Syllabus and Course Description
Fall Semester of the Academic Year of 2012
Course Title：(Chinese) 商業智慧
(English) Business Intelligence
Department/
Institute of Business
Institute
and Management
Permanent Course
IBM
ID
Instructor: Sule Balkan
Year of Students
(for undergraduate
courses)
Required competence or courses that must be previously taken by students: Graduate standing,
English Competency, Basic knowledge of Business and Economics
Credits
3
Required/
Elective
Elective
Course Overview: This course focuses on business intelligence (BI), which is a broad category of
technologies, applications, and processes for gathering, storing, accessing, and analyzing data to help
its users make better decisions. BI can help organizations in strategic and operational decision
making by improving corporate performance management, optimizing customer relations,
monitoring business activity, and traditional decision support (Negash, 2004).
This course explores BI at both the micro and macro levels. At the micro level, the development
of individual applications is covered. At the macro level, implementing BI enterprise-wide is
investigated. Business Intelligence services based on data mining techniques of data capture,
cleansing, validation, storage and analysis help decision makers improve the timeliness and quality of
inputs to the decision process. Course Objectives: This course provides a thorough understanding of
the concepts of managing data resources and the development of business intelligence capabilities
using data visualization, data warehousing, data mining, online analytical processing (OLAP),
decision support systems (DSS), and other business intelligence (BI) topics.
After successful completion of class students will
 Build a deep understanding of how organizations build sustainable competitive advantage with IT
 Understand the newly evolving BI technologies such as, data warehousing, data mining, and
business performance measurement
 Know how to develop a business case of introducing new BI competencies within an organization
 Be able to integrate BI into business processes and decision-making within your responsibilities
 Identify the information needs of business processes and choose the right metrics as their performance
measures
 Make use of BI systems for implementing business strategy
Textbook and
other reading

Turban, Sharda, Delen, King “Business Intelligence: A Managerial Approach”,
publisher: Pearson, 2nd Ed. 2011. ISBN 9780136100669


Subscription to Information Management free online newsletter
Ayres, Ian. Super Crunchers: Why Thinking-by-Numbers Is the New Way to Be
Smart ISBN: 978-0-553-80540-6
Copyrighted Readings:
1. “Data, Data Everywhere: A special report on managing information”, The Economist,
February 27th 2010
2. "Competing on Analytics." Davenport, Thomas H. In HBR OnPoint, Case No. 3005.
Published 01/01/2006, Harvard Business School Publishing, (12 pages).
3. "Right Away and All at Once: How We Saved Continental." Brenneman, Greg. In
Harvard Business Review, Case No. 98503. Published 09/01/1998, Harvard Business School
Publishing, (11 pages).
4. “What is Strategy?” Porter, Michael E. In Harvard Business Review, Case No. 4143.
Published, Nov-Dec 1996, Harvard Business School Publishing, (20 pages)
5. "Diamonds in the Data Mine." Loveman, Gary W. In Harvard Business Review, Case No.
R0305H. Published 05/01/2003, Harvard Business School Publishing, (8 pages).
6. Online Marketing at the Big Skinny
Free Resource Readings (provided by the instructor):
1. “Continental Airlines Takes Off with Real-time Business Intelligence”, Teradata
University Network.
2. “Seven Simple Rules for Successful Real-time BI”.
3. “Making IT Matter: A Manager’s Guide to Creating and Sustaining Competitive
Advantage with Information Systems.” Piccoli, Gabriele. The Center for Hospitality
Research, Cornell University.
4. “Harrah’s High Payoff from Customer Information”, Teradata University Network.
5. “Data Mining Primer” Zaima, Arlene (Teradata Corp.)
Course Contents
Hours
Remarks
Description of Course Details:
Case Discussions: Professor will facilitate discussions to address questions raised from the case studies,
with students doing most of the conversation. Readings and discussion questions appear in this document.
(See “How do you prepare for class?” and “Readings, presentations, and discussion questions” below). In
order to ensure classroom contributions, weekly quizzes will be conducted at the beginning of the class.
Students have to come to the class well prepared and ready to discuss the topics.
Lectures : Portions of class sessions will be devoted to traditional “lectures” and
discussions around concepts, frameworks, and models that may be applied to a real-life situation
described in the case study.
Hands on Exercises: Portions of a few class sessions will be devoted to technologies that underlie BI
systems – data warehousing, data mining, business process management – including hands-on computer
use to further the understanding of concepts introduced in the class.
Student Presentations/Discussions: Student teams will be asked to make a presentation in front of the class
to provide a deeper understanding of a topic or to illustrate relevance of the topic to real-life situations.
Homework assigned will mainly consist of preparing such presentations.
In-class Work: Students will be asked to work individually or in teams on topics of the day, do problem
solving, generate ideas, write short answers to questions, etc.
Weekly Case write presentations/Quizzes: 150 points (10 points each) Multiple Choice Quiz
from the readings that will be discussed that day. If you will be absent from the class please
provide proper documentation.
Homework and Assignments: 150 points: Homework assignments will be given from the
textbook or from the Teradata University Network site. Students will share their work in class
in rotation.cs
Group Project 200 pts : Group Presentation:
In this assignment you are being asked to work in teams of 4 or 5 to assess an important
emerging trend in the area of data warehousing and business intelligence. Your assessment will
result in a 30 minute presentation with 5 minutes for Q&A. Please bring a hard copy of your
presentation materials (a well written research paper and power point (or other medium for)
presentation) for review the instructor.
