Power BI Support and Ad-Hoc Development
Business Intelligence Reporting with Power BI
Introduction
Maintel provides managed cloud communications and digital transformation services to organisations across both the public and private sectors. Through a combination of cloud communications, digital workplace technology, customer experience solutions, and secure connectivity services, Maintel helps businesses improve collaboration, productivity, and customer engagement.
Supporting organisations through increasingly complex technology environments requires access to reliable business intelligence and reporting. As reporting requirements evolved across the business, Maintel sought a more unified and scalable approach that would improve visibility, reduce duplication, and provide decision-makers with consistent, trusted data.
Challenges
Maintel approached Dolphin IT Solutions to assist with the consolidation of its legacy reporting environment.
Over time, multiple Power BI reports and data models had developed across the organisation, resulting in overlapping datasets, duplicated reporting logic, and inconsistent outputs. This fragmented approach made it increasingly difficult to maintain reporting standards and created unnecessary complexity within the Power BI environment.
The business required a solution that could automate and standardise reporting through a single Power BI data model while establishing a reliable single source of truth across the organisation.
However, centralising data alone would not be enough.
Maintel’s reporting users operated across different business functions and levels of responsibility, each requiring tailored visibility into company data. Sales teams required access to individual performance and opportunity reporting, operational teams needed detailed contractual and service information, and senior leadership required high-level business intelligence to support strategic decision-making.
The challenge was therefore twofold: consolidate and simplify the underlying reporting infrastructure while delivering a flexible reporting suite capable of dynamically adapting to different user roles and information needs.
Our Solution
Dolphin IT Solutions began the project by consolidating Maintel’s existing reporting architecture into a single, centralised Power BI data model.
Rather than maintaining multiple disconnected models with overlapping datasets, the new approach established one governed reporting foundation that standardised business calculations and reporting logic across the organisation.
This consolidation delivered several immediate benefits. By reducing duplicate datasets and minimising unnecessary Power BI Service refresh activity, the reporting environment became more efficient, easier to maintain, and more consistent in the information presented to users.
With the unified Power BI data model established, Dolphin then implemented a comprehensive security framework using Row-Level Security (RLS).
The RLS model enabled multiple user groups to access the same underlying data model while restricting visibility according to organisational role and permissions. This ensured users could securely access relevant information without exposing broader business data unnecessarily.
For example:
- Sales teams could view their own sales performance and opportunities
- Department managers gained visibility into team-level activity
- Senior leadership maintained access to organisation-wide reporting and performance metrics
This approach provided secure, scalable reporting without the need to create and maintain separate reporting environments for different audiences.
Dynamic Reporting Experience
Maintel’s reporting requirements extended beyond data access alone. Different departments required entirely different reporting experiences, ranging from executive dashboards to highly detailed contractual reporting.
To support this, Dolphin IT Solutions designed and developed a dynamic Power BI reporting suite driven by an intelligent menu system.
This approach allowed users to navigate reporting relevant to their role and business function while operating within a single reporting ecosystem. High-level management dashboards, operational reporting, and detailed contractual views could all coexist within one unified platform.
The result was a reporting experience that remained flexible and intuitive while maintaining consistent underlying data and governance.
Automated Daily Dashboards
In addition to interactive reporting, Dolphin delivered a daily executive dashboard designed to proactively surface key business metrics.
Rather than requiring users to log into reporting platforms each morning, automated dashboards containing critical figures and business indicators were distributed directly to relevant stakeholders via email.
This provided leadership and operational teams with immediate visibility into opportunities, performance indicators, and emerging trends at the start of each working day, supporting faster and more informed decision-making.
The dashboards were optimised for both desktop and mobile devices, with carefully selected visuals and layouts designed to complement native screen experiences and encourage easy consumption of information across devices.
Technology Trend Reporting and Phase Two Expansion
Following the successful delivery of the initial reporting platform, Dolphin IT Solutions was engaged for a second phase focused on strategic technology and contract trend analysis.
This phase involved extending the Power BI data model and introducing a new suite of analytical reports designed to identify changing technology trends across Maintel’s portfolio.
By modelling contract values over time and analysing performance against specific dates and technologies, Dolphin created dashboards that enabled senior leadership to understand:
- Which technologies were performing strongly
- Where demand trends were emerging
- How contract portfolios were evolving over time
- Which strategic areas presented growth opportunities or risk
Because the data refreshed daily, leadership teams gained access to current, data-driven insight rather than relying on static historical reporting.
Results
The completed solution transformed Maintel’s reporting environment from a fragmented collection of legacy reports into a governed, scalable, and highly flexible Power BI platform.
By consolidating reporting into a single data model and implementing Row-Level Security, Dolphin IT Solutions established a trusted single source of truth while simplifying maintenance and improving reporting consistency.
The dynamic reporting suite enabled different teams to access information tailored to their role without sacrificing governance or usability, while automated dashboards and strategic trend reporting gave leadership faster access to actionable insight.
With centralised Power BI reporting, secure data access, and daily refreshed analytics, Maintel gained a modern business intelligence platform capable of supporting both operational efficiency and long-term strategic decision-making.
