Expectations & Goals
The Business Intelligence Case Studies (ICS) course far exceeded the expectations I had for it going in. I was excited to read each case study and learn how data impacted each of the businesses we reviewed; however, I was not prepared for the scope of the studies and just how many industries were analyzed, evaluated, and described in the course’s book Big Data in Practice.
I can honestly saw that I achieved all three of my course goals during the ICS course even though I set those goals 11 months ago with absolutely no clue what to expect, at the very beginning of my journey. Being able to take a raw business case study and turn it into a rough BI solution proposal was an amazing experience and being able to do so with an organization that was in the same relative industry as my capstone client was refreshing. ICS was a great course with the opportunity to practice the skills learned throughout the entire program.
What I Learned
I struggle to answer what I learned from this course because it is much more about what I was able to practice. The previous courses in the BIMS program provided the initial foundation, then the knowledge, then the skills to create truly impactful work.
This course was not about learning a single concept but more about being able to take the foundation, knowledge, and skills obtained and put it to practice for a client.
So, I think for ICS – what I learned was that the BIMS program has equipped me with an amazing toolbox full of skills that I can lean into and even in a time crunch with limited knowledge of a company generate an impactful proposal that is founded in facts, data, and research.
Applying the Knowledge
Applying the knowledge from ICS going forward seems to be the easy part. ICS focuses on generating factual arguments, data-supported proposals, and thinking strategically. I plan to use these skills and the knowledge gained in the ICS course to drive my own career further by submitting data-supported ideas for my leadership and executives and presenting those ideas in a visually appealing, easy to digest, and well-organized manner similar to the Solution Proposal created during the ICS course.
Nicholas Sherren's Journey to Mastery 