Case Study II-2 Real-Time Business Intelligence at Continental Airlines
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Teaching Note on Case Study II-2:
Real-Time Business Intelligence at Continental Airlines
Objectives
The purpose of this case study is to explore the benefits of and the process for delivery of data
Overview
Real- MIS Quarterly Executive 3:4 (December 2004).
This case is a comprehensive example of how an organization used real-time data warehousing
and business intelligence applications in its turn around from a poorly performing to an industry
leading organization. The case is not heavy on technical details, but the essence of the
technology is explained. Thus, the case can be used with either Chapters 3 or 5 in Part I or with
Wixom, B.H., H. J. Watson, A.M. Reynolds, and J.A. Hoffer. 2008. “Continental Airlines
Continues to Soar with Business Intelligence,” Information Systems Management, 25, 102-112.
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Questions for Discussion
1.
Continental apply active or real-time warehousing differently than this concept is normally
described?
– -time, meaning they have an appropriate
mixture of data feeding and reporting cycles based on what refresh rates the business
2. In what ways does real-time data warehousing fit with the Continental strategy and
plans?
To change the company, Continental decided to be on the leading edge of applying high–
value technologies and business concepts, and real-time warehousing distinguishes
Continental among its competitors.
3. Describe the benefits of real-time data warehousing at Continental.
Each application, from the initial ones to the most current, have shown cost savings or
–
with a $5M dollar revenue increment).
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4. What did the data warehousing group do right that has led to the successful deployment
of (real-time) data warehousing and BI within Continental?
Developed a warehouse architecture that could grow and scale to meet these new real-
time and operational needs
5. What elements of the data warehousing environment at Continental are necessary to
support the extensive end-user BI application development that occurs?
Data exist in the data warehouse from sources that are trusted by end users
Users have access to and are trained in tools to access and manipulate data
6. Why does Continental believe that a 3rd normal form enterprise data model is important?
The comprehensive nature of an enterprise data model naturally results in a 3NF data
model
7. What special issues about data warehouse management (e.g., data capture and loading
for the data warehouse (ETL processes) and query workload balancing) does this case
suggest occur for real-time data warehousing? How has Continental addressed these issues?
Date and time management is amplified because of the finer granularity of data; although
the techniques available to handle date and time stamping are the same for any data
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warehouse, users in a real-time environment have to be better trained to deal with time in
queries and the large volume of data requires qualifications on time be handled as quickly
as possible (e.g., use of active flag quickly identifies the most recent values).
8. What generalizable lessons learned can be gleaned from this case? Are there other lessons
for you beyond those listed in the Lessons Learned section?
The published articles on this case study (see introduction to this teaching note) mention