How to save time on your dashboards?
1. Meet with stakeholders.
It seems obvious, but it isn’t always so. Analysts can often jump straight into their work without considering whether they’re creating exactly what their clients need. This can result in the generation of metrics or charts that aren’t relevant or useful to the end stakeholder, wasting time and resources.
To ensure maximum efficiency when creating dashboards, whether in Looker Studio or through another tool, it’s crucial to engage deeply with stakeholders from the beginning.
For example, imagine you’re tasked with developing a tactical dashboard for the sales team, specifically to identify the best buyers from the last period by mapping out their funnel . While it may be tempting to jump right in, you need to meet with the client, department(s), and stakeholders to fully understand their needs and context.
In these meetings, you can ask stakeholders to share their pain points and even show you how they currently report. This provides a deep understanding of what they really need and how your solution can effectively integrate into their existing operations.
Focusing on the needs of the user from the outset ensures that the final report not only meets the technical requirements they’ve requested, but is also practical and valuable to the person using it. By maintaining this business-centric approach, we can optimize productivity and effectiveness in solution development.
Furthermore, at IKAUE, we know that it’s essential to maintain ongoing communication with stakeholders throughout the development process to ensure the final product remains relevant and useful as business needs evolve.
2. Make wireframes.
A well-designed dashboard is able to display more information in a limited space, or more importantly, the most relevant data for the business segment in question.
So, before you start developing the report they’ve asked you to create, sketch out the design. This will serve as a guide as you create it. Plus, if you have the opportunity to share it with your clients, it’ll also be a good way to validate whether the final result is what they’re looking for.
