Thread Intelligence Article

November 6, 2003
By Dirk Knemeyer

The executive dashboard is a hot technology product. The logical progeny of portal applications and technology, the executive dashboard is a single interface that serves as the point of entry into the masses of data and information within a company that might be relevant to a particular executive. While it is really just marketing-speak for a personalized portal, the importance of an executive dashboard cannot be overstated: Indeed, executives of large companies need to make decisions based on often disparate and far-flung data and information. Data stored in divergent sources can be unified to provide insight and key metrics for areas ranging from marketing automation and bookings to human resources and operations. After all, the most difficult part is often not the decision making itself but identifying what data and information are relevant and having easy access and appropriate presentation of it.

Design and the executive dashboard
As with so many web-based executive information systems (EIS), the executive dashboard is largely seen as a technology solution or static "product." Not so. While it is necessary from the back-end to make all relevant data and information accessible and included in the system that feeds the dashboard - a technology component - the selection of which data and information to provide top-level access to and how, not to mention the creation of an appropriate interface, is a design solution. It is also a design solution that, almost by definition, must be custom to each specific company and the unique responsibilities of the executive decision maker. A "canned" product is simply not appropriate.

In order to design a successful executive dashboard, we need to see the world through the eyes of an executive at a major corporation. Their job is a complicated one. Consider that they:

• Ultimately preside over many hundreds or thousands of employees and various business units and processes
• Regularly track key performance indicators and make major decisions that have varying degrees of impact on people in particular and the world in general
• Almost by definition are not able to have deep, intimate, granular knowledge of all vital data and information within their sphere of influence
• Must make decisions based on a cross-analysis of data and information that the people reporting to them may not be required or able to do themselves
• Are required to move quickly and decisively, setting strong leadership - particularly important in today's fast-moving digital world

The role of the executive dashboard is to proactively anticipate and make easily available the data and information most important to the executive's thought process and decision making in order to create broad efficiency and improve the quality of the decisions being made.

The application of information design
Information Design teaches us that, in order to have the greatest impact and benefit, information must be relevant, clear and memorable. This provides an excellent framework for approaching the design problem of an executive dashboard.

Relevance
This relates to the information architecture component of the design. It is a question of understanding the role and scope of the executive, reviewing the available organizational (and externally available) data and information from that contextual point, and making decisions on what data and information are most important to make available, in what order, percentage and juxtaposition.

In many ways, this is the most time consuming - and critical - part of the process. It requires a deep understanding of the executive, organization and all available content to make valid decisions about what should or should not be available, and the degrees and relationship therein. After all, what data and information are available determines which decisions can sensibly be made and how.

Clarity
This relates to the interface component of the design. Once we have blueprints of what data and information should be available and roughly where, it is a question of arranging it to provide optimal cognitive assimilation and create logical frameworks of knowledge and causality. It also pertains to the visual presentation of the data and information, making choices about the aesthetic presentation that are contextually appropriate for the specific executive, in order to maximize clarity.

Memorability
This relates to the impact that data or information has. There is a hierarchy of value, particularly when you are dealing with content at this level. It is important that the executive is not only exposed to the correct data and information, but that it is done in such a way that it easily "sticks" in digestible chunks that can be communicated and cross-contextualized into other relevant domains.

Clarity and memorability both fall into traditional areas of visual design. Guided by the framework of the architecture, it is a delicate and complicated process to put together a portal that is truly clear and memorable. Indeed, it requires not only a strong knowledge of visual design, but also demands a deep understanding of human factors, as well as interface design and general technology issues. This requires a specialist with a great deal of experience and a strong skill set.

In total, the design of an executive dashboard is an excellent example of an Information Design problem, and those who are in the business of providing executive dashboards would be well served by learning more about and working with Information Designers.

It all starts at the top
Executive dashboards represent a very interesting design problem. After all, it really does start at the top. The scope and importance of what large corporate executives do, relative to other individuals and contexts, is quite pronounced. By providing those individuals with well-designed solutions that directly address their most pressing and vital needs - such as access to relevant organizational data and information that is clear and memorable - we continue to raise our value as a discipline while providing tools that hopefully empower good decisions that have a positive impact on a variety of people and even the world.

Author - Dirk Knemeyer

Editor - Stephen Bury

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