How many metrics do you use on a daily basis when you’re driving your car? If you’re like most people, you use a handful. You check your fuel tank and speedometer. Less often, you may glance at your temperature gauge and any warning lights that appear.
There are thousands of metrics that could be used to measure your car’s performance. But you don’t really need to know propulsive efficiency or ground pressure, unless there’s an issue. An excess of unimportant metrics may only distract you from need-to-know insights, like the fact you’re about to run out of gas.
Keep Your Focus on Business Intelligence Essentials
All too often, inexperienced analysts will attempt to cram dozens of metrics into a single dashboard. Remember, the purpose of a dashboard is to quickly uncover key insights. Excessive and unimportant metrics don’t just make for a distracting dashboard; it distracts from critical business intelligence. If data is not crucial to decision making and strategy, it’s likely best kept off your dashboard.
Which Metrics Drive Your Business?
Most organizations have a half-dozen metrics that are critical to operational decision making. These measures are typically reflective of overall organizational health. There are hundreds of other measures that are important to your company, but not crucial to an executive dashboard. Remember, while your vehicle’s coolant levels are important, dangerously low levels will be reflected in a temperature gauge.
Trimming Down Your Data to Pure Dashboard Essentials
Your half-dozen metrics are probably calculated using a wide array of data, which may be pulled from five to six different systems. When one of these measures goes awry, it’s a sign that decision makers need to shift their focus towards this area. While organizational needs and goals can vary greatly, some metrics that may belong on your company’s dashboard include:
- Marketing-qualified leads generated
- Sales pipeline and lead conversion
- Customer retention and recurring revenue
- Customer satisfaction
The most challenging aspect of the dashboard essentials design process is trimming down your unnecessary business intelligence. However, the process of getting rid of less-than-crucial indicators is worthwhile.
Business Intelligence Must Be Contextually-Based
Metrics rarely have much use if they’re viewed in isolation. True business intelligence comes from understanding how your half-dozen metrics stack up against your performance last quarter, last year or against your organizational goals.
Dashboard essentials can only act as vital signs if they’re kept current. Timeliness is crucial here. In order to drive true business intelligence through Power BI, you must update your metrics daily, several times daily or in real-time.
The Power of Mobile Business Intelligence
With the help of modern tools, like Microsoft Power BI, utilizing dashboards continuously is possible. You can choose to carry your dashboard with you on your tablet to monitor key performance indicators in real time. You’ll be able to make data-driven decisions in real-time.
Responding to challenges, issues and warning indicators in your organization can be as simple as sharing an annotated dashboard. By simply jotting a few notes on a concerning dashboard tile and sending it to a colleague, you can respond to key issues as soon as they arise. This facilitates communication through data, which can enable optimal decision-making at every level of the organization.
Driving Success Through Dashboard Essentials
Driving profitable decisions through business intelligence isn’t difficult, provided you’re able to trim down your sources to just the dashboard essentials. Think of the car analogy as you select the half-dozen metrics that drive your organization. The key is to understand the complex metrics and the context that allow you to keep your company on-the-go, with as few breakdowns en route as possible.
Learn more about leveraging the capabilities of Power BI by joining our free webinar, Power BI: Makeover Your Spreadsheets For Real Business Intelligence
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