Why Does Your Power BI Report Look “Fine” Until a Consultant Touches It?

Read time: 2.5 minutes

Tips For Creating a Power BI Report Consultant-Proof:

1. If one person's leaving breaks your Power BI report, then that report was never stable.
Having a Power BI report work does not imply that it is replicated.
Solution: All datasets should have an owner and a purpose defined.

2. Your KPIs should tell their story without a long meeting.
If you have to spend 20 minutes explaining a KPI, you will lose trust in the future.
Solution: Rewrite your KPIs to be explained in three sentences.

3. Hidden Filters are Logic Changes Without Noise.
Slicers and Page Level Filters do not look like governance but function as such.
Solution: Label all logic-changing filters and remove them from executive pages.

4. Your Report Is Only As Strong As Its Semantic Model!
If your semantic model is not structured properly, each time you create a new report, you create more chaos.
Solution: Build a Semantic Model as a Product with versioning and ownership.

5. Your Greatest Audit is the External Consultant Test!
If it takes less than one hour to explain why each value is what it is, then it is easy for other future versions of yourself to replicate.
Solution: Have the report given to a new analyst to change one of the KPIs within 48 hours.

💡Key Takeaway: 

A Power BI report does not qualify as a 'good' report simply because it loads... it will be considered a 'good' report when anyone can interact with it without causing any instability to the entire system.