Dashboard & Analytics Design

Let’s face it, we are living in a world of big and little data, where many different stakeholders  have to make sense of numbers as part of their job! The trouble is that there can be a lot of resistance involved when mining the data.

This is where dashboards come into play: a well-designed dashboard can save huge amounts of time, helping people to quickly identify the numbers that matter, in order to make insightful observations or to compile reports.

Over the years ITVantage have found that Dashboard design is a tricky business, because the challenge is all to do with KISS. Keeping it stupidly simple. Your dashboard must be able to communicate the key numbers in a straightforward way, while allowing users to drill down into the specifics. It should avoid clutter, cater for personalisation, and be able to prioritise the right metrics. This is a difficult thing to get right, however with the assistance of our analytics design team, our interactive infographic <<link>> team and wireframing <<link>> service , we can assit you orgnsiation mock up and implement world class sexy looking dashboards which bring your data to life.

Please see an example of wore framed dashboard design for a current project we are working on – as part of a compliance suite of dashboards:- 

Now more so than ever before, dashboard design really do matter,  they have become alomost an expected and mandatory business tool for any application. You only have to goole “dashboards”  to find that  hundreds of  of dashboard building solutions have sprung up in the past few years to meet the demand. However ITVantage Systems have found that little attention has been paid to the design focused, thoughtful, and user-friendly dashboards. Traditional old shool dashboard design focuses primarily on defining jusyt the right success metrics, then pulling together a bunch of charts and gauges on a single page. This method gave way to a series of ugly looking, ill defined hodgepodge dashboards with confusing information that needed further interpretation.

However, now with HTML 5 and saclable vector graphics (SVG’s) in full flow -modern web design has moved on to seek a union of utility, usability and beauty. ITVantage Systems Ltd take pride and time in designing individual interface components for both your dashboard and applications. See interface componetns/elements  kits below for one of our projects:- 

We must find a similar amalgamation when displaying data in business. Here at ITVantage we approach dashboard design in a holistic way, beginning with general goals that your organisation would like to achieve from a reporting perspective and then eventually evolving and drilling down to specific data presentation. 

Intially for us, the most important thing is to identify your target audience, understand what type of dashboard you want to create and why it is valuable to your organisation. We then build upon this by creating an agreed structure which helps you start on designing your dashboard, including what form it should take, how to design for audience understanding, and what navigation, interactions, and capabilities will make your dashboard useful and engaging. FinallyInformation Design dives into the details of interface and information design. A Purpose-Filled Dashboard We’ve all heard reasons why business dashboards are useful: that which we measure we improve, and the importance of a shared understanding of the state of your business. You need to find the specific reasons why your dashboard will be useful to your organisation. 

The table below summarises some important questions our consultants would require answers to. This forms part of our intial workshop which focuses our design team in laying out dashboard components in the most optimum manner which would drive value. 

Please excuse us for the simply or silly question- What value will the dashboard bring? We find that in our first few opening sessions, everyone is interested in a dash board of their own, with lots of pretty colours, charts and reports- but they sometimes struggle in actually articulating the value that the dashboard brings to various different stakeholders. Dashboards can serve many purposes. Take a moment to consider what you want to get out of your dashboard. Check the top eight reasons below.

  • Help management define what is important
  • Educate people in the organization about the things that matter
  • Set goals and expectations for specific individuals or groups
  • Help executives sleep at night because they know what’s going on
  •  Encourage specific actions in a timely manner
  •  Highlight exceptions and provide alerts when problems occur
  •  Communicate progress and success
  •  Provide a common interface for interacting with and analyzing important business data

What type of dashboard am I creating? Over the years we have seen a lot of discussion about the definition of a “dashboard.” Some people argue that something only qualifies if it fits on one-page or shows real-time information or offers a comprehensive view of a business. We find those requirements too constraining. Dashboards can come in many flavors. What never changes is good dashboards focus on the most important information and communicate this information clearly and concisely. The delivery channel, level of interactivity, timeliness of data, and analytical capabilities will vary based on the situation. Below is a list of options for your perfect dashboard. We suggest you print of this page and check the boxes that best fit your situation