There is considerable flexibility in what can be done, and creativity is encouraged. You are welcome
to give software demonstrations, compare products in the market, present a case study, give an
update on current practices, etc. When creating your presentation, please focus on communicating
depth within your topic, not breadth.
The presentations are graded based on the group’s demonstrated depth of knowledge on the topic and
the ability to communicate useful, relevant information about the topic to their peers. In other words,
the group needs to add value to their peers so that their peers can leave and apply their new topic
understanding. Why should an IT manager care about your topic? And, how should the IT manager
change people, processes, and technologies to best leverage the topic within his or her organization?
Your presentation should cover at least the following.
Topic Understanding. Your analysis should begin by defining your topic and presenting your topic
within the warehousing and BI industry. In general, what exactly should your peers understand about
this topic to manage it effectively?
Business value. Assess the potential business value of your topic for organizations involved in
warehousing and BI. In general, what should your peers consider when putting together a business
case for this topic?
Software demo or case studies. Place your topic within a context by presenting either
1) a software tool that represents the space under examination or 2) a case study of a
company that is currently exploring and managing your topic. In general, how can you
best communicate to your peers exactly what this topic is in a tangible way?
Looking ahead. What next? Given your research and analysis of your topic, where do we go from
here? In general, how can your peers best prepare to manage your topic in the future?
Note: Make sure that as you cover these four basic areas, your presentation is communicated as a
consistent and coherent overall story.
Teams and topics: You will work in teams of 4 or 5. Each team will be assigned a different
topic. By Monday, October 15th your team must email your 3 possible topic choices from the list
below to Sule Balkan. Topics will be assigned based on the order your requests were received, so
please submit your choices as soon as possible. Please e- mail your topic requests in rank order of
preference.
Managing unstructured data
Unstructured data warehouses per Bill Inmon;
text mining;
knowledge management in BI
In-memory Analytics/In database Analytics
Active data warehousing
Mobile BI
Social BI
BI and Marketing
Privacy and BI
Closed- loop processes, active warehousing techniques
Integration platforms or warehouse appliances
EII, virtual warehousing, appliances like Netezza
Microsoft or SAP as viable enterprise analytical solutions
The importance of data visualization
Using warehousing/BI to measure business performance
Office Hours
Time Slot
Location
Contact Information
Syllabus
Week
Subject
HBR Case/ Text Book Reading Assignments
Meet and Greet/Goals-Objectives/Terms and Concepts
Introduction to Case Method
Teaching with Cases
1 Introduction
Because Wisdom Can’t be Told
Turban CH1: Opening Vignette, Sections 1.1-1.3, Data
Data Everywhere: A Special Report on Managing
Information
2 Managing Information
“Competing on Analytics”
Turban Ch 1.4, Ch 2-Sections 2.1-2.4
A Dimensional Modeling Manifesto (ER and Dimensional model
comparison)
3 Data Warehouse
“Business Intelligence Tutorial: Past, Present and
Future”
Ch 2-Sections 2.1-2.4
HW: Case:
“Continental Airlines Flies High with Real-time
Business Intelligence”
Read the full Continental Airlines case (summarized in
4 Real time BI
the End of Chapter Application Case) at Teradata
studentnetwork.com and answer the questions.
Ch 3 Sections 3.1-3.6
Business Performance
5 Management
Case: Harrah’s Case. Read the case and answer the
questions at the end of the case
Microstrategy Tutorial (TUN)
Ch 3 Sections 3.7-3.9
BPM Methodolgies and Dashboards
A Real Six Sigma Experience
What Is Strategy? (HBR OnPoint Enhanced Edition)
Making IT Matter
6 Strategy
Chapter 4 - Opening vignette, Section 4.1, 4.2 (Light)
“Diamonds in the Data Mine”
Data Mining Primer
7 Data Mining
Predictive Analytics
CH 4.1
Steps with Structural Data
Sas E-Miner Example
8 Data Mining Process
Predictive Analytics
Campaign Execution and Wales Market Case
9 Campaign Management
InData Base Analytics (BI Journal)
Ch 5 Sections 5.1-5.4
10 Text Mining
Introduction to Unstructured Data
Big Data Analysis
Claudera
Ch 5 Sections 5.6-5.7
11 Web Mining
Hadoop Tutorials
“Online Marketing at the Big Skinny”
12 OnLine Marketing
13 Data Visualization
Tableau Software
15 BI Implementation
CH 6
16 Group Presentations
17 Group Presentations
Additional Resources
There are many resources that can help you in your data warehousing and business
intelligence education. Resources that I highly recommend:
 The Data Warehousing Institute (www.dw-institute.com) sponsors regional
training courses and quarterly conferences that are outstanding. They also sponsor
The Business Intelligence Journal, which publishes very strong articles.
 DM Review (www.DMReview.com) is the leading practitioner publication for
this space. I highly recommend that you register for DM Review if you are
interested in data warehousing and BI.
Remarks：
1、Computers in class. You may use computers for note taking or calculations during
class. However, you should refrain from “surfing” the web, sending/receiving e-mail, or
working on other courses during class. This is disrespectful to the other students around
you and diminishes the overall learning in the classroom. If you have something else
that MUST be done during class, please do not attend.
unless you are expecting emergency notification.
Attendance. Prompt attendance is expected.
unexcused absences
Please turn off your cell phone
You will get a wquiz grade of 0 for
Consistent with University policy, I will excuse absences of students that result from
religious observances and to provide without penalty for the rescheduling of examinations
and additional required class work that may fall on religious holidays. Any student in
this course who plans to observe a religious holiday that will conflict with course work
should contact me as soon as possible so we can make appropriate arrangements