Meeting the needs of business users with data visualization

Some roles within an organization, such as data analysts, have always had easy access to data. For a long time, these roles were effectively gatekeepers of the data, and any "ordinary" business users that had custom data requirements would need to go through the data gatekeepers.

However, over the past few years, the growth of big data has expanded the thirst and need for custom data among a growing number of business users. Business users are no longer willing to tolerate having to go through long, formal processes to access the data they need to make decisions. Instead, users have come to demand easier, and more immediate, access to wider sets of data.

To remain competitive, organizations need to ensure that they enable all the decision-makers in their business to have easy and direct access to the right data. At the same time, organizations need to ensure that good data governance is in place, and that data...