Chapter 4

Advanced Business Analysis

4.1. Introduction

The main aim of the approaches previously discussed was to provide decision makers with suitable information. It is possible to identify this information if you precisely define the monitored key performance indicator (KPI) or if an analyst formulates adequate queries during the analysis. They usually ask and then answer the questions “What happened?” (reporting), “Why did it happen?” (analyzing), and “What is happening now?” (monitoring). But the most intriguing are the questions about the future: “What will happen?” (extrapolation and prediction). Additionally, we can often discover unexpected connections (regularities) in the given business area. This can be achieved thanks to data-mining ...

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