytics, and business intelligence efforts.

While governance ensures your data is secure, accurate, and compliant, a Data Warehouse (DW) provides the infrastructure needed to store and structure that data for meaningful analysis. Without proper warehousing, organizations may struggle with fragmented data, reporting inefficiencies, and performance issues when querying large datasets.

A Data Warehouse is simply a repository for data that’s used for reporting and related purposes. It may also be referred to as an Enterprise Data Warehouse (EDW), or a Data Lake, although the latter term is often misused. A Data Lake is considered raw data storage for any purpose, while a Data Warehouse is a structured data store for defined purposes.

We encourage our clients to consider some type of Data Warehouse for their Business Intelligence needs. Often, this is as simple as another database instance in an existing location in your infrastructure and is often cloud-based, although it does not have to be. It also does not necessarily need to be new or fancy technology that carries a large cost. In the simplest form, it’s just a database containing the information that’s important to you in a format that suits you.

It’s not unusual for reporting activities to take substantial amounts of computational power. This can affect the performance of the source system. For example, running a report over multiple years of data in an ERP system can slow it down significantly, affecting others while the report is processing. A Data Warehouse alleviates this.

It’s also not unusual for businesses to have multiple sources of data that are interrelated but contained in different systems. For example, customer data may be kept in both a CRM and an ERP system. The two systems together provide a comprehensive view of a customer’s journey but are physically separated. A Data Warehouse allows you to aggregate that data in one place and make connections that aren’t otherwise possible.

A Data Warehouse allows you to transform raw data and store it in a way that is most meaningful to your operation. There might be a need to eliminate certain records, perform calculations, or aggregate data together. Although these transformations can be performed during the reporting process, storing the data in the most useful format upfront simplifies access and enhances efficiency. Performance is typically better as well.

If you generate large amounts of data, it may not be feasible to keep all historical records in the source system it came from, or you may only want to allow a certain range of data for reporting purposes. A Data Warehouse allows you to shrink or extend the retention period in a way that fits your unique needs.

Utilizing a Data Warehouse enables you to create a data dictionary for your data consumers. Data users don’t need to navigate the complexities of every software system as they only need to work with a single relevant dataset tailored to their needs. This is particularly helpful if you adopt a Datamart approach.

Many of our clients have data in informal or unstructured systems such as Microsoft Excel, SharePoint, or other types of documents, including machine data and third-party data. When data sources are highly distributed and shared ad-hoc, it can lead to confusion and incorrect or less useful data. Bringing that information into your Data Warehouse eases those concerns, encouraging your staff to utilize data from one central location.

A Data Warehouse is an important asset in your Business Intelligence journey. It is one of the two primary technical components in your “Data Estate” which will help to eliminate the struggles you have in managing data today.

Let’s turn your data into a strategic advantage. Contact us today to explore how our Data Warehousing solutions can support your business goals.