Did you know that data transformation is just like cooking? Yes, you read that right! Join Robert Buktenica and his guest Brian Gilligan on another episode of Late Night Brews: Business Intelligence and Data Analytics as they talk about how to transform and utilise the data you collect.
As usual, grab a drink, sit back and relax as our guys talk about all things data transformation and the importance of using good data to create excellent reports.
TIMESTAMP
00:07 – Introduction
00:28 – The Brew
01:21 – How do we transform data?
03:48 – What do you do with the transformation?
TRANSCRIPT
Introduction
Robert: Hello, everyone, and welcome to another episode of the Late Night Brew, where I’m your host, Robert Buktenica, and joining me for episode three of the data analytics and or business intelligence, Brian Gilligan. Brian, welcome back.
Brian: Hello, again.
The Brew
Robert: Now, I completely forgot my intro, however, we all know the deal by now, we talk the brews first. Brian, what are you having with me, buddy?
Brian: All right, today, I got this one, Beachworth Pale Ale. This is very tasty. By the way, Pale Ale is really my go-to when I go to the pub here in Australia. They’re usually very quite nice and refreshing.
Robert: I respect that. Wheats have become my go-tos. I have a Honey Rye Golden Ale from Four Corners Local Buzz.
Brian: That looks tasty.
Robert: It’s really good. It is dangerously light flavorful, but not too much. I believe it’s like a five percent, so you can drink it most of the day. It’s a good one, it’s one of those you got to watch yourself on how many cans you’re going through.
How do we transform data?
Robert: All right, today, we are going to dive into what are we doing with this data, how do we work with it. On that, Brian, how do we transform all of these data that we’ve spend two episodes talking about?
Brian: Data, there’s a lot of it. I think the best way, the best metaphor for data transformation, a lot of times people call it ETL, something like that, but really, all we’re doing is we’re bringing the data together and making something beautiful of it, very similar to making a beautiful meal. I equate it to that.
If you think about a good meal, you first have to start with your ingredients. You have to go out and get the best ingredients you can. In the data world, that means that your data quality is good. But you may have data that’s your ingredients for your dashboards and your reports could be coming from anywhere. You have it from whether it’s the web, a data warehouse, whatever you might have it, think of it like those ingredients.
As a chef, what you really do is you’re bringing the best quality ingredients together, you’re preparing it, and you’re cooking it in a way where you bring all those beautiful flavors together to create a beautiful meal.
For me, that’s what I think about when I think about transforming data. You got to bring it, get all your ingredients and bring it together. Now, when I think about it, specifically with data, the big thing for me always comes down to, I guess of a tip, is you want your data to be scalable, which means that it can grow big and small. I ‘s not going to fall over.
Second is you want it to be sustainable, which means that you want it to last a long time. And then, lastly, you want it to be easy to use. Think about the meal, you want it to be tasty, but it doesn’t have to be super complex even though you have a lot of ingredients. You just want to bring it together in a way that’s elegant and something that’s easy to work with, and taste delicious.
Robert: In the culinary world, you eat with your eyes first. When you got that pretty dashboard, it’s a feast for your eyes and then you dig in to it.
Brian: That’s right.
What do you do with the transformation?
Robert: On that hungry, hungry point, you’ve got this beautifully cooked meal and this wonderfully sourced data, what do you do with it to transform it? What do we do with the transformation?
Brian: Well, when you transform it, you are bringing it together in what’s called a data model. That is that combination of bringing it together. There’s a lot of different ways we do it, but it is essentially getting all those ingredients, all those data things to talk. You might have something here, and you might have something there.
Really, the transformation is not just to aggregate or to bring it down, but it is to bring that, join that data together or stack it on top of each other, just make it talk. That’s really what we’re doing with it. Not that much, how do I say, it’s not anymore sophisticated than that or more complex.
Robert: It’s no big deal without beef bolognese, no big deal.
Brian: Well, like cooking, I will say this, like cooking, the data aspect of this transformation part, like good cooking, it takes up about eighty percent of the time. I found with more complex meals and more complex data, it does take a long time to do it, but if you do it right, it tastes delicious in the end.
Robert: My experience is the longest thing that always takes me, whether it’s cooking or projects, is the prep work. Dicing all the ingredients, gathering. Like I take out of this into migration world, a migration is eighty percent planning. You got to plan all those pieces and parts before you push any data across.
That’s most of it, and then the cooking, it was like, you just do this, do this, toss it, right? Put things in in the right order and out comes the meal.
Brian: That is exactly how it works. It just takes time and you’re a good chef, you have good techniques and different ways to bring it together. Some are better than others, but you know a good meal and that’s a good meal.
Robert: Always, whether it’s culinary or IT, garbage in, garbage out.
Brian: That’s exactly right, it has to be good ingredients.
Robert: Succinctly right there. You give terrible data, probably going to have a terrible report.
Brian: That’s exactly right.
Robert: On that hungry note, I’m going to go cook dinner because I am now very hungry after talking about data of all things. Brian, thank you very much for the information, for making us hungry. If there’s any questions, please feel free to reach out, our contact info is always below. Stay tuned for the next episode. Until then, mate, thank you very much and cheers.
Data transformation is what turns a spreadsheet of jumbled figures and numbers into usable, actionable business insights. Learn more about how to transform and leverage business data by checking out our full video series on Late Night Brew.
Suppose you want to find out how you can use data transformation to boost organisational success. In that case, you can download our Empower Your Decisions: Mastering Business Intelligence with Power BI guide or check out our BI consulting services. Contact us today to start planning your data transformation journey.
