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28 SMT007 MAGAZINE I JUNE 2024 1. Audience and Objectives e first step in developing a dashboard is determining the audience and its objectives. Examples of an audience might include: • Owners • Management team • Operational department • Customers • Sales team • Project team Each audience will have its own objectives. Can you think of different objectives for each example? Since audience members are stake- holders, we recommend involving them in the dashboard development. 2. Key Performance Indicators KPIs are financial and non-financial metrics used to measure progress towards an objective. Aer identifying the audience and objectives, determine the KPIs to measure, monitor, and assess whether the objectives are being met. Determine the five to 10 key metrics that tell the story with your stakeholders. Of all the numbers you could track, which ones matter and which don't? 3. Design the Dashboard e third step is to design a method for track- ing, analyzing, and displaying the data about the KPIs. ere are many off-the-shelf or custom so- ware solutions for dashboards that you can find with an internet search. One example is idash- boards.com, but for many small companies, a spreadsheet program such as Excel works very well and is what we have used at Ascentron. Keep in mind that using specialized soware does not replace careful design in the first two steps of the process. e first two steps are crit- ical to developing working dashboards. e adage, "garbage in, garbage out" applies here. If you don't have the audience and objectives right, or have the KPIs well thought-out, the soware won't fix your design. our business, the dashboard has become a key tool for monitoring and managing it. Our dashboards are formatted so that they are easy to see on an 8.5" x 14" page or a com- puter screen, but sometimes, in a presentation environment, we find it helpful to get a close- up view of the charts that make up the dash- board. In this article, I'll discuss the process we followed to develop and refine our dashboards and share some of the resources we used. Getting Started With Dashboards At the end of 2008, we were invited to partic- ipate in the monthly IPC EMS Statistical Pro- gram. at was when we started using dash- boards to develop the metrics needed by the program. For example, the monthly EMS Sta- tistical Program for the Americas reports EMS shipments, bookings, and near-term forecasts. To help us complete this survey for IPC each month, we created a central spread- sheet. en we analyzed that data and devel- oped some charts to provide visual reports of the data. at led us to develop our first dash- board. In 2009, our sales were down over 50% from 2008 and the charts were ugly, but as time went on, we could quickly see how things were stabilizing and signs of future growth. Dashboard Basics Our initial dashboard went through several revisions. We needed to understand the basics of creating and using dashboards to develop a formal dashboard. We talked with one of our key customers who had been using dash- boards for several years, and their advice was very helpful. ey recommended a few books to review, and we added those to the list of others we had identified 1 . Our dashboard process evolved to include these three phases: 1. Identify the audience and objectives 2. Determine the key performance indicators (KPIs) 3. Design the dashboard with a specialized soware or service and a spreadsheet