Performance Dashboard Design

Rasmussen highlights three areas where dashboards can go wrong. Design and data factors include manual data entry as opposed to automated data refresh, lack of useful metrics and drill down/drill across to support decision-making, poor dashboard design that does not appeal to users, dashboard technology that is difficult to use, difficult access to dashboard platforms, and long response time for updates. Organisational factors are typically the lack of hierarchies and business rules that easily and accurately aggregate and calculate metrics. And there are management and leadership factors, such as the lack of executive sponsorship and of proper user training. In addition to a lack of executive sponsorship, mentioned by Rasmussen, Malik notes that it was often believed that dashboards were only for senior executives, and were merely for report distribution. These notions diminish the value and intent of dashboards. Rasmussen refers to situations where managers are often eager to get dashboard projects off the ground but overlook critical factors, resulting in abandoned projects and rework. Considering these challenges of creating performance dashboards, research was conducted to determine criteria for the ideal design of performance dashboards for successful use in organisations.resulting in abandoned projects and rework. Considering these challenges of creating performance dashboards, research was conducted to determine criteria for the ideal design of performance dashboards for successful use in organisations.