Digital Dashboards
Question 1
Digital dashboards are electronic interfaces that visualize and aggregate data from multiple sources such as web services, locally hosted files, and databases (Klipfolio, n.d.). They can also be described as computer interfaces that organize and present data or information in easy and understandable ways. Dashboards allow leaders or managers to monitor the performance of their businesses by displaying actionable data, historical trends, and real-time information. Digital dashboards are of different kinds, each designed to serve different industries. These include analytical dashboards, operational dashboards, and executive or strategic dashboards (Klipfolio, n.d.). However, they can be used in any profession. Additionally, they can benefit all business sizes, ranging from major airlines to small car dealerships.
Question 2
Organizations are always looking for ways to simplify the distribution and analysis of data. Therefore, information on digital dashboards should be tailored for anybody within an organization that is interested in gaining control of their performance and processes, and in avoiding data overloads (Klipfolio, n.d.). Dashboards can be used by marketing teams, sales teams, and executive teams. Marketers, for example, always want to get the attention of their audiences, launch campaigns, or consistently design ads. They may also be interested in knowing the campaigns that are underperforming, those that are bringing most leads, and they may also want to know if they are achieving their goals. Information on marketing dashboards, should, therefore, be designed to give marketing team seamless ability to measure and monitor their performance metrics (Klipfolio, n.d.). As regards to sales teams, it becomes important for them to know their latest challenges and opportunities. Sales dashboards should, therefore, display information that will enable sales teams to remain focused tasks that are most pressing and on the actions that need to be immediately executed. Executive teams do not always have a lot of time to gather or summarize data. Dashboards for business executives should, therefore, summarize and present such data in ways that are actionable and easy to understand (Klipfolio, n.d.). In other words, executive dashboards, information on executive dashboards should make it possible for business executives to make informed decisions. Therefore, information on digital dashboards should be tailored towards anybody who wishes to be in control of his or her performance in an organization.
Question 3
Yes, it is important for dashboards to present real-time information. Real-time information is not only clean, but it is also consistent and understandable (Lang, n.d.). This makes it possible for all departmental employees to understand information on dashboards and important KPIs (key performance indicators). In other words, real-time dashboards put important goals and metrics at the center and at the front at all times. For employees to be able to know and understand the goals and the metrics that are most important; therefore, it becomes necessary for digital dashboards to automatically present up-to-date data. Real-time dashboards can be helpful in so many ways. For example, business executives will not have to wait for too long for them to be updated on KPI data, and neither will marketing assistants need to spend too much time every month to copy and paste data into excel spreadsheets because data is automatically updated. Another advantage of real-time dashboards is that business executives are put in a better position to make informed decisions quickly, such as when strategies need to shift (Lang, n.d.). In other words, real-time dashboards ensure that all people involved in decision-making have all the relevant data that they need to make their decisions.
References
Klipfolio (n.d.). What is a Digital Dashboard? Retrieved from https://www.klipfolio.com/resources/articles/what-is-digital-dashboard
Lang, V.R. (n.d.). Why Your Enterprise Needs a Real-Time Business Dashboard. Uhuru Network. Retrieved from https://uhurunetwork.com/business-dashboard/