Usability criteria for Business Intelligence Reports in the South African banking industry

Abstract

Background: The South African banking sector is renowned as world-class, exhibiting ample capital, cutting-edge technology, robust infrastructure, and a rigorous regulatory and supervisory framework. Business intelligence systems are fundamental to providing the data-driven decision support needed to keep the banking industry competitive. The problem is that many business intelligence (BI) reports are not used optimally, or not used at all, because of usability problems.

Objectives: The objective is to report on an investigation into BI usability criteria and to propose evidence-based, critical usability criteria for BI reports in the banking industry.

Method: A mixed-methods research design, guided by a pragmatist philosophy was employed. Usability criteria for BI systems from literature formed the basis of a survey with employees at a South African Bank. The company issues log (CIL) on BI reports was analysed to investigate the mapping between the reported issues and usability requirements. Interviews were performed to validate the findings from the survey and CIL analysis.

Results: The triangulation of the findings from the survey, CIL data analysis and the interviews revealed discrepancies, which were used to refine the initial set of criteria towards proposing the critical usability criteria for the BI banking context.

Conclusion: Despite the discrepancy between the survey findings and the CIL analysis, the reports’ usability issues were confirmed by the interview findings.

Contribution: The scientific contribution is the evidence-based critical usability criteria for South African BI banking reports. On a practical level, the usability criteria can be applied to design and evaluate financial reports.