Build Dashboards That
Tell You What To Do
If you run operations, you probably have more reports than time or agreement on response. You may not know which numbers to watch, whether they’re right, how to spot an unexpected change, who to tell or what to do next.
Show what changed
Explain why
Assign the action
Your team knows what needs attention.
You either have a dashboard, or you don’t.
You probably have one of two reports.
If you have a dashboard, you have a handful of charts per area: sales, products, people or marketing. The charts probably update automatically from your CRM or accounting system. That’s good. A dashboard can make changes easier to see than a page of numbers.
If you don’t have a dashboard, you probably have a few reports for your main team meetings. You might pull them up to see last month’s change. If something unusual happens, you might run more reports to dig into the details.
We build dashboards that you can trust to watch your business.
A dashboard will only help if you know what to watch and what to do when it changes. If you choose the wrong number, or set the wrong threshold for action, a dashboard could distract you from the real problem. For a reliable dashboard, you need to know which numbers matter, what each should do and what will move it in either direction.
For a reliable dashboard, you need to decide BEFORE you build it what each number should do and how your people will respond. Once you know what you’re trying to achieve with a number, you can design a dashboard to show when a change needs a response. Without that, a dashboard might show a problem that you can’t act on or distract you from a real need.
We start by working out what you should track, in enough detail to know what each number means.
You need a set of numbers to explain each important decision.
You need someone to own the response to each number’s change.
We start by mapping your decisions and the numbers you need to run them.
We work with the people who own each decision to identify their important numbers.
We ask about each number’s expected range, its relationship to other numbers and what would move it in either direction.
Then we work out who will react to each number’s change, what they will do and how fast they need to act.
We’ll identify each number that should move as you expect; every number that should stay within a certain range and every figure with a minimum that can never fall below.
We’ll find a few numbers that must change if you want the whole business to do well.
We’ll find the handful of numbers that directly influence each important metric.
We’ll help you identify the numbers that indicate change.
We’ll work with your operational leaders to make sure each number has an owner.
We’ll help you assign each number to an owner and define their response to each of its changes.
For example, a sales number might have three stages.
You might set a lower threshold to signal a need for a quick response.
You might choose a mid-level warning to flag a problem for investigation.
You might add a red threshold to demand an immediate response.
Once you agree on the numbers, the owners and their actions, we’ll design a dashboard around the important metrics.
We’ll map each number in the dashboard to its authoritative source, whether in your CRM, accounting system, stock control or spreadsheets.
We’ll set up your dashboards to display what matters: the expected range, threshold and owner for each metric.
If you’d like to set up a dashboard that you can rely on, start a dashboard audit.
A dashboard can help you to spot, predict and avoid the problems that might have snuck up on you. A dashboard can tell you who to inform and what to do if an unexpected change takes you by surprise. With an audit of your existing numbers and dashboards, we can help you to set up a reliable system.