Transitioning to Microsoft Power Platform

Welcome to this step-by-step guide for Excel users, data analysts, and finance specialists. It is designed to take you through practical report development scenarios, including both technical and non-technical challenges. This book will equip you with an understanding of the use of Power Platform, technical skills, and solutions to address common development challenges.

While Power BI continues to be an exciting tool in the BI space, Power Platform is the real game changer in business. Using this architecture, a small team of citizen developers can build all kinds of solutions. For small businesses, Power Platform can be used to build bespoke CRM, Finance, and Warehouse management tools. For large businesses, it can be used to build an integration point for existing systems to simplify reporting, operation, and approval processes.

As reporting teams and individuals pivot from traditional Excel-based reporting to self-service reporting tools such as Power BI, you will find that this book shows how to transfer an existing Excel report into Power BI. You will take a step-by-step approach to the fundamental skill set in Power BI, including Power Query, Data Model, and DAX, and best practices in report sharing and data visualization. You will understand the importance of report governance for your organization. You will also learn about the most common SQL operations required for everyday report development. On the PowerApps side, you will start with a simple PowerApp and improvement techniques before moving on to Power Automate. The book concludes with an integrated solution framework that can be adopted to solve a wide range of business problems.

The book follows an Agile mindset in starting with a simple baseline and then building incremental improvements. It also takes a "What, Why, and How" approach to learning, so that you not only acquire the skills but also understand when to apply them. As an early adopter of Power Platform solutions, the author has used these tools to solve a wide range of business problems in different industries. This broad experience allows you to extract the most practical fundamentals of Power Platform to solve everyday business challenges.

What You Will Learn

• Develop reporting solutions and business applications
• Understand the Power Platform licensing and development environment
• Translate an Excel report into Power BI
• Apply Data ETL and modeling in Power BI
• Use Data Storytelling and dashboard design
• Reinforce development learning with Power Apps and Power Automate use cases
• Carry out data operations using SharePoint lists and SQL
• Integrate solutions with Power BI, Power Apps, and Power Automate

Who This Book Is For

Next-generation data specialists, including Excel-based users who want to learn Power BI and the Power Platform; finance specialists; and data analysts who want to enhance their skill set for the future job market