Enable Analyze in Excel Without Build Permissions on Power BI Semantic Models

[Louise_D]

Description: Currently, Power BI requires users to have Build permissions on a semantic model to use the Analyze in Excel feature. However, this permission also grants users the ability to create new reports in Power BI based on the semantic model, which conflicts with governance models in organizations that maintain centralized reporting.

Request: We propose introducing a separate permission that allows users to utilize Analyze in Excel without granting full Build rights. This would allow organizations to maintain strict control over report creation while enabling end users to perform ad-hoc analysis in Excel as needed.

Business Case: Our organization follows a centralized reporting approach where only designated individuals or teams are responsible for building and maintaining reports to ensure data consistency and governance. At the same time, business users often require the ability to perform their own exploratory analysis using Excel. The current permission structure forces organizations to choose between either:

• Restricting Analyze in Excel, limiting business users' flexibility for self-service analysis.

• Granting Build permissions, which compromises governance by allowing users to create and share their own Power BI reports based on the semantic model.

By decoupling Analyze in Excel from Build permissions, Microsoft would enable organizations to:

• Maintain a single source of truth by restricting report creation to approved users.

• Empower end users to leverage Analyze in Excel for ad-hoc analysis without jeopardizing data governance.

• Reduce reliance on workarounds, such as exporting static data, which can lead to inefficiencies and inconsistencies.

Proposed Solution: Introduce a dedicated permission (e.g., "Analyze in Excel" Access) that allows users to connect to the semantic model in Excel without being able to create new Power BI reports. This permission could be managed separately in dataset security settings.

This enhancement would strike a balance between governance and self-service analytics, benefiting both IT administrators and business users.

We encourage the Power BI team to consider this enhancement and would love to hear feedback from other users who face similar challenges.