A great business intelligence dashboard is an absolute must-have tool for all businesses. Not only does it provide a holistic overview of your business in a single page, but it also provides capabilities to filter and drill down to delve even deeper into your data.
Business dashboards make the process of keeping track of your data smoother by providing a variety of views of your data in different formats. The great thing about a rock solid business dashboard is that it works for any type of industry and any size business. To illustrate this, we are sharing first what makes a great business dashboard and then providing examples of five killer business intelligence dashboards.
What Makes a Great Business Dashboard?
A great business dashboard is the best way to visualize necessary business intelligence quickly and effectively and to do this each interface should have the following key components:
- Easily integrates into your existing data systems
- Fit onto a single computer screen with critical information, such as priority performance measures easily viewable
- Always have functionality available to more thoroughly review detailed BI data
- The data displayed should automatically refresh, otherwise old data could potentially misguide users and cause incorrect reporting.
A common misconception is that BI dashboards are only for executives or those who work deeply with numbers on a daily basis, but that's simply untrue. Organizations as a whole greatly benefit from accessing clear and concise data to allow complete understanding of company performance. Oftentimes implementation, such as data integration with CMaps analytics, can seem like a hurdle, but SAP BI tools easily connect with little additional effort.
IBM Cognos Easy Product Analysis - Returns
This Product Analysis for Returns is a great example of a business intelligence dashboard many reasons. The setup process is easy and painless, only requiring a few simple steps which provide valuable BI. The dashboard also displays data clearly, providing an excellent snapshot view of returns, all while still being visually appealing.
In just a fifteen minutes or less, business owners can create this product returns dashboard view using their own data and IBM Cognos. Instructions are available here, and with this setup users are able to drill deeper into the data, create a top filter, summary calculation and related charts.
IBM Cognos – Market Analysis, Sales
The Sales Market Analysis is another great example of how business intelligence dashboards should be set up. It has a great design and data is easily viewable while fitting onto a single page. The capability to tab through to difference sections allows for a more detailed view of each aspect, and this dashboard displays product breakdown based on trends, geographic data and top customers. The best thing is that this is all viewable at a quick glance without overwhelming end users.
IBM Cognos – Employee Satisfaction
IBM Cognos can provide valuable information about internal data. Both employee satisfaction and retention are important metrics to track, and this dashboard is fantastic at charting this info. It displays a breakdown of training, employee satisfaction, and includes a slider to change the market view. This business dashboard also has sortable sections each of which has color-coded reporting. As with the other IBM Cognos dashboard examples, everything fits into a single page.
SAP Crystal Reports – Balance Sheet
SAP Crystal Reports is another option for business dashboard software. With this balance sheet dashboard example, we see how easily the reporting capabilities can showcase financial BI. Using this tool, you can easily understand the financial health of your business in a single glance. With an easy to understand breakdown of assets users can still view more detail by toggling the sliders available.
SAP Crystal Reports – Sales Map
Another BI dashboard to consider utilizing is SAP Crystal Report's Sales Map analysis. This is the perfect tool to quickly digest key performance indicators on sales by examining geographic data, total sales rank as well as sales reports for focus states and product shares. The tool is able to provide a holistic analysis of overall sales and demonstrate how products are faring across the country on a macro and micro level, and works well for any business needing geographical sales data to measure KPI's.
Conclusion
These 5 examples are just a few ways that SAP Crystal Reports or IBM Cognos can be implemented. As you can see, every company can benefit from a rock solid dashboard setup.
If you'd like to learn more about how this would work for your business, 5x Technology is available to help you integrate, implement and ensure adaptation of business dashboard software that fits your specific needs. Additionally, if you already have a dashboard that's being underutilized or its capabilities are not quite understood, 5x Technology offers training to help you fully understand how and when to best use dashboard technology to achieve your goals.
To help you better understand how reporting software can help you, download our free eBook, The Business Dashboard Software, Design & Reporting Guide.
