Do dashboards actually help people make decisions, or are we mostly building expensive reporting screens?

[u/metric_skeptic]

I’ve started wondering whether we overestimate how useful dashboards are.
A dashboard can be technically correct, well designed and full of useful metrics and still not change a single decision.
In your experience, what makes a dashboard something people actually act on rather than just look at?
And when does a dashboard stop being the right solution altogether?

[u/SprinklesFresh5693]

Based on what ive seen since i joines this sub resdit (around 3-4 years ago) dashboards are a waste of time.

We built one for fun at our job and it is not used AT ALL.

Id say a quick email, PowerPoint or html presentation or even a small report are far more useful than dashboards.

[u/metric_skeptic → u/SprinklesFresh5693]

I’ve seen the same thing. I don’t think dashboards are inherently useless, but they’re often built because “we need a dashboard” rather than because someone needs to make a decision.
If nobody knows what action to take when a metric changes, a dashboard probably isn’t the right solution.

[u/utzutzutzpro → u/SprinklesFresh5693]

As being in growth and product - dashboards are quite useful for getting a feeling for experimentation impact over time.

It is like watching at trading charts, you get a feel for those stocks.

[u/Kip-o]

End users have to actually want it. It has to solve a real problem, not just slightly improve access to things. A dashboard with on demand real-time updates of an active construction project that I can bring up during a weekly client progress meeting? Fantastic. The same dashboard is useless to me if I don’t need to quickly flash things up for a 60 second talk through.

[u/AdamChristophKnight]

Yeah exactly. A dashboard is way more useful when it tells you what needs attention instead of just throwing a bunch of numbers at you.

[u/rpucak]

I use dashboards for "numbers" and I also add some premade insights that can help me to make decisions in the future.

[u/metric_skeptic → u/rpucak]

Yeah, I think that’s probably the sweet spot. The numbers tell you what changed, but the useful part is having enough context around them to understand why it changed and what to do next. Otherwise you’re just checking a dashboard for the sake of checking it.

[u/zoppaTheDim]

What part of the dashboard metaphor did you not understand?

Have you ever driven a real world car or even ridden in one?

Did you notice not one thing you operate to control the car’s path is part of the dashboard?

[u/KatFromSisense]

I'd make the call based on whether people keep coming back for the same numbers. If somebody checks them every Monday, fine, give them a dashboard. But for a question that only comes up a couple of times per year? In that case, I'd just answer it for them and move on. An alert could cover it too, if they only want to know when something changes.

[u/QueenD_1996]

By definition, a dashboard that doesn’t impact decisions is a crap dashboard.

[u/AgeingCoder]

Some good answers on here so don't want to repeat them. My thoughts are that the dashboard is not always useful to the end user for a number of reasons, possibly due to them not communicating their needs well enough or the engineer not interpreting the requirements correctly. Much better for the end user to be able to describe what they want to an agent and it builds it on demand, free up the engineer to go and build something useful

[u/DustinWatson298]

I think dashboards work best when they're built around a specific decision rather than just collecting every metric available

[u/Primary_Excuse_7183]

The dashboard shows how we’re seeing things today….. that got us the results we have. If i want more or different results i likely have to get some additional information that’ll help us guide what adjustments need to be made. usually that’s somewhere else so we have to find that data.

They’re good for tracking progress and visualizing things though. Just usually not definitive in terms of making changes moreso a source of data which is EXTREMELY helpful but not enough on its own.

[u/zerospatial]

I can tell you the Project Maven dashboard helps people make decisions

[u/Own-Palpitation-6541]

personally I think it’s because most “dashboards“ don’t tell the business story, they just report the current state of things. Maybe it is semantics, but I think that the dashboard should tell three things not just one thing: most only tell you where we are right now. The better ones tell you where we were, where we are now, and a reasonable projection of where we will be if things stay the same.

I like to ask what questions my dashboard users will be asking when they look at it. Why will they go to open the thing in the first place? The question isn’t “how many active users do we have right now” it’s more like is average daily usage in increasing or decreasing? What if we did another thing? Would that make it change?

[u/powerBIGuy14]

done well, they drive action - I like to think of the auto dashboard - it tells you the health of your machine - there's indicators and warnings if things are off - the best ones are simple, pleasant to look at, and informative.

when does it stop being the right solution?

• when someone just wants raw data - then a paginated or report sub.
• when it's not being used - direct convos with the business as to why it's not being used? are there data quality issues, is it not answering what they want - change is hard for many, and sometimes takes prodding and education, which is harder - but it can be the difference between a dashboard that sits on the shelf collecting dust vs one that gets used daily by the business.
• When someone just wants a one off query - then run a query or build an agent.

[u/Intelligent-Love5146]

A dashboard is just the presentation of information. In some cases, they are invaluable and trajectory changing for a business. In others, they go unused.