If you are involved in management reporting, the statement above resonates with you. You need an appealing, interactive dashboard that articulately gives you the insights you need to make a decision.

Valentine is a time to express in practical ways your affection for a loved one! Top Managers have been accused of losing control whenever their eyes lay on a ‘beautiful thing.’ And rightly so, who wouldn’t want an attractive, articulate and thought-provoking thing! Whether it’s a good movie, a wife, a suit, etc. it has to appeal to the eye. You would want to invest your time and money on it, right? Talk of the recent (February 2016 to be precise) Kenyan offer of KSh 5.4 million for a 2-3 nights of romance and the point is hammered home.

Recently I was talking to a lady (a beautiful one) involved in reporting to top manager in her organization. She wanted help in automating some of her reports using Excel macros. The task was really simple and clearly it did not require macros. The boss however prescribed it to be programmed. 20 minutes into the chat and I decided to show case some of the ‘beautiful things’ (in this case Data Visualization Dashboards) I’ve created in Excel.

After interacting with it, she unsurprisingly exclaimed, “THIS IS WHAT I NEED! NOT MACROS. AM SURE THE BOSS WILL LOVE THIS.”

If you are involved in management reporting, the statement above resonates with you. You need an appealing, interactive dashboard that articulately gives you the insights you need to make a decision.

The difference is that it shouldn’t just be beautiful, but it needs to be communicative and dynamic for you to filter diverse facets of the same report. Ultimately, investing in a good dashboard will save the time you spend updating the report and the time taken for board meetings!

Take time and learn on how you can implement dashboards in MS Excel. Its a skill you won’t regret. Are you a manager and you want your team to generate such? Leave a comment.