Power BI and Data Estate Modernisation for Flourish Australia
Flourish Australia (Flourish) is one of Australia’s leading providers of community-based mental health support. With over 65 sites across five states, it delivers a wide range of services designed to help people with lived experience of mental health issues live meaningful, self-directed lives.
As a registered NDIS provider, Flourish supports recovery through peer-led services, personalised recovery plans, housing support, physical and mental health programs, and employment transition.
Focusing strongly on co-design, cultural inclusion, regional access, and innovation, Flourish aims to build communities where mental health and wellbeing can truly flourish. The organisation's values—trust, respect, hope, inclusion, integrity, diversity, and partnership—show in its support of individuals and in the evolution of its services.
As Flourish continues to expand its reach and impact,
digital transformation is playing a key role in ensuring those services remain responsive, measurable, and future-ready.
The Challenge
Flourish was facing a familiar challenge: too much
data, too little insight. Despite having rich data sources across operations, finance, people and culture, and marketing, the organisation lacked a central business intelligence (BI) capability. Employees manually created most reports, using Excel spreadsheets and legacy dashboards.
“Our biggest challenge was that we knew we had a lot of data, but we didn’t have a system and a meaningful way to process and present it. We didn’t have a shared language around data,” explains Dinoy Jose, General Manager, Digital & Technology at Flourish. “It was time-consuming, inconsistent, and often out of date.”
“Our relationship with Flourish began in 2023 through a referral from Wellways. After a strategic consulting review, we stayed in close contact, and when their Dynamics 365 rollout surfaced reporting challenges, they turned to us as a trusted
Microsoft partner,” CBS Business Development Manager, Robert Williams.
Reporting lag created delays in program evaluation and decision-making, especially in the provision of NDIS support where real-time performance insight is critical. Flourish needed a more reliable, scalable BI platform to support their digital transformation roadmap.
The challenge wasn’t just technical. It was also cultural. Because multiple departments produced their own reports through necessity, a significant mindset shift was necessary. “People were invested in their own spreadsheets and outdated tools” says Dinoy. “We needed a unified, shared language around data.”
The Solution
Canon Business Services ANZ (CBS) partnered with Flourish to
modernise their data architecture and build a new analytics capability using Microsoft Power BI and Microsoft Fabric.
The engagement began with a one-day Business Insights Workshop, hosted at Flourish Australia’s Parramatta office. This workshop brought together stakeholders from nine business functions, including People and Culture, Operations, Strategy, and Marketing.
“We had nine Flourish business areas in the room, which gave us a richness in understanding,” says Raji Haththotuwegama, Head of Data & AI at CBS. “It was vital to get all the voices in the room. We wanted to understand not just what people were reporting on, but why.”
CBS facilitated exercises to gather user stories, prioritise metrics, and co-design dashboard wireframes. “That early engagement was critical,” says Dinoy. “It created ownership and built trust from the start.”
“Because we’d built a strong relationship over two years, we were able to act quickly. That early alignment—getting the right people in the room and asking the right questions—was a huge contributor to success,” Robert explains.
Following the workshop, CBS delivered a foundational data estate that included:
- A Microsoft Fabric OneLake architecture for unified data storage and management
- A structured data warehouse to enable governance and scalability
- Data cleaning and transformation layers, ensuring accuracy and alignment across departments
- Business logic and definitions that standardised KPIs organisation-wide
- Four priority dashboards tailored to support operational decision-making and cross-functional reporting
CBS also focused on usability, creating visual mock-ups for Flourish stakeholders to approve before backend development began. This meant teams could visualise outcomes early and provide feedback. “The design process made it really clear what we were building,” says Dinoy. “We weren’t surprised by what we saw.”
“From the outset, we knew this needed to be a true partnership—not just a project. That’s why we fully funded the initial discovery workshop, with no strings attached,” explains Robert. “Bringing everyone together upfront was essential for building trust and setting the engagement up for success.”
Benefits and Results
While the project is still in the user acceptance testing (UAT) phase, the benefits are already clear.
- Manual effort eliminated.Where teams once spent hours gathering and reconciling data for monthly reporting packs, they now have dashboards that update in near real-time.
- Greater confidence in data. With consistent logic and definitions applied across the board, teams now trust the numbers they see.
- Faster decision-making. Leadership can access performance metrics and program insights without waiting for static reports.
- Stronger data culture. The collaborative process has helped embed a more mature, shared understanding of data across the organisation.
- Platform for future growth. The modern data estate is built to scale. As new reporting needs emerge, additional dashboards can be rolled out efficiently.
“One of the biggest standouts is CBS’ business analysis capability,” says Dinoy.
“They were great at translating our needs into something tangible and also kept us focused on what matters most.”
Raji agrees. “Flourish approached this with real openness and collaboration. Their appetite to do things properly, not just quickly, meant we could deliver something sustainable.”
“The feedback from Flourish has been overwhelmingly positive. It’s been a genuinely collaborative experience, and I know the team has really enjoyed working with ours,” Robert adds.
The engagement also addressed long-standing reporting pain points. “We used to have to create multiple reports from various data sources, which made it extremely time-consuming and inefficient,” Dinoy explains. “Now, we’re working from a single source of truth.”
This clarity is especially important in an NDIS context, where evidence-based decision-making is vital to support delivery. By providing a consistent lens on what’s working, what needs adjustment, and where effort is being directed, the new dashboards have become a trusted operational tool.
“It’s about empowerment,” says Dinoy. “Staff can now explore insights on their own, without relying on IT and Data Insights team. That’s a big shift.”
Looking ahead
“What sets CBS apart is our ‘we truly care’ culture,” says Robert. “We understand the budget constraints and technical capacity issues that many not-for-profits face, so we bring a practical, partnership-led approach that prioritises both empathy and long-term value.”
With the foundation in place, Flourish is well-positioned to explore more advanced analytics and AI-enabled insights. CBS is now supporting additional dashboard builds and helping identify future opportunities in automation, predictive analytics, and improved data governance.
“Flourish has already begun automating processes like IT onboarding and offboarding,” Robert notes. “Over the next 12 to 18 months, we expect that momentum to expand across every department, unlocking even more efficiency and insight.”
“We’re only just scratching the surface,” says Raji. “The real value comes as data maturity grows, and new questions start to emerge. We’re excited to keep working with Flourish on that journey.”
For Flourish, the project has delivered more than technology. It has set a new benchmark for how digital transformation can be inclusive, practical, and aligned to mission.
“For not-for-profits, where every dollar and decision counts, data modernisation can feel daunting—but it’s one of the most empowering steps you can take,” Robert suggests. “With the right partner, it becomes not just achievable, but transformative.”
