Maximising the Potential of Microsoft Power Platform
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Microsoft Power Platform is a suite of business tools for forward-thinking enterprises, providing accessible and versatile solutions to improve workflow. Originally launched in 2018, Microsoft has continuously added new features and improvements to the toolset. OGL, building on its history of extensive experience and practical knowledge of Microsoft’s business products, offers active, comprehensive support services for Microsoft Power Platform, with a special focus on three applications.
Microsoft Power BI
Power BI (Business Intelligence) is an innovative DataOps solution for companies of any size. With a smart approach to data, Power BI gives businesses a new way to handle analytics, and the processing and presentation of data. Using automation and user-friendly interfaces, Power BI makes critical information more accessible and digestible to those who need it, without requiring micromanagement or large data teams.
Microsoft Power Apps
A professional-grade app development platform which is more accessible than many consumer-level tools, Power Apps allows the creation of unique application solutions to fit the specific needs of any enterprise. Power Apps offers an in-depth toolset, including AI, to create both customer-oriented experiences and powerful solutions for the business’ internal needs.
Microsoft Power Automate
Taking a collaborative and visually oriented approach to automation within the business, Power Automate integrates easily into your organisation’s structure and workflow. This tool allows you to create a flexible, linear map of business processes and set powerful automation scripts. With both fine-grain control and the capacity for transparency and ease of communication within the organisation, Power Automate has the potential to enable a new level of productivity in your enterprise.
Benefits of Microsoft Power Platform over other solutions
Data management
Data is an indispensable resource, and its management has become integral to business success. DataOps has evolved as an independent field to manage the acquisition, storage, analysis, selection and presentation of data. This can sometimes require an entire team to make sure that the most reliable, useful data finds its way to decision-makers quickly.
Power BI creates a robust and flexible solution to automate data extraction and presentation, streamlining your DataOps pipeline to keep costs low and efficiency high. This benefits communication through all levels of the business. Not only is critical strategic data delivered to leadership, but performance metrics and monitoring can give every organisational layer the information it needs to excel.
Business apps
In-house apps are of great benefit to any business. Some companies use third-party business software, but these are not designed with a firm’s unique needs in mind. They often lack scalability and become increasingly inefficient as the business evolves and grows. Whether for inventory management, payment processing, customer data storage or performance monitoring, a tailor-made app will always offer the most.
This may be ideal, but for organisations without a technology core focus, hiring someone to code and maintain a bespoke app can be prohibitively expensive.
Power Apps is an intuitive, low- or even no-code tool to create applications that fit exactly with the business’ needs. Because of the platform’s flexibility, these apps can be adjusted and updated as the organisation grows without disruption to ongoing business processes.
Backend automation
Automation is important in more industries than you might assume; 97% of businesses believe that automation is integral to their digital transformation. Anything from a two-person team of content creators to a successful manufacturing business with hundreds of employees can save time, energy and money by automating its repetitive backend processes.
Implementing or updating automation within a business can disrupt the organisation and inhibit productivity during the adjustment period, making it a risky option despite the benefits. With Microsoft Power Automate, any part of the business process that can be connected to the Power Platform can be automated intuitively – and the processes can be changed or updated as needed.
Smooth integration
Although each tool in Microsoft Power Platform is powerful individually, the platform excels in its synergy. Each application has been designed with connectivity in mind. Apps, BI and Automate can all work together, with automation improving data management, Apps drawing on the data organised by BI and business apps created in Power Platform helping to manage and monitor the automated processes. Microsoft Power Platform can also integrate with other Microsoft products and a vast number of third-party apps, websites and sources.
Unlocking Power for non-tech-oriented businesses
The accessibility and scope of Power Platform can help organisations navigate the IT skills gap as well as improving efficiency while minimising costs – but leveraging this potential is easier said than done. In today’s marketplace, technology is a critical part of any business’ success, but not all leaders have in-depth technical knowledge along with their own specialisations.
OGL is familiar with this problem. When HCT Construction Consultants was struggling with its Microsoft SharePoint implementation in 2021, the business was considering scrapping SharePoint altogether and returning to an on-premise data solution. However, with OGL’s help, a systematic data review allowed them to integrate and adapt SharePoint in a way that suited the business.
If you’re considering adopting the Power Platform for your business, you can easily become overwhelmed with decisions to make, information to account for and details to plan. Without well-informed, meticulous planning, you may find yourself implementing any new platform alongside other tools but not knowing how to connect them effectively. Using exclusively Microsoft products may sound like a solution, but if you already have good, effective solutions in some aspects of the business this could create unnecessary waste by updating to a new system from one that was working well.
The best way to maximise Microsoft Power Platform’s potential for your business is to partner with a reputable, expert support provider who can work closely with you and your business to find the ideal path forward. OGL Group brings world-leading technology expertise and responsive, in-depth support services together to assist businesses like Motivair with integrating Microsoft products into the long-term growth strategy.
From moving the firm away from an ageing Exchange on-premise infrastructure onto Microsoft 365 to adding Defender for ATP to provide additional security around its Office suite and introducing Exclaimer to centralise the management of their email signatures, Microsoft products allow Motivair to take a more collaborative approach to working. Visit OGL’s IT solutions page and get in touch to discover how to get the most out of Microsoft Power Platform or any other business solution.
