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dipped sharply in the recent months in the entire enterprise. The analyst starts this
analysis by querying for the overall sales for the last five months for the entire
company broken down by individual months. The analyst notices that, although the
sales do not show a drop, profitability exhibits a sharp reduction for the last
three months. Now the analysis proceeds further when the analyst wants to find out
which countries show reductions. The analyst requests a breakdown of sales by
major worldwide regions and notes that the European region reveals the reduction
in profitability. Now the analyst senses that clues become more pronounced. So the
analyst looks for a breakdown of the European sales by individual countries.
The analyst finds that profitability is increased for a few countries and decreased
sharply for some other countries and has stayed the course for the rest. At this
point, the analyst introduces another dimension into the analysis. Now the analyst
wants the breakdown of profitability for the European countries by country, by
month, and by product. This step brings the analyst closer to the reason for the
decline in the profitability. The analyst observes that the countries in the European
Union show a very sharp decline in profitability for the last two months. Further
queries reveal that manufacturing and other direct costs remained at the usual
levels but the indirect costs shot up. The analyst is now able to determine that the
decline in profitability is because of the additional tax levies on some products in
the European Union countries. The analyst has also determined the exact effect
of the levies so far. Strategic decisions follow on how to deal with the decline in
profitability.
Now look at Figure 20-15 showing the steps through the single analysis session.
Thought process based on each query result
Query sequence in the analysis session
Sales OK,
profitability
down, last 3
months
Countrywide monthly sales for
last 5 months ???
Sharp enterprise-
wide
profitability dip
Monthly sales breakdown by
worldwide regions ???
Begin
analysis
Sharp
reduction in
European
region
Breakdown of European sales
by countries ???
Breakdown of European Sales
by countries, by products ???
Increase in a
few countries,
flat in others,
sharp decline in
some
Display of direct and indirect
costs for Euro Union countries
Additional tax
on some
products in EU.
Direct costs
OK, indirect
costs up
Sharp decline in
EU countries,
last 2 months
End
analysis
Figure 20-15
Query steps in an analysis session.
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