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Application lead developer
The application lead developer should be prepared to discuss access and analysis issues on the review agenda. He or she may also actively participate in discussions regarding database design, tool selection, and technical infrastructure. Topics such as OLAP tools, ease of use, reports , and the extraction of data into private data sets require input from the application lead developer as well.
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BI infrastructure architect
The BI infrastructure architect should be prepared to discuss the technical infrastructure components , such as servers, network, the database management system (DBMS), and the various tools. In addition, the BI infrastructure architect should be able to address the scalability of the current platform and the plans for expanding the platform for future BI application releases.
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Business representative
The business representative who was involved in the BI project provides his or her opinions ”from a business person's perspective ”about the development process. He or she may comment on budgetary issues, the project plan, the overall management of the project, the effectiveness of his or her own contribution to the project, testing activities, or on any other topic he or she feels could be improved.
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Business sponsor
The business sponsor spearheads the BI project from its inception to its implementation and initiates the post-implementation review. He or she sends the invitation to the attendees, prepares opening remarks for the review, and closes the session.
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Data administrator
The data administrator must be prepared to discuss the data requirements and the business decisions made during the requirements and analysis activities. The data administrator should review the procedure used for resolving data disputes and make recommendations for improving it. He or she can also contribute to discussions about the nontechnical infrastructure.
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Data mining expert
The data mining expert should be prepared to suggest any necessary improvements to the BI application (or the BI decision-support environment as a whole) that could enhance the use of the data mining tool. These suggestions could involve discussions about the extract/transform/load (ETL) process, the cleanliness of the data, and the completeness of the data, as well as any limitations the current technologies impose on data mining activities.
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Data quality analyst
The data quality analyst should be a very active participant on the topics of source data analysis and data cleansing. He or she must be prepared to present a summary of data quality problems. This summary should include the impact of the bad data on the BI application as well as on the operational systems. The data quality analyst must also explain what type of cleansing is being performed in the ETL process. He or she should send out a document before the meeting that lists the data elements not being cleansed, indicating whether they are being rejected or moved into the BI target databases as is. He or she should also be able to discuss the current triage procedure for prioritizing the source data for cleansing.
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Database administrator
The database administrator must be prepared to discuss the design and content of the BI target databases and how to navigate through them. If one of the session topics is database design or database performance, it is the database administrator's responsibility to explain the database design decisions made during the project.
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Developers
All developers, whether ETL developers, application developers, meta data repository developers, or Web developers, should be encouraged to share their experiences with the development process. This could include discussions about methodology, status reporting, technical infrastructure components, testing procedures, and any other topics directly related to their development activities.
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ETL lead developer
The ETL lead developer should be prepared to discuss the data transformations being performed in the ETL process. He or she must be able to explain how the data from the source systems is being reconciled to the BI target databases and where the reconciliation totals can be viewed . On the technical side, the ETL lead developer may actively participate in platform scalability and tool discussions.
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Facilitator (not on the BI project team)
The facilitator must be someone who was not directly involved with the project. This person must have training in facilitation. His or her responsibilities include time-boxing questions and discussion topics, halting runaway discussions, keeping on schedule with the agenda, giving turns to attendees to speak, and in general "directing traffic" at the review meeting.
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Meta data administrator
The meta data administrator must be prepared to discuss what meta data is available and how to access it. He or she should send out a document with meta data examples prior to the meeting. The meta data administrator should also walk through the ETL load metrics that are being captured in the meta data repository, such as ETL reconciliation totals, trapped data error totals, and data quality (reliability) statistics.
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Project manager
The project manager is primarily responsible for organizing the review session. This includes finding a venue , creating the agenda, shipping documents to be reviewed during the session, scheduling the session, arranging for a facilitator and a scribe, and following up on action items.
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Scribe (not on the BI project team)
The scribe's main responsibility is to document the review discussions. The scribe writes and distributes the minutes of the meeting, prepares and distributes the action item list, and helps with other administrative activities.
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Stakeholders (including data owners )
Occasionally other stakeholders may want to participate in the post-implementation review. Stakeholders could be business people from other departments, the data owners of the operational source data, or IT staff from other BI applications who want to benefit from the lessons learned. Stakeholders could also be staff from operations, technical support, or the help desk. In general, stakeholders (with the exception of the data owners) do not actively participate in the review discussions.
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Subject matter expert
The subject matter expert is an active participant who represents the business view during the review discussions. Topics of data quality, meta data, ease of use, and problem resolution procedures should be of particular interest to this person. The subject matter expert may also contribute to the discussions regarding cost justification, the measurement of ROI, the impact on operational systems, and potential improvements to business processes.
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Web master
The Web master must be prepared to review the Web application issues and to answer questions regarding data access capabilities through the Web, as well as data security on the Web server. If some data is accessible globally through the Internet, the Web master should invite the security officer to the meeting to answer global security and privacy questions raised during the review session.
