DATA WAREHOUSING FUNDAMENTALS: A Comprehensive Guide for IT Professionals

4.6. CHAPTER SUMMARY

• While planning for your data warehouse, key issues to be considered include: setting proper expectations, assessing risks, deciding between top-down or bottom-up approaches, choosing from vendor solutions.

• Business requirements, not technology, must drive your project.

• A data warehouse project without the full support of the top management and without a strong and enthusiastic executive sponsor is doomed to failure from day one.

• Benefits from a data warehouse accrue only after the users put it to full use. Justification through stiff ROI calculations is not always easy. Some data warehouses are justified and the projects started by just reviewing the potential benefits.

• A data warehouse project is much different from a typical OLTP system project. The traditional life cycle approach of application development must be changed and adapted for the data warehouse project.

• Standards for organization and assignment of team roles are still in the experimental stage in many projects. Modify the roles to match what is important for your project.

• Participation of the users is mandatory for success of the data warehouse project. Users can participate in a variety of ways.

• Consider the warning signs and success factors; in the final analysis, adopt a practical approach to build a successful data warehouse.