Do you find your dashboard packed with KPIs but few are useful?
You are not alone. The main cause is disjointed reporting efforts across the organization.
Make these two changes to your reporting approach and transform your dashboard into an indispensable tool for decision-making.
First, review the KPIs for alignment with critical results the business aims for. Start with the corporate KPIs.
This seems intuitive but many businesses tend to go the easy route. They use common KPIs or adopt industry KPIs without ensuring that these results are indeed what their business cares about.
The key question to ask here is “what are critical results for the business?”
Second, cascade the corporate KPIs to departments by developing departmental KPIs. This is an exercise to align departmental focus with the overall corporate objectives.
Many businesses often ask each department to develop their own KPIs. This leads to functional KPIs that seem logical but they tend to optimize functional performance in silos.
The key question to ask here is “what results does the department need to focus on to support the high level business objective?”
The main purpose of dashboards is to provide insight for decision making. When you make these two changes to your reporting approach, you align results and actions. Instead of creating a dashboard for reporting sake, you develop pertinent KPIs, hone in on results and respective drivers that support your business goals.
Want to use KPIs as a strategic tool, watch this.