Corporate Dashboards

Operational Excellence

Corporate Dashboards are changing how we look at information and how we analyse our business.

A well constructed corporate dashboard answers four basic questions:

1. Where
2. What
3. How
4. Why

Instead of wading through pages of disparate operational data, dashboards provide a collection of powerful graphical elements to portray critical operating and strategic information about an organisation.

Enterprise dashboards may include:

• Bar Charts
• Speedos
• Maps
• Trend Lines

One quick glance at the dashboard tells users the key performance indicators and metrics used to measure and monitor the companies performance. This contributes to:

• Better Analysis
• Better Tracking
• Proactive Alerting

When KPI's are exceeded, visual and email alerts can draw attention to the right area. Further drill down to root cause analysis instantly signals where the exception happened, and what triggered it.

Users of Corporate Dashboards

Corporate dashboards are often referred to as 'Executive Dashboards'. I disagree with this term, as they are a valuable tool for everyone in a company. If you are considering implementing the benefits of Balanced Scorecard, then Corporate Dashboards are an integral part of the total system.

Corporate dashboards can be used by any type of organisation, for example:

• Manufacturers – supply chain logistics, quality control
• Healthcare – hospitals using for monitoring patient sat, quality of care, performance
• Banks – monitoring loans
• Govt – monitoring crime, prison population

Dashboard Options

1. Charting Tools - Many organisations are understandably tempted to start with lower cost options, by developing 'simple' charting tools. This often ends up being a fools economy, as the background data collation takes a long time to blend, and needs a lot of programming resources. Such options are useful for proof of concept in isolated areas, and as an exercise to identify what data is available, and what is missing.
2. BI Dashboard Platforms  are very expensive upfront costs, and not necessary to provide all the benefits of a dashboard
3. Niche Players – there are many good dashboards available without high cost.

The key to implementing a successful dashboard is in the functional design. The benefits of using an experienced consultant provide a ROI well in excess of the additional cost. One of the biggest mistakes that most organisations use in process re-engineering or performance systems is employing low to mid tier business analysts. The results are also generally low to mid tier.

Overall, a well implemented Corporate Dashboard improves accountability and transparency across organisation > improved compliance > better decision making.

Corporate dashboards work effectively with Balanced Scorecard implementations

More on Dashboards at theiqx.com

Sample Executive Dashboard Screens

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