BI vs. PM

I thought the debate as to whether business intelligence (BI) and performance management (PM) were the same thing had long since been settled. Imagine my surprise when Mark Smith points out in “BI Is Not Performance Management“ that the discussion is alive and well.

Rather than spill more ink documenting the differences between business intelligence and performance management, here is a handy table that categorizes the most important ones:

Business Intelligence	Performance Management
Understand	Align, understand, and adjust
Monitor and measure	Motivate, manage, monitor, measure
Metrics	Goals, initiatives, and metrics
Structured quantitative data	Structured and unstructured qualitative data
Automated data loading	Automated loading and manual data entry

BI might be an enabling technology used in some PM applications but, in general, they serve different purposes.

Still not convinced? Read this story of performance management in local government and tell me what it has to do with business intelligence.