External Data Incorporation into Data Warehouses

Most organizations are exposed to increasing competition and must be able to orientthemselves in their environment. Therefore, they need comprehensive systems that areable to present a holistic view of the organization and its business. A data warehouse(DW) may support such tasks, due to its abilities to integrate and aggregate data fromorganizationally internal, as well as external sources and present the data in formats thatsupport strategic and tactical decision-makers. Traditionally, DW development projects have focused on data originating frominternal systems, whereas the benefits of data acquired external to the organization, i.e.external data, have been neglected. However, as it has become increasingly important tokeep track of the competitive forces influencing an organization, external data is gainingmore attention. Still, organizations are experiencing problems when incorporatingexternal data and these hinder the organizations from exploiting the potential of externaldata and prevent them to achieving return on their investments. In addition, currentliterature fails to assist organizations in avoiding or solving common problems. Therefore, in order to support organizations in their external data incorporationinitiatives, a set of guidelines have been developed and contextualized. The guidelinesare also complemented with a state of practice description, as a means of taking one steptowards a cohesive body of knowledge regarding external data incorporation into DWs.The development of the guidelines, as well as the establishment of a state of practicedescription, was based upon the material from two literature reviews and four interviewstudies. The interview studies were conducted with the most important stakeholderswhen incorporating external data, i.e. the user organizations (2 studies), the DWconsultants, and the suppliers of the external data. Additionally, in order to furtherground the guidelines, interviews with a second set of DW consultants were conducted.