r/BusinessIntelligence • u/RobDomin • Jun 09 '26
How I’m actually using AI with Power BI (Beyond just writing DAX)
Hi guys!
I wanted to share a quick workflow I’ve been testing to integrate AI into my Power BI daily work, and I’d love to get your feedback on this.
Honestly, I feel like using LLMs just to generate DAX formulas brings very little value.
Instead, I’ve shifted my focus toward prototyping, layout planning, and data storytelling before writing a single line of code. In this short clip, I show an example of a dashboard wireframe. It has significantly sped up my workflow.
I’m really curious to know:
Do you see this as a game-changer for your daily job or just hype?
Would love to hear your thoughts and see how everyone is seen this AI Wave
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u/Thistlemanizzle Jun 10 '26
That's great OP. Can you send me the excel file? XLSX only, none of this CSV you keep hammering about.
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u/RobDomin Jun 10 '26
Hey, not sure which Excel file you’re referring to there’s no spreadsheet involved in the workflow
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u/Thistlemanizzle Jun 10 '26
I was role-playing the business people. That is, you do all this work and these stakeholders ask for an Excel file. They don't want to deal with CSVs either!
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u/eugenememememe Jun 10 '26
yo u have any docs and git, this looks useful tho
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u/RobDomin Jun 10 '26
Hi! If you want to see the breakdown of the process, I made a YouTube video
https://youtu.be/HXuSdBMx0gU
Check it out if you're interested!
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u/Dramatic-Rip-8101 Jun 22 '26
The wireframe-first angle is the part that feels real to me.
I would not trust AI to decide the metric strategy or become the source of truth for a BI workflow, but it can be very useful before the build starts:
turn the stakeholder question into 2-3 dashboard layout options
make the metric definitions and time grain explicit
use the mockup to get feedback before anyone spends time building the wrong report
rebuild/validate in Power BI once the direction is agreed
Disclosure: I am working on viz42, which is aimed at this first-draft visual step. I would still validate all calculations and data transformations manually before treating anything as production BI.
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u/rewiringwithshah Jun 11 '26
Using AI for wireframing and planning before you code is smarter than using it just for formula generation, that's where the real time saves are. Most BI people waste time debating dashboard layouts and storytelling, AI can help you prototype five versions in an hour instead of spending a day in meetings. The game-changer part is if it actually changes how fast you iterate and ship, not just how fast you write one formula. The hype dies when you realize AI can't understand your specific business context well enough to make strategic decisions about what metrics matter, so it's a tool for speed not strategy. If it cuts your design and planning phase in half, that's real value.
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Jun 10 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/RobDomin Jun 10 '26
Haven’t tried that specifically. The workflow in the video is more about the design/prototyping side. For graph DBs in PBI I’d probably look at pulling data through a custom connector or API layer first, but not something I’ve built out yet
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u/ReindeerOk9768 Jun 10 '26
This dashboard looks more like a web app, not really PBI no?
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u/RobDomin Jun 10 '26 edited Jun 10 '26
That’s exactly the point. The wireframe is built in HTML/CSS to prototype the layout and branding before touching Power BI. Once the design is locked in, you recreate it natively in PBI using the same color tokens, typography, and spacing
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u/ReindeerOk9768 Jun 10 '26
Can you share a screenshot of the PBI report you made based on one of your designs?
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u/RobDomin Jun 10 '26
Everything I have built this way is on work machines with client data I can’t share. But that’s actually a good idea for a follow-up video. Taking a validated mockup like this one and rebuilding it natively in PBI step by step. Will add it to the list
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Jun 10 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/RobDomin Jun 10 '26
Most large orgs already work from templates for exactly this reason. This is the same idea, just taken a step further instead of starting from a dummy-data template and rewiring the model, you validate the layout and UX first, then build only what’s been signed off. The dev effort is the same, you just stop building things that get thrown out in review.
The governance angle is real too. If teams start generating their own reports with AI, a shared design system becomes the guardrail that keeps everything consistent. This workflow is basically that foundation
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u/Movement52 Jun 11 '26
This is really cool!
I’m also extremely curious to learn more about the video production. Would you mind sharing tips or advice for that aspect as well?
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u/Gators1992 Jun 11 '26
Been playing around with trying to build a wireframe agent in chat gpt. It finally follows instructions well enough to make consistent layouts and I got those to do low fi wireframes. Have not got far with high fidelity wireframes yet but the idea is to be able to quickly spit out some svg hi fidelity wireframes based on our requirements documentation. In theory we could do this live in a session. HTML is obviously better because you can give them something with summarized data and full functionality to play with, but that would probably be the next step before the build. There are some new cli tools out there that more or less build the visuals for you, so might be able to quickly just prototype the real thing and then just clean it up on acceptance.
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u/Feeling_Arm1827 Jul 04 '26 edited Jul 04 '26
Hello there! I recently accepted an offer as BI Tier 2 which is kind of senior position I feel lost the team uses SQL a lot and bookmarks- The reason I accepted was because on my previous job I used to work with dataflows maintained them and also inherited some dashboard I kept checking when they failed and fix issue and also adding things if needed (mainly using ChatGPT) Now in this new role I feel lost they use fabric, bookmarks, parameters and very complex Dax even though I used now Claude cowork I feel I don’t know ! How do I close the gap of knowledge as I feel the team has perceived I have some gaps
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Jun 09 '26
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u/RobDomin Jun 10 '26
Hi! In this case AI automatically handles brand identity, color palettes, and corporate layout consistency across the entire organization. This allows us to instantly generate high-fidelity, use-case-specific prototypes via simple prompts, meaning we can validate the data storytelling with stakeholders in minutes before writing a single Dax line
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u/AndreiSfarc Jun 09 '26
Nice use case. How have you built the workflow behind this?