The 6-Step Dashboard System

Learn how to conduct thorough stakeholder interviews to uncover needs and goals, gather key metrics, and tailor a dashboard design that is intuitive and widely used.

Prepare for stakeholder interviews by planning a 30-minute session, include at least one end user, and ask open-ended neutral questions to gather insights for dashboard design.

Brainstorm a data interview by listing as many stakeholder questions as possible within ten minutes, then categorize and narrow them into revenue, customer demographics, and expenditure to guide dashboard design.

Practice a two-part mock interview to build rapport and confidence for stakeholder interviews. Introduce yourself, articulate the dashboard's value, and ask open-ended questions categorized by topic.

Schedule and finalize stakeholder interviews by coordinating in-person or virtual logistics, sending confirmations, and preparing materials for a welcoming conversation while using open-ended, neutral questions to guide dashboard design.

Explore and prototype dashboards iteratively using stakeholder insights to test concepts, and apply data exploration with Excel, Power BI, Tableau, or Jupyter to understand data types and guide design.

Engage in low-fidelity prototyping to quickly draft dashboard layouts with your chosen tool in a low-stakes environment, test visualizations, and iterate based on feedback to meet goals and questions.

Build a reusable library of dashboard elements and mockups, use concise sticky notes for context, then select line charts for growth and maps for regional sales to support prototypes.

Explore design principles for dashboards, emphasizing visual hierarchy, simplicity, color, typography, and accessibility to create engaging, readable dashboards that guide user attention to key metrics.

Design three dashboards using your element library to address stakeholders' needs, justify visuals with sticky notes, and highlight the best data visualizations to help stakeholders make informed decisions.

Wrap up the prototype phase by compiling multiple rough drafts into a presentation, share key insights with stakeholders, and gather feedback to inform design changes before the stakeholder presentation.

present prototypes to stakeholders to gather feedback and align on dashboard design; listen, take notes in a conversation, and incorporate insights into a concise five to ten minute talk.

Iterate dashboard designs within the original scope by refining with stakeholder feedback, not scope creep. Communicate goals, update prototypes, email a final summarized prototype, and move toward step four.

Learn how ETL (extract, transform, load) powers dashboards by gathering data from databases, flat files, and APIs, cleaning, transforming, and loading it into data warehouses or data lakes.

Design a data model for dashboards by mapping relationships between fact and dimension tables, selecting star or snowflake schemas, and normalizing data for querying in data warehouses and business intelligence.

Create a functional, visually appealing dashboard by building charts one by one in your Power BI tool and applying design principles to meet stakeholder needs.

Plan and conduct user acceptance testing to finalize and deliver a polished dashboard, using a test script, stakeholder demos, and iterative refinement to meet business needs.

Refine dashboards by applying stakeholder feedback to visuals, features, and layout, iterating with testing to ensure clear, simple communication of stakeholder needs.

Conclude the dashboard project with a stakeholder-ready delivery, hand over assets like static dimension tables and images, and set up ongoing maintenance or new engagements for improvements.