What kind of questions do you ask your clients when engaging them to determine the correct solution?

[Anonymous]

Hello BI consultants,

As a begginer, I want to ask the question, how do you go about approaching your clients in the first meeting. Often times, I realize that the requirements for the actual data aggregation, visualization, etc is the easy part. What I want to know about, is how do you determine what kind of licenses are required? How do you discuss the architecture of the solution with the client? What kind of questions do you see yourself asking for high level purposes?

Example:

- How many people need access to this report?

- On Prem or in the Cloud?

- Refresh cycles?

Very broad question, but would appreciate any input.

Thank you,

Ron

[Migasuke]

Hi @Anonymous ,

I a sure you will hear here lot of informations.
On the first meetings I usually ask general questions like:

• What are the data sources?
• What is the data about?
• Can I expect any issue with data quality?
• What should be the best output? (Easy report with main KPIs or some sofisticated report with advanced visuals)

[selimovd · Accepted solution]

Hey @Anonymous ,

that's not really easy to answer. In general it's challenging to find the best solution for your client.

In your mind you have to be aware of the different ways you can use Power BI (import, live connection, direct query, composite) and the Service (Workspace, Premium, Premium per User, Gateway, App) what are the different criteria.

Start to find out if import would fit, as it gives the most possibilities. For example ask how much data we are talking about. If it's a few Gigabyte to import it will be difficult, check if they have a premium capacity that they could use with Incremental Fresh.

Ask in general what are the data sources as things like Incremental Refresh depend on them. Also ask if they are on Premises or in the cloud as this would open the Gateway topic.

Then you have to find out how they use it. How many user will access the report, how many will create reports? Will there be multiple reports based on the same data set. Is the report just for a small group or a big audience what will tell you if should create an app.

Who should maintain the report? Maybe a SSAS Tabular makes more sense? If a lot of users are affected, you have to make sure there are backups and there is a deployment process.

Like this you have to get a feeling what they really want and then you can lead them to the right direction.

As I said that's not easy, but it's getting easier from time to time.

I'm a Senior BI consultant since nearly 9 years, that's acutally what I do on a daily schedule.

If I answered your question I would be happy if you could mark my post as a solution ✔️ and give it a thumbs up 👍

Best regards

Denis

Blog: WhatTheFact.bi

Follow me: twitter.com/DenSelimovic

[AndreaLee1212]

@selimovd 

Hi Selimovd,

I have read carefully your answer and had a few doubts. When you say: "this would open the Gateway topic" . What are you thinking that I should explain about the gateway if the customer has an hybrid data model related to the gateway ? Didn't get your toughts here.

And another doubt that I have is when you say "Is the report just for a small group or a big audience what will tell you if should create an app." - I'm considering that if it is for a big audience then the customer should be thinking to get an app so BI users can acess the reports, am I right ? But what is the benefits using the app in this scenario ? 

Sorry for all the questions , just a lonely wolf trying to understand more about PowerBi.

thanks,

andrea